Press Notes from Lee Blackett

[Chunky24]

If lima fit to start at 10 and Umaga been released and available he could start at 15 to deal with the kick tennis, very good under the high ball in the agen game until his injury.

[wasps]

So many people complain about Eddie playing players out of position, yet we're happy to make similar "outside the box" suggestions for Wasps


A common one is Lima at 12.
But here we also have Bassett at full back and Odogwu at centre.


The thing is, I can see the benefits of each of those ideas.
Lima has the skills that we see from Jimmy at 12 and arguably he's not setting the world alight at 10.
Odogwu has fast footwork, can change direction quickly and could make defenses think twice at 13.
Bassett seems good under the high ball most of the time, is quick and could return the ball into traffic - not sure about the rest of a full back's skillset though


That all being said, there's probably a reason that Odogwu and Bassett are wingers and Lima is a 10 throughout their senior careers.


I suppose what I'm saying is that I don't see the difference between these experimental ideas and Eddie playing Tom Curry at 8

[AKWasp]

Think that’s a really fair comment, Wasps. Think fb is more nuanced but think Wing to 13 and FH to 12 is more transferable.

I’d say Watson’s experience at 15 makes him a very capable option and I would keep the same back 3 as the tiger’s game. Also think Dobby is very good under the high ball for a 9 so we might see him drop into the back field a little more regularly

[wasps]

There's lots of transferable skills between flanker and 8 as well. In fact, I see that we have Shields playing 8 this Friday.


The truth is that I don't feel it worked too well with Tom Curry at 8.
However, it needs more than 1 or 2 games to prove whether any experiment is successful or not.

[AKWasp]

There's lots of transferable skills between flanker and 8 as well. In fact, I see that we have Shields playing 8 this Friday.


The truth is that I don't feel it worked too well with Tom Curry at 8.
However, it needs more than 1 or 2 games to prove whether any experiment is successful or not.

I don’t mind Eddie having Curry at 8 in terms of carrying, especially as he offers an extra jackal into the back row however there was some issue with controlling the ball at the back of the scrum.

I believe Shields has played 8 a lot more regularly than Curry so would hope he’d be a little more successful yet Jack and YY have both played 8 more recently so could have been deployed there instead

[Hymenoptera]

You can hide easier at 8 behind a dominant pack. Under pressure is what separates the wheat from the chaff as controlling and picking up a ball in retreat is a real skill.
Curry and EJ haven't had that yet really and will get found out when/if that happens.
For me its EJ being EJ, being as contrary as possible just to be talked about and feed his ego, which is permanently starving. Next he'll be playing Jack maunder in the second row. He wouldn't be doing this sort of shit in a weaker squad where he has less to hide behind.

[coddy]

So many people complain about Eddie playing players out of position, yet we're happy to make similar "outside the box" suggestions for Wasps



The big difference is Eddie can choose from a vast pool of players whereas Wasps when faced with injuries and international call ups have a very limited amount of players left to choose from.