What do we do about fly half?

[HDAWG]

Self explanatory title, thought I'd ask what we should do.

It appears clear we aren't signing a 10 going into next season.

But during next season, what would you do?

Who would you sign? What kind of 10 would you sign? What would we then do with Atkinson and Umaga? Given Robson's drop off, would you also sign/promote a 9?

[Neils]

Pray

[WonkyWasp]

Every day.

[Westy68]

I would be very surprised if Jacob is the answer, short or long term. He is far to inconsistent, the odd good game is not good enough.

I would like to see Charlie progress but that’s another 2 seasons at least. In the meantime we need a 1st choice 10, if the coaching staff can’t see that, then that’s a shame and the next couple of seasons could well be difficult, let’s hope not

[wasps]

It's an awkward situation.
Personally, I don't feel Jacob is anywhere near as bad as is sometimes said here...
However, I also don't feel that we're seeing anything from him at the moment that would suggest we're going to win the league with him at 10.


As they say though, the grass isn't always greener on the other side, and sometimes it's better the devil you know.

We've tried a high profile, expensive overseas option recently that didn't really work out.
We're currently trying young, domestic options via the academy, and unless you stumble across a Marcus Smith, then there will always be question marks if the youngsters don't progress.


Ultimately, we're after a tried and tested fly half familiar with the premiership, who plays attacking rugby as per the traditional Wasps ethos, and who is reliable with the boot under pressure.
That's a very rare combination of skills



How much is George Ford on these days?
Would we even be able to afford someone like him?

[Jac A]

I pretty much agree with 'wasps' post.

It's a Venn diagram of affordability, availability and quality without even considering issues such as playing style, mentality, adapting to a new league/country etc.

In terms of affordability, your George Fords etc will be on a top salary (£400k+), with the cut in the cap and the removal of a marquee I can't see how we can afford to go that high on salary so (if we were to be looking) it would be a 'cheaper' option.

Who is available? France and NZ retain their best players, Japan is more lucrative for players no longer in the international frame, SA is becoming more competitive and fewer players are leaving there. Playing within the UK at the I can't think of who would be available either - McGinty would have been a good option but has already been snapped up. Tian Schuman (hasn't played because of injury - do we want that risk), Joel Hodgson (not good enough for Newcastle!).

I would be surprised if Jacob and Charlie are not are fly halves next season. It's not the best, they certainly aren't in the top 6 stand-offs in the league but I don't think they are as bad as many on here make out and I think we have issues elsewhere - I think sorting the scrum with Koch and playing better looseheads than Bomber will help, Robson either finding some form or starting Porter and getting some consistency at 12 and 15 are key and I certainly don't put all our issues at the moment at the door of our 10s.

[Vespula Vulgaris]

I strongly disagree that this is a player issue. Dobby and Jacob are playing exactly the game they are being coached to play.

With the right coaching, off field support, and vision they'd be back to the sort of form that got us to within one throw of the title.

What we need is not to bring even more talent into a team that is having all its flair suppressed and is being coached into mediocrity and start helping our squad move towards hitting its potential.

[Rossm]

It's an awkward situation.
Personally, I don't feel Jacob is anywhere near as bad as is sometimes said here...
However, I also don't feel that we're seeing anything from him at the moment that would suggest we're going to win the league with him at 10.

As they say though, the grass isn't always greener on the other side, and sometimes it's better the devil you know.

We've tried a high profile, expensive overseas option recently that didn't really work out.
We're currently trying young, domestic options via the academy, and unless you stumble across a Marcus Smith, then there will always be question marks if the youngsters don't progress.

Ultimately, we're after a tried and tested fly half familiar with the premiership, who plays attacking rugby as per the traditional Wasps ethos, and who is reliable with the boot under pressure.
That's a very rare combination of skills

How much is George Ford on these days?
Would we even be able to afford someone like him?

I quite agree with you about Jacob. Not nearly as bad as some on here say.  What ever problems he currently has, have been compounded by Dobby's drop in form.  Jacob's a real trier. He stepped into SH when Will got yellowed and we came out ahead of the game when we were down to 14. Down to Jacob? Not necessarily but he made a good fist of it. I liked him at FB. Once again, he tried hard. Some posters are very black and white when it comes to our players.

Good tens are hard to find so I wouldn't give up on Jacob just yet. I firmly believe that Jones f*cks with players heads. Rather than give them a shot, he tells them they need to work on certain things in their game and then discards them and sends them back to their clubs to work on what he has told them. It affects some player more than others. I think Jacob still has to get over his encounter with Jones.

[InBetweenWasp]

Agreed on Jacob not being nearly as bad as some would suggest.  He’s shown he has the attributes in terms of skills and vision to be a very, very good 10.  His issue is consistency.  At times he looks lazy, but think that’s more a reflection of his laid-back approach/attitude to life in general - A bit like Finn Russell in that sense.  He needs to work on his application/concentration.

Tactically, we’re not seeking to play to his strengths.  Jacob needs ball in hand, not boot-to-ball.  Is he a strong enough voice to demand that within the squad, or to the coaches?

Kicking yesterday was clearly deliberate.  Would be interesting to see Bobby pose this to Lee and Team: Why is a team that has proven it’s strongest when playing ball-in-hand kicking away so much ball and seemingly kicking without a particularly strong chase, or variety or finding space?

They may well have the data that shows Newcastle tend to fold when it comes to kick ping-pong and they felt it would be an easy way to gain territory against a pretty good Falcons defense - But let’s be more open about it, so that we're able to try and understand/see why we're doing it.

Yesterdays first half was one of the worst I've seen from us in a long, long time.  Some really stupid, dumb mistakes.  Totally unforced errors and we were lucky that Falcons just happened to be more off the pace than we were.

For a change as well, I thought we had the rub of the green from the ref - Several forward passes from us that went completely unnoticed a couple of wonky throws as well at the line out.

We've got to start playing to the strengths of our squad.  Lee had previously said that was turnover ball and unstructured play.  Does he believe that's changed; what would he say our strengths are now?

[wasps]

I strongly disagree that this is a player issue. Dobby and Jacob are playing exactly the game they are being coached to play.

With the right coaching, off field support, and vision they'd be back to the sort of form that got us to within one throw of the title.

What we need is not to bring even more talent into a team that is having all its flair suppressed and is being coached into mediocrity and start helping our squad move towards hitting its potential.

Unfortunately, I think this is the case.

Is it Mitchell that has brought a more kick based game plan back from England, or was it already forming before he joined?


When things start going wrong with a team, coaches tend to feel they need to earn their corn, so I feel they tend to enforce their coaching more and more.....
Yet, so often, we see up turns in performance when players are given freedom.

I can't imagine many coaches wanting to back away when things are going bad, but sometimes that may be the best thing to do

[Westy68]

Not sure it’s totally down to the coaching set up, admittedly they play a large part of the blame. I’m struggling to remember Jacob having a good game this season, his kicking is atrocious. The one thing you can guarantee with Jacob in every game, is on at least one occasion he will kick out on the full

[Rossm]

Not sure it’s totally down to the coaching set up, admittedly they play a large part of the blame. I’m struggling to remember Jacob having a good game this season, his kicking is atrocious. The one thing you can guarantee with Jacob in every game, is on at least one occasion he will kick out of the full

I posted a comment in the game thread made by Tom Cruse during the game commentary yesterday, that kicking coaches are 'greedy' Presumably this means that they encourage players to really go for it - particular now that the 50/22 has reared it's head. Perhaps the 50/22 may not be such a good idea after all? Now there are a few more defenders in the back field, yet there still doesn't seem to be any more space for attackers

[HDAWG]

I strongly disagree that this is a player issue. Dobby and Jacob are playing exactly the game they are being coached to play.

With the right coaching, off field support, and vision they'd be back to the sort of form that got us to within one throw of the title.

What we need is not to bring even more talent into a team that is having all its flair suppressed and is being coached into mediocrity and start helping our squad move towards hitting its potential.

Tbf that's a good point. For me I feel an attack coach who also had experience at 10 would help develop players further. E.g. Smith obviously showed his talent, but he became more well rounded as a result of Nick Evans 1 on 1 tuition.

[Vespula Vulgaris]

Not sure it’s totally down to the coaching set up, admittedly they play a large part of the blame. I’m struggling to remember Jacob having a good game this season, his kicking is atrocious. The one thing you can guarantee with Jacob in every game, is on at least one occasion he will kick out on the full

Agreed, but a year ago or even more his kicking from hand was among the best in the league. Yes he'd occasionally put one out on the full, but he'd drop others beautifully just inside the line about 10m further than he had any right to.

He has the ability, so either his mental game is off, or he's not playing to his instincts. Both of those are coaching issues.

[Shugs]

Umaga has talent. So does Atkinson. The cap is getting smaller and 10’s are expensive. So I suggest we’re going in with Umaga and Atkinson for the foreseeable. I don’t think it’s too much of an issue either. Next year with a theoretical front row of West Cruse Koch plus good second row and back row options our scrum must improve and probably will. Someone then needs to drum into Umaga and the rest of the squad to play with freedom and keep ball in hand rather than kicking all the time. As fans we would need to accept this will come with some mistakes but I’d rather that than what we’re currently doing.