The start of the season. Summer is over. It has been a slightly bizarre off-season both inside and out of rugby. Heatwaves and the climate situation, politics, a cost-of-living crisis and falling pound have made for a often depressing news-cycle and within rugby the long-term impacts on players health, trans rights and financial woes with Worcester’s plight brining sharp focus on how we maintain the game going forward. Without wanting to downplay the impact of any of the above, however, I am delighted with the return of the domestic game here; back to the rituals of checking the teams at midday, the journey to the match and pre-match atmosphere and setting myself on the sofa with a drink and the dog when I can’t make the game in person.
So, first game for us and it’s a toughie – Gloucester away. One of my favourite match days as Kingsholm always provides a good atmosphere and knowledgeable supporters.
Is this Gloucester’s year? The seemingly perennial question seemed to have disappeared after a few lacklustre years. Last season, however, saw a return to basics approach which saw Gloucester competing for a top 4 spot right until a slightly disappointing end when some indifferent displays denied them a play-off spot. This year pundits, bookies and fans seem to have the west country club down for a finish somewhere between 6th and 4th though in such a tightly contested Premiership anything is possible.
Gloucester have been perhaps the most stable of all clubs in terms of player movement: Ed Slater’s retirement and the nature of it is hugely sad for the club and community, as it is for the wider rugby community, but Ed, like his fellow departee, Jason Woodward, had not featured much on the Gloucester team sheet last year. The notable addition to the squad over the summer is the huge frame of Fijian Albert Tuisue. It’s been suggested that Tuisue provides a replacement for Slater, but it should be noted that while he has filled in at lock during games, all his 58 starts for London Irish were at No.8. The other big addition that will cheer the hearts of the Shed faithful is the return of Jake Polledri to fitness: injured almost two years ago on international duty it’s easy to forget just the impact Polledri was able to have on games. I am sure Wasps fans who have seen what our own Jack Willis has gone thought to get back playing will wish Jake well for this season and hope to see him back to his best, but maybe not on Sunday.
As their success and signings have been centred round their pack, that seems to place to start when evaluating the squad. In the front row, Gloucester have a good selection of experienced, Premiership quality players who provide an excellent, if not eye-catching, base. Gotovtsev, Balmain, Elrington, Rapava-Ruskin and Ford-Robinson shared the workload between them well, however neither Gotovtsev or Val R-R have appeared in pre-season games so we should expect a starting front-row of Elrington, Singleton and Balmain. In the second row, Freddie Clarke and Matías Alemanno had excellent seasons with both being almost ever presents. Alemanno however is still on international duty with Argentina so expect Clarke to pack down with Alex Craig. The arrival of Zach Mercer next year sparked more discussion in the quality of Gloucester’s back-row. Wasps’ fans are rightly proud of our stable of loosies, but Gloucester provide serious competition: Ludlow, Ackermann, Polledri, Tuisue, Morgan and Reid plus the young talents of Jack Clement and Henry Taylor is a formidable selection. Looking forward to Saturday, it’s unlikely Lewis Ludlow will be fit and while Polledri has made his comeback pre-season he will probably need some more conditioning for the Premiership. Ludlow’s loss could be a significant blow for Gloucester, the tenacious tackler missed only one Premiership game last season and his jumping at the lineout to set up Gloucester signature maul attack is a big weapon.
Despite the fact that they made the second fewest running metres of any team (behind Leicester), a full-strength Gloucester back-line looks formidable. A back three of LRZ, May, Carreras and Ollie Thorley off the bench is as good as any team in the league. Luckily for us perhaps, May is on the 10-week post-England tour rest schedule (despite not playing), Rees-Zammit hasn’t been seen in pre-season and Carreras is with Argentina (having beaten the All Blacks playing at fly-half). Harris and Atkinson provide them with a well-balanced and high-class centre combo – indeed with Am injured Chris Harris may be the best 13 playing at the moment. I’m expecting both Hastings and Evans to start with Lloyd Evans having looked assured at 15 in the pre-season: kicking will undoubtably abound so our back field will need to be switched on but it could give the likes of Zach and Crossdale the chance to counterattack.
Whither Wasps? This seems to be the question being asked by pundits and journalists as the season begins. Frequent references to finances, the apparent self-imposed transfer embargo and the bond etc have been made but I am doubtful as to how the team have been affected by any of that. So then, what of departing players and two seasons of disappointment? I think we have covered most of that on this board in depth but my quick summary and personal thoughts are that while they are big names, the players we have lost are not that big a dent in the team. Fifita didn’t start at lock once Lauch was back from injury, nor Young once Jack Willis returned. Fekitoa and Gopperth created little in midfield last year and by the looks of the pre-season Mills, Odendaal and Spink along with Odogwu and Hartley give us perhaps better options. Tight-head has seen some significant upgrading and Watson and Miller are covered by Haydon-Wood, the return of Minozzi and hopefully more gametime for Mehson and perhaps we’ll see some more of our academy wingers. Hopefully a strong forward pack can provide the base and set-piece dominance for our backs to play with the freedom and confidence that Wasps became known for.
Injuries have, however, been the bane of the last few seasons. While the situation is far from the horror show of the start of last season, we begin this campaign with worries at loosehead, fly-half and lock. There has been good news regarding longer term absentees with the likes of Stooke and Umaga on track to return sooner than may have been originally expected but we still await news on Tom West, Launchbury, Cardall, Carr and Vukasinovic before Sunday’s game while knowing that Odogwu is out for sure and that Charlie Atkinson, while seemingly fit has limped off early in both pre-season games.
Pre-season went well for us and Bobby Bridge’s excellent article on the positives and negatives covers it better than I could. For me the defence was the biggest positive. Too often in recent years we have conceded soft tries and allowed the opposition to build easy points to stay in the game. Our set piece could be a worry with potentially our whole first choice front five (West, Oghre, Koch, Lauch, Stooke) out so we many have to try to keep the ball in play and deny Gloucester the chance to use their greatest asset against our potential weakness.
Possible line-ups
Gloucester:
Elrington, Singleton, Balmain, Clarke, Craig, Ackermann, Reid, Morgan, Chapman, Hastings, Thorley, Atkinson, Harris, Reeves, Evans
Walker, Knight, Ford-Robinson, Clark, Tuisue, Meehan, Twelvetrees, Moyle
Wasps:
Hislop, Cruse, Alo, Lauchbury, McDonald, Shields, Carr, Willis T, Robson, Atkinson, Bassett, Mills, Spink, Kibirige, Crossdale
Oghre, Millar-Mills, Ryan, Vukasinovic, Barbeary, Porter, Odendaal, Minozzi
Officials:
Referee: Anthony Woodthorpe (14th Premiership game)
Assistant Referees: Simon Harding and James Clarke
TMO: Ian Tempest
Citing Officer: Duncan Bell
Topic: Gloucester away: thoughts & preview (Read 1790 times)
Always a Wasp