Always a Wasp

Some fans will hate to hear it, but it's possibly the right time and situation for a compete rebuild.

If we believe the majority of the rumours we will be without Simmo, Daly, Hughes, WlR next season, and possibly Mullan, Taylor, JCW and maybe some others.

Players like Mullan and to some extent Simmo and JCW have featured so rarely for us over the last 12 months that it's hard to think of them as first choice at the moment, so replacing them will likely be easier.

To some degree the same can be said about Nathan Hughes. Between injuries, tweet gate, and international call ups, I'm not sure how many games he's actually played in the last 12 months and whether it represents a fair return on investment.
When fit and firing, he's definitely a must have in the team though.

Daly and WlR on the other hand are starters, and players with their ability are few and far between. There's still time to go before the new year, but there are murmurs that these 2 aren't playing near their best. Even world class players need to play their best or they're no better than the other squad players.

I don't believe all the rumours are "done deals" yet. For example, given how Dai often doesn't select a player if they're known to be leaving, I find it hard to believe he would have made Daly Captain for the last couple of games.


If these guys do go though, we will have a super chunk of salary cap available.
It's time to find out who wants to play for the club and who doesn't. Anyone wishing to go can go, with a big "thank you for your services".

I don't know where we get replacements from or who they would be, but as has been recently stated by nick Eastwood, Dai is a forward looking guy who always has a plan for next season.
I feel that he knows what cards he'll be dealt with for next year and is already well along the path of trying to smooth the transition.

Whatever he does though, it has to involve a significant increase in the size of the coaching team


I predict that we're going to see a quite significant player turnover this year, and those coming in to replace them won't all be big names. I think that we will now be building for medium term success rather than trying for immediate gratification and constantly trying to plaster over the cracks.

If it does happen, it'll only work properly if fans, critics and media alike all buy into it rather than complaining about the lack of a Willie leRoux, Kurtley Beale or Charles Piutau

We're all a bit down about the champions cup at the moment.

We lost to Leinster, but realistically, I think we all knew that was a probability.
Drawing with Bath was a kick in the teeth that we didn't need

However, we now have back to back games against Toulouse.
I think we have to go for it with everything we've got. We all know that French teams don't always travel well, and it'll be a few degrees colder in Coventry then Toulouse.
If we can win well and then do the same the following week, we'll be on at least 11 points.
Suddenly, European qualification doesn't look so bad.

I know it's a tough task to be Toulouse at any time, but I think we need to go into it with positivity and try to get 2 wins

15 Wille Le Roux
14 Ross Neal
13 Elliot Daly (c)
12 Michael Le Bourgeois
11 Michele Campagnaro
10 Lima Sopoaga
9 Craig Hampson
1 Ben Harris
2 Antonio Harris
3 Kieran Brookes
4 Will Rowlands
5 Kearnan Myall
6 Brad Shields
7 Nizaam Carr
8 Nathan Hughes

Replacements
16 Gabriel Oghre
17 Zurabi Zhvania
18 Mike Daniels
19 Charlie Matthews
20 Ben Morris
21 Will Porter
22 Billy Searle
23 Juan de Jongh

Wasps play well when there's plenty of options available in the backs. We typically run 2 lines and Cips takes his pick of the best choice available at any given time.
However, there's more to it than that.

On a number of occasions today, Cipriani either wasn't available, or not in a great position to take the ball, however we didn't have much of a second option so it either went to him anyway, or went straight to midfield where we tried to push through the defence.

I now see one of the things that Jimmy brings to us.
We seem to play so much better with him, but I think it's having the second playmaker at 12 that we need.
That way we can still attack with the same pace even when the 10 is not available.

We see the same when Jimmy is at 10
We still play well, but it seems harder to really break through the defence.


I like Gaby, I think he's a great addition to the squad, but I'm now thinking that we need 2nd 5/8 type of inside centre