Always a Wasp

With the news that Barbeary and Umaga are available it changes the personnel and options versus Falcons. My 23.

McIntyre Taylor Brookes
Gaskell Douglas
Barbeary Morris Young
Vellacott Umaga
Gopperth De Jongh
Bassett Sopoaga Kibirige

Bench
West Cruse JTA
Cardall Oghre
Wolstenholme Odogwu Le Bourgeois.

One of the en vogue topics at the moment is hybrid players. Wonder if part of our resurgence is down to us having an abundance of these. Forwards wise we have Oghre and Barbeary who can hook and play back row. Our back rowers frequently chop and change during the game. We then have three distributors in the backs (four if you count Mills). Odogwu looked decent at 13 on Sunday. It gives us lots of options and allows clever bench options. I wonder if we'll become like the Dutch football team of the 70's and start a form of total rugby. Although I don't fancy Minozzi at TH.

Bit of media heat about this post match. I couldn't see a problem with it at all. The whistle had gone. If the Bristol players want a dialogue about why that is up to them. Carley quite rightly began explaining but also quite rightly didn't stop the play as Wasps played on. Hopefully it might even stop a bit of the silly appealing for and contesting of decisions. For me refs need to do less of the explaining and in game coaching.

There are obviously a myriad of factors in our upturn in fortunes but it strikes me our balance of power, pace, creativity, grunt and overall ballast has fallen nicely into sync. I think back a few years and we had the stellar backs but a scrum that only achieved parity. Then Dai tried to take us back the other way a bit. Our front row is now as good as it has been for years. Willis has transformed the back row and punches regular holes. Shields is a workhorse. Mills and Fekitoa are a great combination of physicality and craft and we've loads of pace and skill across several back three options. Linking it all up Umaga and Robson look impressive. It's possible we've found that blend of pragmatism and creativity that we've been one side or the other of for some time.

Tigers getting absolutely pumped at Castle Grim. Thorley has four tries within 30 minutes. Good game Quins v Saints - a good result for us as well as Saints didn't even get a losing BP.

Really need to get the Sale game out of the system. So looking forward we've got a tempting six day break before Bath. Tempting as it must be feasible to play most of tonight's team again with a normal sort of break in between. I'd go all in and go much the same again as tonight's squad injuries permitting. I think I'd find a place for Watson, Gaskell and Sopoaga in the 23 probably for Bassett (looks injured), Atkinson and Cardall. I'm actually more hopeful for the Bath game. Sale just don't suit us and often frustrate us.

Our back row was phenomenal on Sunday. I've been trying to work out how on earth we're going to get through the remaining games in that department however. First up picks BS, TY and JW speak for themselves. But underneath that as far as I can tell we have Morris who could probably play 6,7 or 8. Vailanu who can play 8. Tom Willis who can play 8 or, at a push probably flanker. Douglas who is a 2nd row who can do back row and Gaskell who is the same. It's 6 and 7 that are the issue. We can rotate the 8's to give Shields time at 6 but beyond that I don't see a way round it. My worry is that we overplay JW and TY. A tempting strategy based on their talent but not a great long term.