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<blockquote data-quote="Vieux Talonneur" data-source="post: 1117953" data-attributes="member: 73144">I&#039;ve been banging this drum for ages and largely getting flamed for it. I&#039;ve always felt he was a bit underpowered and unbalanced the pack, but that was a price mostly worth paying when he was otherwise having a big influence on matches. But those days of being there or thereabouts for MOTM most games feel like they&#039;re in the past. The game&#039;s either moved on or he needs to recalibrate.I don&#039;t believe that there&#039;s really any shortage of effort or players aren&#039;t trying. Instead I think we have an unfortunate mix of some players clearly past their best, some who just aren&#039;t as good as their hype suggests and a whole shedload of inexperience - Chessum, Curry, Dombrandt, Ludlam, JVP, Smith, Marchant, OHC, Malins and Steward from the starting XV were all sub 20 caps which is still in international nappies really. The sprinkling of stardust that any team needs is also missing - who&#039;s going to provide that game turning piece of magic as McVdM did yesterday or peak May could? Malins can&#039;t and watching Irish OHC has looked good but he doesn&#039;t make the hairs on the back of the neck stand up with possibility in the way Arundell does. Add in a revolving selection door through injuries or otherwise and a new game plan / coaching set up and what did we realistically expect?On Steward. He&#039;s still young and should be our FB for years. He&#039;s rock solid under the high ball, possibly the best in the world, which is great. But opponents will realise this, so will cut down the kicking and look for other ways to test him. Like most players there are definitely areas for him to work on to become the finished article.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Vieux Talonneur, post: 1117953, member: 73144"] I’ve been banging this drum for ages and largely getting flamed for it. I’ve always felt he was a bit underpowered and unbalanced the pack, but that was a price mostly worth paying when he was otherwise having a big influence on matches. But those days of being there or thereabouts for MOTM most games feel like they’re in the past. The game’s either moved on or he needs to recalibrate. I don’t believe that there’s really any shortage of effort or players aren’t trying. Instead I think we have an unfortunate mix of some players clearly past their best, some who just aren’t as good as their hype suggests and a whole shedload of inexperience - Chessum, Curry, Dombrandt, Ludlam, JVP, Smith, Marchant, OHC, Malins and Steward from the starting XV were all sub 20 caps which is still in international nappies really. The sprinkling of stardust that any team needs is also missing - who’s going to provide that game turning piece of magic as McVdM did yesterday or peak May could? Malins can’t and watching Irish OHC has looked good but he doesn’t make the hairs on the back of the neck stand up with possibility in the way Arundell does. Add in a revolving selection door through injuries or otherwise and a new game plan / coaching set up and what did we realistically expect? On Steward. He’s still young and should be our FB for years. He’s rock solid under the high ball, possibly the best in the world, which is great. But opponents will realise this, so will cut down the kicking and look for other ways to test him. Like most players there are definitely areas for him to work on to become the finished article. [/QUOTE]

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