psychic duck
International
- Joined
- Mar 7, 2011
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With the coaching duo Justin Burnell and Gareth Baber in charge, the Cardiff Blues had a poor season finishing 7th in the RaboPro12, and the Quarter Finals in the Heineken Cup (although they were no way one of the top 8 European teams) where they were hammered by 34-3 by Leinster. And in the RaboPro12 they were notably thrashed 31-3 to Glasgow, and lost 33-12 at home to the Ospreys and should have lost by more had referee George Clancy not given some bizarre scrum decision with Ospreys dominating. In total the Blues lost 6 of their last 7 matches of the season, and the win was against an Edinburgh reserve side.
For a side that had highly rated players such as Gethin Jenkins, Bradley Davies, Casey Laulala, Leigh Halfpenny, Alex Cuthbert, Xavier Rush and others in their side, their results and performances were simply not good enough.
Crazily, the duo known as B&B were initially thought to be being retained as coaches, until later Phil Davies was named as the main coach, and then news came that B&B were to got rid of.
But unfortunately for the Blues, the damage they inflicted onto this side did not finish at the end of the season. The Blues lost a wave of experienced players, and since B&B were still in charge for a period at the end of the season, they sadly for the Blues had an impact on the beginning of the Blues rebuild.
And who did B&B think it was a good idea to sign? The Fijian prop Campese Ma'afu, who is nearly as much as an inept player as B&B are inept coaches.
I have nothing against Ma'afu, but he is simply not a good player, and quite possibly one of the worst signings I have ever seen. The Cardiff Blues had a poor scrum last season with Scott Andrews particularly struggling against pretty much every opposition, what they needed is somebody to boost the scrum at loosehead prop, but instead they have signed another poor scrummager to join Andrews.
Every single time I have seen Ma'afu play for Fiji, the scrum has been totally munched.
Justin Burnell said in his official statement on the Cardiff Blues website, amazingly that he first thought signing Ma'afu would be a good idea after Wales drew 16-16 with Fiji in 2010.
But Ma'afu was annihilated in that match, Wales were poor in other areas, but they destroyed the Fijian scrum and won 8 scrum penalties including a penalty try, and the scrum was really the reason Wales didn't lose that match.
Ma'afu was struggling massively and substituted off after 58 minutes that match.
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Laughably Burnell thinks Ma'afu did well.
Really Mr Burnell? Just because Fiji got a draw in that match because Wales were dreadful in other areas, doesn't mean that Fiji weren't dominated in the scrum.
The next week, Fiji played Italy, and Ma'afu and the Fijian scrum was again totally destroyed, conceding 6 penalties and a scrum against the head, and Italy got 4 penalties from those scrum infringements and the game finished 24-12 (all penalties) so the scrums basically cost Fiji the match.
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So what we learn from this, Ma'afu won't be able to hold his own against the top scrummaging teams like the Ospreys, Clermont, Toulouse, Leicester, Northampton and Toulon.
So how will he do against front rowers who aren't as world class as Adam Jones and Martin Castrogiovanni.
He came up against New Zealand's reserve front row (Wyatt Crockett and Ben Franks) last year, and was again destroyed; the Fijian scrum conceded 8 penalties (including a penalty try) and a scrum against the head. Yet somehow Burnell thinks this annihilation makes him an "exciting prospect" here is the quote from his official statement.
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How getting completely annihilated at scrum makes you "an exciting prospect" is beyond me, but clearly not beyond the clown Burnell (perhaps this is why he has been starting Andrews for much of last season).
Burnell also mentions the World Cup there, and at that World Cup he came up against Samoa, who have a decent scrum but not an exceptional scrum.
And again when he played Samoa he struggled, although he didn't concede as many penalties as the other matches mentioned, the Fijian scrum was on the backfoot and lost scrums against the head several times, one of those times leading to a Samoan try for Kahn Fotuali'i.
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So every time I have seen Ma'afu play he has been destroyed. And it's not exactly as if he's going to have a world class tighthead to support him at the Cardiff Blues. The tightheads will be Scott Andrews who has himself been being destroyed regularly last season, Taufa'ao Filise who is not getting any younger and has had injury problems, and Benoît Bourrust who was third choice with Perpignan and somebody who nobody really knows whether he is good, just that he has hardly got a game with his last three clubs Perpignan, Biarritz and Sale. I feel sorry for young Scott Hobbs, how is he supposed to develop alongside Ma'afu and Andrews?
The Cardiff Blues scrum struggled last season, they even conceded a penalty try against the Scarlets. Next season their scrum (unless maybe if Bourrust turns out to be good) will become a laughing stock.
Cardiff Blues Heineken Cup opponents Toulon and Montpellier have tighthead props who were voted by Rugbyrama.fr as the two best in the Top 14, they will destroy the Cardiff Blues scrum. Even the other team in the pool Sale Sharks' tighthead Tony Buckley may get on top against Ma'afu.
Even if Burnell was pleased with his awful recruit. See the quote.
The Cardiff Blues fans shouldn't be pleased though. Ma'afu has got to be one of the worst signings I have ever seen and considering he has been signed to replace one of the best props in the world over the last few years, it makes it even worse. Doubly worse is that he will be working alongside Scott Andrews and Marc Breeze who are both also crap themselves.
Thankfully though, the Blues finally saw sense and got rid of Burnell before he could ruin the Cardiff Blues any further with more joke signings like Ma'afu.
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