Post by Jamie Crawford on Oct 10, 2018 12:32:12 GMT
Bedford Blues preview sponsored by Porsche Centre Sheffield (www.porschesheffield.co.uk)
Round 7, Goldington Road Sat 23rd Sep, 2017 - 02:30pm
EDIT - Sorry just noticed the date! Sat 13th Oct, 2018 - 03:00pm
like to forget, recorded as “ a bad day at the office”, sees us languishing in the bottom four instead of the top four. It’s a little early to be a harbinger of gloom because poor Griff is having his own serious problems (best wishes Griff), we had three players injured and unusually a sickness bug had caused seven players to not be included. This does not criticise any voiced opinion on unsatisfactory performance but I believe they weren’t in receipt of the facts of the decimated squad. To have ten players unavailable or a third of the squad is serious. We are only one game away from being last but similarly we are only one game away from being in the top half of the table (sixth).
Our opponents on Saturday are in fact fourth and six points above us. The Blues have reached fourth place courtesy of three wins and three defeats over their six games played. The Knights have won two and lost four. On their journey’s Bedford have amassed four bonus points to the Knights’ brace. The Blues have scored 151 points, just twelve more than the Knights and conceded 153 points, 17 fewer than the Knights. (Wikipedia)
Bedford Blues were delighted to announce the signing of Jamie Elliott before the start of the season, “Bedford Blues have strengthened their back line options for the coming Championship campaign with the capture of local lad Jamie Elliott.
Capable of playing on the wing or in the centre, Elliott, 25, has signed for his hometown club after leaving Northampton Saints in the summer
Blessed with an impressive turn of pace and plenty of gas in the tank, Elliott will add additional fireworks to an already impressive set of backs at Goldington Road who will all be looking to push on from last season.” (Blues’ website) The Knights are beginning to see home-grown (nay, nurtured) talent break into the Knights professional squad
Still no stats on Statbunker! Over five games the Blues had scored 20 tries (4th Highest) to the Knights’ 14. Given Hutler’s (below) try-scoring, The Blues Wingers had scored 40% of their tries
Blues’ Wing Ryan Hutler is the equal-second highest try-scorer in the Championship with five tries to his name after six games (Wikipedia). Hutler is a success story of the Blues Academy.
On the flip side, the Blues had conceded 22 tries to the Knights’ 14. Almost 74% of these tries had been conceded to the Backs, mainly to Half Backs and Centres with only a couple to Wingers. Although Forwards have only scored about 27% of the tries conceded by Bedford, all but one of these have been scored by the Back Row. Only Carnegie have conceded as many tries to the Back Row, so it looks like an opportunity for our Back Row to peel off the set piece and for our backs to look for the gaps in the middle of their defence. Again these stats are over their first five games.
Other fixtures that could impact our league position this weekend are:
Saturday
Jersey Reds (6th, 4 points above & game in hand) welcome top-placed Cornish Pirates to Stade Santander International
Richmond (7th, 3 points above) travel to Trailfinders Sports Club to play Ealing (2nd)
Coventry (8th, 1 point above) host London Scottish (9th, also 1 point above)
Carnegie (12th, 4 points below) go down to Reading to play London Irish (unbeaten 3rd with a game in hand)
Sunday
Hartpury College (11th, 1 point below) travel to play Nottingham (5th)
Bedford Blues have the third highest average attendance in the Championship, so we need to support the team and make our voices heard.
COYK
Let’s get that winning feeling again
DONNY, DONNY, DONNY…
