Post by Jamie Crawford on Nov 7, 2017 13:31:19 GMT
Round 8, Friday 10th November 19.45 KO
Richmond’s player pre-season movements according to Wikipedia were minimal. No players in and two players out. Their settled team has recorded three wins from their first seven games. Mond only logged seven wins from 21 Championship games played last season, so a vastly improved start to their campaign. League position is even more important now the top-up, bottom-down system has been re-established. Bottom position Rotherham Titans have yet to win and are 13 points below Mond but its early days yet.
After a disappointing performance for the Knights last time out when they lost 29-46 to the Pirates in what must be one of the worst home performances in a few seasons, the Knights have had a week off competition games to re-assess, recuperate and regroup before travelling down to the Capital to play ninth-placed Richmond. Our injury situation can only have been helped by having a fortnight between games plus Jack Ram is back. Hopefully he will feature against Mond.
The Knights are fourth despite their last performance; however Bedford Blues and Carnegie have equal league points. Hartpury College are only two points below us. Richmond are ninth after being beaten 34-17 up (for them) at Nottingham’s Lady Bay. As mentioned, the Knights are fourth with four wins and three losses, Richmond have won three and lost four, so only one defeat separates fourth from ninth after seven games.
Looking up, Nottingham are third and three points ahead of us.
Contrary to Richmond’s ninth place in the Championship, Full Back Robert Kirby is the fifth top point’s scorer and Scrum Half Luc Jones is the division’s fourth-equal top try scorer. Wing Jordan Simpson-Hefft has only scored one try fewer. Kirby has a strike rate over 89%, which is Premiership class; in fact the leading kicker in the Premiership (Harlequins’ Marcus Smith) has a strike rate of 77.5%.. Kirby has converted every try and only missed three penalty kicks from 15 attempts. Leicester’s George Ford has also converted 13 tries but he additionally missed another five. Saracens (and England) kicker Owen Farrell’s strike rate is 78.6%. Beware of giving away kickable penalties Knights.
Try scoring has been a roughly 75%;25% split, Backs:Forwards. Mond have scored 16 tries and conceded 30. Most tries have been conceded down the Wings, then the Front Row followed by the Back Row. Mond are second only to Bedford Blues in the number of tries that have been conceded to the Front Row, so an opportunity there perhaps?
The Knights will want to repeat last season’s victory with a similar magnitude at Richmond’s Athletic Stadium when they returned home 16-57 winners. It was a game when the Knights scored nine tries, Tyson Lewis scored a hat-trick and both Lloyd Hayes and Paul Jarvis crossed the whitewash twice. Alex Shaw and Sean Scanlon scored the other two.
According to the BBC and Statbunker we have equal league points as Bedford and Carnegie with Hartpury two below, the Pirates five below and Richmond seven below! Again, Nottingham are three above.
Elsewhere…:
Bedford Blues (5th, equal points) welcome Nottingham (3rd, 3 points above) to Goldington Road on Friday
Carnegie (6th, equal points) travel to London to face Ealing Trailfinders (2nd, 7 points above) on Saturday
Hartpury College (7th, 2 points below) go to Cornwall to play eighth–placed Cornish Pirates on Sunday
COYK
DONNY, DONNY, DONNY…
Footnote about Richmond from Wikipedia. “…In 1996, the then third division club (Richmond) was bought by financial markets trader and Monaco tax exile Ashley Levett. Levett turned the club into the first professional team in England, and began buying in big names to push the club up the leagues, including Ben Clarke from Bath Rugby, the first £1million signing. The club outgrew the Richmond Athletic Ground and became tenants at the Madejski Stadium in Reading. But the crowds and revenues from competition meant that Levett was continually financing the club, and so he placed it in administration in March 1999.
The professional Richmond club and professional London Scottish F.C. were both merged into London Irish, who moved to the Stoop Memorial Ground before taking up tenancy at Madejski the following year.[2] This period of hesitancy and uncertainty resulted in many of the professional players leaving the club pre-merger, and returning to their original home-teams. The amateur club was reformed in 2000, and the club rejoined the leagues as an amateur club at the bottom of the pyramid…”
Richmond’s player pre-season movements according to Wikipedia were minimal. No players in and two players out. Their settled team has recorded three wins from their first seven games. Mond only logged seven wins from 21 Championship games played last season, so a vastly improved start to their campaign. League position is even more important now the top-up, bottom-down system has been re-established. Bottom position Rotherham Titans have yet to win and are 13 points below Mond but its early days yet.
After a disappointing performance for the Knights last time out when they lost 29-46 to the Pirates in what must be one of the worst home performances in a few seasons, the Knights have had a week off competition games to re-assess, recuperate and regroup before travelling down to the Capital to play ninth-placed Richmond. Our injury situation can only have been helped by having a fortnight between games plus Jack Ram is back. Hopefully he will feature against Mond.
The Knights are fourth despite their last performance; however Bedford Blues and Carnegie have equal league points. Hartpury College are only two points below us. Richmond are ninth after being beaten 34-17 up (for them) at Nottingham’s Lady Bay. As mentioned, the Knights are fourth with four wins and three losses, Richmond have won three and lost four, so only one defeat separates fourth from ninth after seven games.
Looking up, Nottingham are third and three points ahead of us.
Contrary to Richmond’s ninth place in the Championship, Full Back Robert Kirby is the fifth top point’s scorer and Scrum Half Luc Jones is the division’s fourth-equal top try scorer. Wing Jordan Simpson-Hefft has only scored one try fewer. Kirby has a strike rate over 89%, which is Premiership class; in fact the leading kicker in the Premiership (Harlequins’ Marcus Smith) has a strike rate of 77.5%.. Kirby has converted every try and only missed three penalty kicks from 15 attempts. Leicester’s George Ford has also converted 13 tries but he additionally missed another five. Saracens (and England) kicker Owen Farrell’s strike rate is 78.6%. Beware of giving away kickable penalties Knights.
Try scoring has been a roughly 75%;25% split, Backs:Forwards. Mond have scored 16 tries and conceded 30. Most tries have been conceded down the Wings, then the Front Row followed by the Back Row. Mond are second only to Bedford Blues in the number of tries that have been conceded to the Front Row, so an opportunity there perhaps?
The Knights will want to repeat last season’s victory with a similar magnitude at Richmond’s Athletic Stadium when they returned home 16-57 winners. It was a game when the Knights scored nine tries, Tyson Lewis scored a hat-trick and both Lloyd Hayes and Paul Jarvis crossed the whitewash twice. Alex Shaw and Sean Scanlon scored the other two.
According to the BBC and Statbunker we have equal league points as Bedford and Carnegie with Hartpury two below, the Pirates five below and Richmond seven below! Again, Nottingham are three above.
Elsewhere…:
Bedford Blues (5th, equal points) welcome Nottingham (3rd, 3 points above) to Goldington Road on Friday
Carnegie (6th, equal points) travel to London to face Ealing Trailfinders (2nd, 7 points above) on Saturday
Hartpury College (7th, 2 points below) go to Cornwall to play eighth–placed Cornish Pirates on Sunday
COYK
DONNY, DONNY, DONNY…
Footnote about Richmond from Wikipedia. “…In 1996, the then third division club (Richmond) was bought by financial markets trader and Monaco tax exile Ashley Levett. Levett turned the club into the first professional team in England, and began buying in big names to push the club up the leagues, including Ben Clarke from Bath Rugby, the first £1million signing. The club outgrew the Richmond Athletic Ground and became tenants at the Madejski Stadium in Reading. But the crowds and revenues from competition meant that Levett was continually financing the club, and so he placed it in administration in March 1999.
The professional Richmond club and professional London Scottish F.C. were both merged into London Irish, who moved to the Stoop Memorial Ground before taking up tenancy at Madejski the following year.[2] This period of hesitancy and uncertainty resulted in many of the professional players leaving the club pre-merger, and returning to their original home-teams. The amateur club was reformed in 2000, and the club rejoined the leagues as an amateur club at the bottom of the pyramid…”
