Monday night rugby doesn't seem so weird in these COVID cursed times but at least if a game is on a Friday or a Saturday there's scope to have a drink to celebrate or drown your sorrows depending on the result.
Whilst last night's game against Cardiff resulted in a defeat the manner of it along with the personnel available to Edinburgh left me a little confused. We did deserve more out of the game. We had the lion's share of territory and possession throughout. We ran further, beat more defenders, won more rucks and had more gain line carries yet still left with nothing to show for the performance.
Perhaps that's just evidence that on the whole Edinburgh's attack is still blunt. The opening 20 minutes being evidence of that. We probably spent about ¾ of that time in Cardiff's half yet were it not for Jarrod Evans striking the post with his first effort at a penalty we would have been behind.
George Taylors incisive run and score under the posts as well as Charlie Savala’s first points for the club in a competitive match gave Edinburgh a 10-3 half time lead but it felt like it should have been more. Much more.
A poor restart allowed Cardiff to gain a foothold with a successful Evans penalty and then they pulled ahead only 6 minutes later with a converted try. It still felt at that point that the game was there for the winning but as Edinburgh's already challenged roster was weakened further Cardiff smelt blood and put the game in the bag.
You can see the starting and finishing fifteens for Edinburgh below and make your own assessment about strength in depth but the starting fifteen had only two first choices and that might even be arguable.
Edinburgh didn’t go down without a fight though and had it not been for a significant swing as the TMO (with the benefit of the technology available to him) made a frankly ludicrous decision to chalk off Eroni Sau’s try after Blair Kinghorn’s fantastic solo break then at the very least the scoreline would have been a little more indicative of the match play.
There were some creditable individual performances.
Charlie Savala looked very comfortable and assured at 10 especially when you factor in the very small (tiny) amount of rugby union he’s played. Some of his passing looked a little wayward but I put that down to inexperience. I think we will be seeing a wee bit of this lad.
Mike Willemse probably had one of his best games in an Edinburgh shirt. What a shame it took being released to bring that out of him.
Bill Mata looks back to his best and Kunavula showed up big time and is a unit and a half. I have wondered if he might just fade into obscurity but on this showing he’s got a lot to give.
Hoyland had a good game although I’m still a little unsure about his ability to break the line from 15 in the way that Kinghorn can.
There were some inaccuracies. It felt like we were trying to inject a little more pace into our play but not being used to that some phases looked a bit stop start.
All in all everyone who took to the field for Edinburgh made an enormous effort and whilst the result was not what we wanted you can't fault the players determination
It’s the nature of the beast but international rugby and it’s all encompassing demands has literally pulled the legs from under Edinburgh this season. If the Rainbow league happens maybe we will see a first choice (or as near as damn it) Edinburgh make a fist of it.
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