Red faced at Scarlets. 10 things we learned about Edinburgh after this defeat

 

1. Our on field ability to adapt to circumstances is not good. You’ll have heard that the definition of madness is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome. Well that’s exactly what we did at every ruck for the first 50 minutes of this game. I bet even Scarlets couldn’t believe we didn’t mix it up in this area to try and keep Lousi guessing. The same could be said about our ability to prevent turnovers at the ruck. Perhaps a few where we committed a few more to it to make Scarlets think differently next time. Altogether we were too predictable in these facets of the game and seemed incapable of changing the narrative.

2. Before this game I was concerned about where our points would come from. The starting XV had only 10 tries between them all season and only 12 points from penalties. We have been overly reliant on the likes of Darcy to get us over the line. We have selected 5 centres all season; only Dean, Currie and Hutchison have scored tries and even then the total is a mere 4. This chart shows the diminishing returns as the season has progressed. Game 8 is when we lost Darcy.

 

3. Our lineout malfunctions far too often. Before the weekend we had the highest number of lineout penalties against us of any team in the league. 12 in total and 5 of those were for obstruction. This is not aimed at the hookers because there are lots of moving parts to a lineout, sometimes it feels like there are far too many but do we have a lineout coach, even on a consulting basis? I think we could do with one. 

4. We lose players to injury/illness pre-match an awful lot. Here’s the list for this season. It seems like a lot but I don’t pay much attention to other teams in this regard. Can’t be good for cohesion regardless.

18/2/23 v Scarlets - Cherry out, McBurney in

23/2/22 v Glasgow - Goosen out, Paterson in

15/1/23 v Castres De Bruin, Venter, Harrison, Boffelli out

17/12/22 v Castres - Duhan out, Hoyland in

30/10/22 v Cardiff - Immelman out, Blain in

24/9/22 v Bulls - Kinghorn out, Jaco in. Dean out, Currie 

5. It’s become increasingly apparent that Ramiro Moyano is a loss. 953 minutes on field and 9 tries   before he was injured towards the end of last season. His replacement, Wes Goosen, has so far had 570 mins and has crossed the whitewash twice. He can’t help the injuries he’s had but the fact remains we got more bang for our buck from the Argentine.

6. A repeated criticism of Blair Kinghorn at 10 is that he doesn’t manage his back line. If that’s true of him then it's doubly true of Charlie Savala. Yes, he’s raw. Yes, he’s learning but he’s a good bit shy of where he needs to be to run a line particularly when things are not going our way and the captain isn’t doing much captaining. Watch how Ben Healy dictates the plays for Munster. He’s only 10 months older than Savala. Different roads have led them to where they are but I think we are in desperate need of that kind of steerage in this pivotal position.

7. We are soft. More than once this season I've reflected back on a game and used the word bullied in relation to our play. That softness has crept back following Richard Cockerill’s departure. The other thing that's crept back in is that effort is something that's being mentioned as a positive. And regardless of who the coach is, Cockerill's quote that “effort shouldn’t be commended, it should be expected, really” should still hold true. In fairness to Mike Blair after the match there probably wasn’t anything else in the plus column to focus on.

8. Hamish Watson isn’t ready to return to starting for Scotland. It’s debatable if he ever will be.

9. Progress is illusory. Someone on Twitter at the weekend made the point that Edinburgh follows every good (relative) season with a poor one. Certainly over the last 5 years that's been the case.

2017 - quarter final

2018 - 5th in conference

2019 - semi final

2020 - 5th in conference

2021 - quarter final

    Of course it's looking highly likely that 2022 will be one of the poor ones continuing this trend.                                                                                                                                     

10. And over to you. What else did we learn?