Edinburgh Rugby: Season 2022-2023 Review

 


There are loads of films that end in ships sinking. Titanic, The Poseidon Adventure, even Jaws but none of those movies reflect the position Edinburgh Rugby are in half as well as this picture of a ship that tipped over in high winds whilst dry docked at Leith. We are hurt but not sunk and hopefully work is now in progress to put us back on the level. Meanwhile let’s break it down and see where it may have gone wrong and what did go right.

 

How it unfolded


After a difficult pre-season where we lost to both Benetton in Treviso and then to London Scottish at The DAM, our first competitive fixture was at home to Dragons. We went on to win that one comfortably by 44-6 but with Savala at 10 seemingly not trusted to take the kicks Mark Bennett was handed that duty and we missed 4 conversions that would have seen us hit a half century. It was nevertheless a good start. 


We then travelled to South Africa for a double header against Bulls and Stormers. Against Bulls it started to go wrong before kick-off with Blair Kinghorn due to start at 10 having to withdraw and being replaced by Jaco Van Der Walt. He only lasted 11 minutes before picking up a serious injury and was replaced by Charlie Savala who hadn’t even been in the original starting 23. By the 20 minute mark we were 15-0 down, Gilco was in the bin for repeated team penalties and we were looking distinctly punch drunk. The fightback ensued however and tries by Savala, a Darcy Graham hat trick and Damien Hoyland meant that Bennett’s conversion on 69 minutes put Edinburgh 30-31 ahead for the first time in the match. It wasn’t to be however and that man Morne Steyn won the game for Bulls on 78 minutes with a penalty. We did have our own penalty on 81 minutes that would have taken the win but it was a tough kick by anyone’s standards and by then we were on our 4th or 5th choice kicker in the shape of Henry Immelman and it went wide.


The defeat that followed to Stormers was more straightforward but despite coming away from our mini SA tour with only 2 points the overall feeling was still quite positive.


We continued against SA opposition at The DAM versus the Lions. This was another that went down to the wire. With the game tied at 19 all Edinburgh were on the attack but the ball went loose and Lions hacked it upfield all the way to under Edinburgh’s posts where we conceded a penalty trying to clear our lines. Another losing bonus point.


Benetton were next up at The DAM and clearly brimming with frustration we hit the Treviso side for 53 points which is our biggest ever total against them. This match was notable for two things. The first because it saw the return of Duhan Van Der Merwe to Edinburgh colours following the collapse of Worcester with the big winger notching a brace which turned out to be the only tries he scored for the club in the entire season. The second thing being that the try scoring didn’t start until Skinner's 30th minute effort in the corner following Kinghorns wide pass. 


Victories on the road with a side shaved of Scotland squad players against Zebre and Cardiff followed before we travelled, again, to Treviso to play Benetton and despite the Italian side having a man sent off after only 10 minutes the best we could do was yet another LBP.


Munster were the next visitors to The Dam and Edinburgh were 17-7 up after 36 minutes before Munster closed the gap just before halftime. They went ahead just after, we failed to score another point in the match and Munster eventually won 17-38. The worst thing that night though was the injury to Darcy Graham, at the time top try scorer in the URC, who suffered a leg injury that kept him sidelined until March 2023.

 

Those 2 defeats certainly had an effect on confidence so knowing that Saracens were our next opponents and in their own backyard was a bit of a worry. It did end in another loss but we were competitive throughout, in the lead for 60 minutes and with a bit of luck it could have gone a different way. We did take a LBP to our next Champions Cup match v Castres at home and disposed of the French side convincingly.


Dispiriting defeats home and away to Glasgow in the 1872 double header followed before we got back on track against Zebre in the new year. Despite it being a bonus point win it was a tight one and was only settled by a Patrick Harrison try with a minute left on the clock. 


5 points and qualification for the knockout stage of the Champions cup was secured with a 20-31 win on the road against Castres before we welcomed the English league leaders to the DAM. This win was probably the highlight of the whole season because no one gave Edinburgh a snowball in hells chance of winning it but we did and Saracens were rattled on the night. There was still a little frustration in that if we had denied Sarries a LBP we would have had a home tie for the round of 16 but it wasn’t going to be a gimme and we could have blown it entirely.


You’d have thought such a win would have instilled some confidence in the team but we proceeded to lose the next 5 games in a row. First up was a LBP at home v Sharks which completed an SA clean sweep against Edinburgh for the season. Then three 40 point plus defeats to Scarlets, Leinster and Connacht respectively. The game v Scarlets probably being a season low. Lastly, we travelled to Welford Road for the round of 16 in the Champions Cup and in the Leicester rain failed to fire a shot going down 16-6.


The final home game of the season against Ospreys was labelled as fan appreciation night and the team did a number on Ospreys hitting them for 7 tries including a brace for the returning Darcy Graham. The other thing of note on the night was Van Der Merwe being dropped to the bench for the first time in Edinburgh colours with pre -match comments by Mike Blair suggesting an attitude adjustment was required. In the end he only got 2 minutes following an injury to Graham.


The season ended a week later with a 28-14 defeat to Ulster at The Kingspan. We started well but failed to take the points when they were on offer and Ulster pulled away as the match progressed. It was the story of the season distilled into one evening.


The tale of the tape


We played 18 league fixtures and won 6 for a win rate of 33%. In  terms of league position this is our 2nd worst ever with our position in the opening year of the league being effectively 13th. Our win rate is not as bad, with our worst being 27% on a couple of occasions. 


We scored 70 tries in the league which is a record for Edinburgh


2021-2022 scored 55 conceded 37 - total match points 54

2022-2023 scored 70 conceded 62 - total match points 38


In the Champions Cup We played 4 group games and won 3. We earned 2 try bonus points for a total of 15 points and finished 5th in pool A. In the round of 16 we lost to Leicester. We scored 12 tries in the competition. This was our 7th season in a row qualifying for the knockout stages in European competition.


We scored 82 tries in total. Here's the top 10. There were another 12 players with a brace.


no.

name

No. of tries

1

Darcy Graham

12

2

Ben Vellacott

4


Dave Cherry

4


Bill Mata

4


Emiliano Boffelli

4


Adam McBurney

4


Henry Immelman

4

8

Pierre Schoeman

3


Patrick Harrison 

3


Luke Crosbie

3



Top points scorer - Emiliano Boffelli 116


Tries by forwards - 42

Tries by backs - 39

Pen tries - 1


League Points for 466

League Points against 467 


(Last year that was - For 421, Against 318)


Viliame Mata played 21 times for Edinburgh across the season and racked up the most minutes on field  - 1477. Boan Venter was the only player to be in every match squad in the league (18) and matched Bill for appearances in all competitions albeit with much less minutes on-field.


We played 11 home games. 10 at The DAM Health and the 1872 Cup match at BTM. Our total attendance number was 89280 which is an average of 8116 per match. This is our best ever average attendance except for 2018-2019 when we hosted Munster at BTM in the Champions Cup quarter final in front of 36k supporters. There were three more home games that year and our overall attendance was 125k, The most people who’ve watched Edinburgh in a single season.


Ins and outs


In for season 2023-2024 are


Loosehead prop - Robin Hislop from Saracens

Tighthead Prop - Javan Sebastian from Scarlets

Hooker - Ewan Ashman from Sale Sharks

Scrum Half - Scott Steele from Harlequins

Standoff Ben Healy from Munster

Flanker Tom Dodd from Coventry


Those departing are - 


Henry Immelman to Bulls

Jaco van Der Walt  to Bulls

Cammy Hutchison to Newcastle 


Stuart McInally has decided to hang up his boots after the World Cup.


The remainder have all departed for unknown destinations 


Jamie Jack

Nick Auterac

Harrison Courtney

Lee-Roy Atalifo

Pierce Phillips

Nick Haining

Henry Pyrgos

Jack Blain

Damien Hoyland


You’ll note that it's 14 out and only 6 in. Mike Blair, said in advance of the game against Ospreys that, “It will be a similar number of players in the squad….”, so, there may be other moves to come. Some of those may be academy guys and Nathan Sweeney signed a full one year professional deal a few days after that interview with Blair. 


Watch this space.


So where did it go wrong?


Defence. As the stats quite clearly show we conceded more tries, nearly twice as many as last year and despite having improved on overall points over last season we finished with a negative points difference. So even though our attack improved, at least points/tries wise, it wasn’t enough to cover up the defensive frailties. 


The easy answer to this was to point to the loss of Calum Macrae to Benetton but albeit that the Italian side have finished a couple of places higher than they did in season 2021-2022 their tries and points conceded totals are actually worse this year. 


Attack. We scored more tries than last year but it should have been even more. Too often we took the lineout option despite our kicking very rarely taking us close to the line and then the lineout didn’t function well enough. That ambition is great but the completion rate for it just wasn’t good enough to rely on it. 


Did we do that too often? Well despite having one of the games best kickers we kicked less penalties than all but two of the teams above us in the league and on at least 3 occasions lost matches by no more than 3 points. Where would those missed points have taken us? You can add to that the times that perhaps taking the penalty goal option may have just altered the narrative in the game. 


If the statistic for turned down penalty kicks was known I guess we’d be near the top of that one.


This is the first time in at least the last 5 years that Edinburgh's forwards have scored more tries than the backs. I don’t know what that means, if anything, but alongside it’s worth noting that we chose 5 starting centres all season and they scored a grand total of 4 tries between them.


Darcy’s injury didn’t help as he was top scorer in the league when he limped off against Munster. In the intervening period before he returned 4 months later we got one try from a winger, Jack Blain.


Talking of wingers, I think in hindsight the mid-season return of van Der Merwe was disruptive. He hasn’t made much of an on field impact and latterly has given off a vibe that definitely couldn’t be described as committed to the cause.


General. The biggest deficit we managed to overcome all season and then win was 6 points which we managed only twice. Firstly against Dragons in our opening match and then against Castres at home. We gave up double digit leads on 3 occasions (10 points to Stormers, 12 points to Munster, 10 points to Glasgow) so I think it’s reasonable to suggest we were a bit soft.


The insistence of picking Blair Kinghorn at 10 and backing him up with Charlie Savala has been limiting. Blair had his moments and his highlights reel would be entertaining but even though I am his biggest fan even I can see it's not his best position. Charlie may have a big future but is a good way short of being the finished article. And yet we had a competent 10 in the squad who was restricted to two starts (and one of those was a last minute change). His style may not have been what Blair wanted but if we can ask someone to switch positions surely asking someone to change their approach to the game shouldn’t be a stretch. Of course that is predicated on it being Mike Blair's decision which for this observer just isn’t credible.  


Some Fixes?


This list is not exhaustive.


  1. Play a stand off at stand off.  

  2. Appoint a captain that doesn’t disappear off to the Scotland squad on a regular basis. Someone for whom this is their pinnacle as opposed to it being a step on a journey. Someone who will read the riot act when we are being too soft and who can see when we need to change our approach mid game.

  3. Appoint specialist lineout and scrum coaches. Edinburgh legend Alistair Dickinson leaves Midlothian everyday to be the scrum coach at Glasgow and yet we don’t have a scrum coach. 

  4. Don’t try to be The Barbarians all the time. It’s great to play expansive rugby but sometimes it's fine to win ugly. Ultimately winning is the only yardstick that matters.

  5. Appoint a new head coach.  


The head coach


You may have read this, Mike Blair is a world class attack coach. No ifs, no buts or maybes. Yet here we are with ‘almost’ the worst season in the club's history, so can that actually be true? As we know being head coach has meant he has had limited time to be a WCAC which begs the questions, How much time did he have to give to the attack and why did the results from that differ so dramatically from 2021-2022 when it was enough to secure a knockout spot in the league a huge 16 points ahead of where we are now with largely the same squad. 


Anyway it’s a moot point. He will no longer be head coach and a replacement is required. I don’t think it's a good idea to retain MB’s services. I’m not convinced of his WCAC status. Everyone says he’s a great guy but If he hadn’t resigned he may well have been sacked at the end of the season. 


Whoever comes in can’t be undermined by his predecessor second guessing him or telling his fellow coaches or players he doesn’t agree with selection. Whoever that head coach is shouldn’t even have to worry about that and unless it's someone with a massive ego (Steve Diamond sized maybe) that’s always going to be in the background.


Clean sweep please. 


Conclusion and Opinion


Even after the opening 5 fixtures when we were 1 from 4 I don’t think many would have predicted a bottom 4 finish. I Tweeted a poll at that stage to see what the Edinburgh faithful thought and it backed that up. I still felt confident and thought that if we kept our nerve those early losses against the SA sides would be evened up as other teams had to face them. 



But it seemed like the inability to overcome a lead or maintain one was mirrored by our inability to see the league as a marathon not a sprint. The loss to Munster, who had been struggling up to that point themselves, alongside the loss of Graham seemed like a knockout blow from which we were unable to recover. If there was any life left in Edinburgh it was extinguished by George Horne in a 6 minute period when he scored 13 unanswered points that gave Glasgow the lead and secured victory for the weeg at BTM.


There is no doubt that players coming and going to Scotland squads and the uncertainty that brings didn’t help but it’s not a new phenomenon and if there's one thing that Mike Blair deserves credit for it was his efforts to keep everyone included so that when the time came for them to step up they'd already had good minutes on field. It didn’t help however and we suffered one of our worst ever defeats to Scarlets, in the midst of a crisis engulfing Welsh rugby, during the 6N.


The allegation that came up time after time was that Edinburgh were inaccurate. It’s hard to disprove that. Only 4 sides made fewer tackles than we did and in the discipline stakes only 4 sides conceded more penalties and no-one gave up more lineout offences than we did.  


But, and it's a huge but, no one in the league had more LBP than Edinburgh (6). It’s as if the dividing line between a good season and a terrible one is actually a cliff edge. So near and yet so aaaaaaaaaaaagh!


As I write we are without a head coach, and Gareth Baber has also resigned. We need a rudder and ideally whilst the ship is in dry dock.  We don't know whether we are readying this ship for heavy lifting or speed. I’d prefer to see the ship's captain involved in the renovations so that when the sea trials and everything that follows comes over the horizon we know how we are doing this. 


We tried the tugboat route with Cockers and then went full speedboat with Mike Blair. Some balance is perhaps in order. 


A lifeboat. That’ll do. Safe, quick and powerful. 

 


  


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