Exeter vs Quins - Sunday 3pm

[Timbo]

Watching Nowell directly up against Murley today was quite interesting. Nowell is noticeably more ‘busy’ than Murley and does lots of important little things really well. But Murley carries so much more threat, both in terms of his ability ball in hand and the athleticism to finish off try’s and support in attack. I’d say Murley’s clearly quicker (no surprise) and more powerful in contact (a bit of a surprise), he even gave Jack a big bump off in a collision at one point, left him sprawling.

Differences aside, they would probably be filling a broadly similar role within an England squad and I’d be hard pressed to make a case for Nowell over Murley tbh.

[Banquo]

That was great fun! But jeez how good was Will Evans!! Outstanding! Next level 7 play!

he's class. Suffered from being unfashionably small and skilful

And injured. He's had a few rather painful injuries. I was still annoyed when Tigers under utilised him when he came back from injury and then didn't do more to keep him. He's flourished at Quins but again only when actually fit. The combination of him and Kenningham will be an entertaining one to watch this season.

Not picked more than injured early in career- still only 25 and has racked up 50 prem appearances despite this. Quins have started him a lot when fit, quite rightly. Excellent player.

[Oakboy]

On the 'backrowers in Jones's mind' debate, I think the Exeter lad's treatment by Wales may prove interesting. Will he get capped and ignored for years as Simmonds was by England, for example? Evans should certainly be in the mix.

For a game tomorrow, I'd pick Curry, Willis and Willis. I assume Jones would pick Lawes, Curry and Billy V. There is a long queue.

[Stom]

On the 'backrowers in Jones's mind' debate, I think the Exeter lad's treatment by Wales may prove interesting. Will he get capped and ignored for years as Simmonds was by England, for example? Evans should certainly be in the mix.

For a game tomorrow, I'd pick Curry, Willis and Willis. I assume Jones would pick Lawes, Curry and Billy V. There is a long queue.

The value of a Billy was shown recently, though. We need that ballast. Though having two carrying options on the flanks would be good. Lawes is better than he used to be.

I think that will put paid to the Quins pair's short-term international aspirations. The way England is set up doesn't lend itself to them, and that's fine. Leave them with us for another couple of seasons.

[fivepointer]

Watching Nowell directly up against Murley today was quite interesting. Nowell is noticeably more ‘busy’ than Murley and does lots of important little things really well. But Murley carries so much more threat, both in terms of his ability ball in hand and the athleticism to finish off try’s and support in attack. I’d say Murley’s clearly quicker (no surprise) and more powerful in contact (a bit of a surprise), he even gave Jack a big bump off in a collision at one point, left him sprawling.

Differences aside, they would probably be filling a broadly similar role within an England squad and I’d be hard pressed to make a case for Nowell over Murley tbh.

It was a good tussle between them. Nowell's workrate and willingness to do the unglamorous jobs isnt appreciated enough.

Credit to Exe for scoring the winning try. They worked the ball from their own goal line to set up the chance. Big effort a man short in the closing minutes.

[Scrumhead]

On the 'backrowers in Jones's mind' debate, I think the Exeter lad's treatment by Wales may prove interesting. Will he get capped and ignored for years as Simmonds was by England, for example? Evans should certainly be in the mix.

For a game tomorrow, I'd pick Curry, Willis and Willis. I assume Jones would pick Lawes, Curry and Billy V. There is a long queue.

The value of a Billy was shown recently, though. We need that ballast. Though having two carrying options on the flanks would be good. Lawes is better than he used to be.

I think that will put paid to the Quins pair's short-term international aspirations. The way England is set up doesn't lend itself to them, and that's fine. Leave them with us for another couple of seasons.

I think Curry, Willis, Willis would be a very good and pretty well rounded back row. However, based upon the most recent evidence at test level, Lawes, Curry and Billy still has plenty of merits. Lawes put in 3 very good performances including a proper captain’s effort in the third test, Curry was playing very well until he got injured and Billy, without being flawless, definitely looked better than he had in his previous England outings.

No word yet on Dombrandt’s injury, but if he’s out of the AIs as well as Barbeary and Tom Willis keeps playing well, he could definitely find himself in the mix.

I love Evans and Kenningham but as of right now, it’s probably fair that they’re not in the England mix. I think Evans has probably been close but has picked up injuries at the wrong times and Kenningham did get a call-up but then had to drop out with COVID and then got injured (only just come back this season).

[FKAS]

he's class. Suffered from being unfashionably small and skilful

And injured. He's had a few rather painful injuries. I was still annoyed when Tigers under utilised him when he came back from injury and then didn't do more to keep him. He's flourished at Quins but again only when actually fit. The combination of him and Kenningham will be an entertaining one to watch this season.

Not picked more than injured early in career- still only 25 and has racked up 50 prem appearances despite this. Quins have started him a lot when fit, quite rightly. Excellent player.

Oh he's an excellent player all right but injuries have definitely held him back, Tommy Reffell a similar player who came through the same club is two years younger and has 55 Prem appearances. If Evans can stay fit he might well be knocking on the door come the 6N, he just needs a good run of games that nasty injury disrupted the last two seasons at a time he was playing well.

[Puja]

And injured. He's had a few rather painful injuries. I was still annoyed when Tigers under utilised him when he came back from injury and then didn't do more to keep him. He's flourished at Quins but again only when actually fit. The combination of him and Kenningham will be an entertaining one to watch this season.

Not picked more than injured early in career- still only 25 and has racked up 50 prem appearances despite this. Quins have started him a lot when fit, quite rightly. Excellent player.

Oh he's an excellent player all right but injuries have definitely held him back, Tommy Reffell a similar player who came through the same club is two years younger and has 55 Prem appearances. If Evans can stay fit he might well be knocking on the door come the 6N, he just needs a good run of games that nasty injury disrupted the last two seasons at a time he was playing well.

Mind, Reffell came through when Leicester were using their academy - Evans came through and hit the brick wall of Richard Cockerill.

I love Evans, but every time he plays well, he's off with an injury later in the game. This is the most fit I've seen him in years - I hope to the gods it's a sign of things to come, cause he really does deserve a better run of luck.

Puja

[Banquo]

And injured. He's had a few rather painful injuries. I was still annoyed when Tigers under utilised him when he came back from injury and then didn't do more to keep him. He's flourished at Quins but again only when actually fit. The combination of him and Kenningham will be an entertaining one to watch this season.

Not picked more than injured early in career- still only 25 and has racked up 50 prem appearances despite this. Quins have started him a lot when fit, quite rightly. Excellent player.

Oh he's an excellent player all right but injuries have definitely held him back, Tommy Reffell a similar player who came through the same club is two years younger and has 55 Prem appearances. If Evans can stay fit he might well be knocking on the door come the 6N, he just needs a good run of games that nasty injury disrupted the last two seasons at a time he was playing well.

There was a fair old period when he wasn't injured but playing for Tigers 2's- he was pretty young, but looked great when he was brought in for injuries. See Puja's post above.

[Timbo]

Not picked more than injured early in career- still only 25 and has racked up 50 prem appearances despite this. Quins have started him a lot when fit, quite rightly. Excellent player.

Oh he's an excellent player all right but injuries have definitely held him back, Tommy Reffell a similar player who came through the same club is two years younger and has 55 Prem appearances. If Evans can stay fit he might well be knocking on the door come the 6N, he just needs a good run of games that nasty injury disrupted the last two seasons at a time he was playing well.

Mind, Reffell came through when Leicester were using their academy - Evans came through and hit the brick wall of Richard Cockerill.

I love Evans, but every time he plays well, he's off with an injury later in the game. This is the most fit I've seen him in years - I hope to the gods it's a sign of things to come, cause he really does deserve a better run of luck.

Puja

Evans has said himself that during his last injury break he put on a bit of timber, and I think you can see it in the way he’s playing. Much more physical in contact and is hitting hard in defence now. Looking a very complete 7 at the moment.

[Banquo]

Oh he's an excellent player all right but injuries have definitely held him back, Tommy Reffell a similar player who came through the same club is two years younger and has 55 Prem appearances. If Evans can stay fit he might well be knocking on the door come the 6N, he just needs a good run of games that nasty injury disrupted the last two seasons at a time he was playing well.

Mind, Reffell came through when Leicester were using their academy - Evans came through and hit the brick wall of Richard Cockerill.

I love Evans, but every time he plays well, he's off with an injury later in the game. This is the most fit I've seen him in years - I hope to the gods it's a sign of things to come, cause he really does deserve a better run of luck.

Puja

Evans has said himself that during his last injury break he put on a bit of timber, and I think you can see it in the way he’s playing. Much more physical in contact and is hitting hard in defence now. Looking a very complete 7 at the moment.

good news- has it affected mobility at all?

[twitchy]

What do you guys think of tshiunza? I remember us discussing his england eligibility (he's capped for wales now) a few years back but this is the first time I have properly seen him.

[FKAS]

Not picked more than injured early in career- still only 25 and has racked up 50 prem appearances despite this. Quins have started him a lot when fit, quite rightly. Excellent player.

Oh he's an excellent player all right but injuries have definitely held him back, Tommy Reffell a similar player who came through the same club is two years younger and has 55 Prem appearances. If Evans can stay fit he might well be knocking on the door come the 6N, he just needs a good run of games that nasty injury disrupted the last two seasons at a time he was playing well.

Mind, Reffell came through when Leicester were using their academy - Evans came through and hit the brick wall of Richard Cockerill.

I love Evans, but every time he plays well, he's off with an injury later in the game. This is the most fit I've seen him in years - I hope to the gods it's a sign of things to come, cause he really does deserve a better run of luck.

Puja

Reffell came through a little bit before we started using the academy in a decent manner. Wasn't until a couple of years after Reffell we saw the academy actually producing a glut of players with the Martin/JVP group. Heyes and Reffell came through as it was still trying to stutter back into life.

Evans certainly suffered through the changing DORs at Tigers. Cockers seemed to go through patches of liking him. Mauger he'd have worked well under but that didn't last and then I imagine MOC was the last straw for him (understand that, the man was an arse). Even at Tigers though he had injuries at unfortunate times, got used a sub with heavy strapping around his knee just before he left with the rumours at the time he wasn't fit enough to play 80, which was a shame as memory served we could have used him for the 80.

[Mikey Brown]

Just watched the highlights back, certainly makes an entertaining few minutes.

Both teams had a borderline dodgy score from a forward pass, but my god the Shickerling one is way more ridiculous than I thought on first viewing. That's a triple-movement at the very least. Annoying for that to play such a key part in the result but I can't be annoyed at anyone else when we still let teams walk in so many first half tries.

I thought Marchant almost dropped the ball for his late score from the Smith chip across, but he knocks the ball up so he doesn't go in to touch when his foot hits the line. He is consistently doing incredibly skilful stuff like that with such nonchalance that it seems to go unnoticed. A bit Am-esque.

Also if a player in a ruck has their foot in touch does that count as the whole ruck?

[Puja]

Also if a player in a ruck has their foot in touch does that count as the whole ruck?

No, only if they're touching the ball themselves. Same with mauls.

Marchant's dexterity and clear thinking on that try was something else entirely.

Puja

[Peej]

Barbeary's out for 10 weeks

[Mr Mwenda]

Barbeary's out for 10 weeks

So tired of the clubs breaking the great hopes of England.

[Mikey Brown]

Barbeary's out for 10 weeks

Did he hurt himself jumping up and down watching the Quins/Exeter game?

[Scrumhead]

Barbeary's out for 10 weeks

So tired of the clubs breaking the great hopes of England.

I’m not sure Barbeary is one of our ‘great hopes’ these days? He seems very injury prone and hasn’t looked as exciting as he did when he first broke through. It’s possible that the injuries have put the brakes on his development a bit?

From a personal POV, I’m less excited about him as an 8 as I was when he was training as a hooker (I say training as we didn’t really see him actually play at 2).