Tigers vs Gloucester (H) - Premiership - Friday 22nd March 2024 - KO:19.45

[sapajo]

Leicester Tigers head coach, Dan McKellar has reacted to his side’s 27-25 defeat against Gloucester in round 13 of the Gallagher Premiership.

A late Stephen Varney try made the difference on a disappointing night for Tigers.

McKellar said: “Gloucester did a lot of good things. We started well but didn’t get anything off the back of it and suddenly it’s 3 – 8. “

“We showed a lot of courage to go back to our strength, we mauled incredibly well and got ourselves back in front.

“They won a lot of ball on the ground tonight, a lot of loose ball off the kick and we didn’t defend as well as we needed to.

“Collision wise, I just thought we were off the pace a little bit, even in and around the breakdown. We didn’t turn over an enormous amount of ball, we’re just watching it live; there’s a constant message from the box around our speed, around clean out.

“Defensively, we allowed them to offload, and they won loose ball on the ground you know, it’s an effort thing to be desperate, to want to win that.

“All of a sudden it’s an unstructured situation and players like (Zach) Mercer thrive off of that and they got field position and took their opportunities.”

Seems to me he is the master of understatement and frankly remarkably uncritical of our defensive performances both last and this week. He needs to wake up and smell the beans

[shedhead1]

Shedhead, I don’t get the hype around Mercer, he was poor on Friday, dropped the ball, made 1 break and very little else, plus didn’t seem that happy in the post match interview. I’d stick with Clement if I were Skivington, he always makes metres and looks impressive. I’d imagine he’ll leave if he can’t get regular game time.

Shedhead 1 here - we have just got back in from the Gloucester match - well that was a surprise!

Great to see Ed and his family and we managed to have a chat with Jo after the game.

For the first time this season we played as a team and not headless chickens - Sorry, but I thought Mercer showed his pedigree and class last night and was very proud of how he went about the game and as already mentioned its the influence he has on his team mates is very notable and brings others into the game and thoroughly deserved MOM.

We are all monitoring Clement closely - just needs consistency in his game.

Varney - Wow, that try and its build up was classy.
Blake - Incredible gutsy performance
Santi - Hope he stays
Ackers - One of the best signings in recent seasons - please stay fit
Harris - Reads the game so well but needs to back himself at times

We have a good blend of maturity and youth which showed in the 15 and on the bench

Anyone know the size of the crowd?

All the best for the season
Bob

[Scuttle]

Sorry to bore everyone with stats, but I'm curious why no one seems to be saying we kicked too much (although I'll admit I haven't read the whole thread)? Edit: just seen the above post!

Today was the most we've kicked in a Prem game all season.

To illustrate how poor the quality of both teams was today, there were more than twice as many missed tackles as in the Bristol v Saints match, but fewer tries and fewer points.

And 3 times as many kicks.

Very low penalty count, with only 6 each, but that's probably because neither team did much to pressurise the other into giving up penalties.

I believe we have one of the worst attacks in the league and it's been that way for very many seasons. It seems all our ex coaches believe an attack is a nice thing to have but not important that why we still rely so heavily on our maul. The gulf between Gloucester attack and ours was laid bare last night. This must change and now is the time to wake up and address the elephant in the room

I have to agree that Glos attack was far better than ours; slick, accurate passing, simple switch moves creating pressure for our backs which builds as the game progresses. It seems to me that all Prem teams have upped their defence and that the attack capability is where games are won with higher than usual scorelines evident (and I haven't looked for stats) compared to seasons past. I know it is a truism and may sound odd but I sense that teams now need to outscore each other with a much better attack to unlock increasingly tight defence. We just don't seem to have that attack which mostly comprises shipping the ball down the line, ruck, repeat. I also think we are much better with Scott in the team.

[DeadlyDunc]

I agree - i appreciate that what I am about to say doesn’t seem to fit with DMK style (I’m being generous!) but Kelly at 12 with any of those 3 outside would be balanced.

Kelly led the defence that season under SB from 12 and also offered some game management in their ball in hand as a second play maker - IIRR he was kicking in behind and passing really nicely out of the midfield channels. Maybe that was a result of being with Fordy running things at 10.

A midfield 3 of Shillcock, Kata and Kelly is just a dog leg waiting to happen - Shillcokc isn’t good enough defensively and then Kata stays tight and Kelly is isolated or comes narrow too and then gets done on the outside.

That said DKs first up tackling last night was atrocious, not giving DMK much confidence in him at 12.

I guess it would be ironic if Kata being injured when he’s been our best back by some way actually results in the midfield selection being more balanced

I don't know if it's DMK style or not, I feel it's just Kata lack of minutes at 13 that stops him from being played there.

Kelly I don't I would agree with him being a defensive leader, when him and Porter are played at 12 and 13 I feel our backline defnece has looked very unorganised. Certainly Moroni and Scott lead the defence at 13 in that season.

Kelly is a phenomenal passer and carrier though at 12, I feel the England training camp in the summer really messed with Kelly's and Porter's confidence. Both looked like half the player since then.

I dunno, that period when we won the Prem (upto Clermont away when Porter got a red card and then Kelly did his hammy) I thought we had a centre pairing that was already looking really good attack and defence and would only grow.

IMO that’s why SB thought it okay to lose Moroni.

[Tigers86asw]

Watching Mc Kellar in warm ups is enlightening. He hardly ever utters a word to nearly all the players. A fly on the wall might tell us whether the players rate him, but my opinion( hopefully wrong) is they dont..

I watched Skivington at the other end. Neither did he. Neither did Lancaster with Leinster a while back.

The best parts of our game are forward play- that’s DM but the attack is woeful and the kicking aimless and predictable. As Head coach he is responsible for all of it but the lack of leadership in attack points to one very glaring issue which we all know about.

[RagingBull]

I agree - i appreciate that what I am about to say doesn’t seem to fit with DMK style (I’m being generous!) but Kelly at 12 with any of those 3 outside would be balanced.

Kelly led the defence that season under SB from 12 and also offered some game management in their ball in hand as a second play maker - IIRR he was kicking in behind and passing really nicely out of the midfield channels. Maybe that was a result of being with Fordy running things at 10.

A midfield 3 of Shillcock, Kata and Kelly is just a dog leg waiting to happen - Shillcokc isn’t good enough defensively and then Kata stays tight and Kelly is isolated or comes narrow too and then gets done on the outside.

That said DKs first up tackling last night was atrocious, not giving DMK much confidence in him at 12.

I guess it would be ironic if Kata being injured when he’s been our best back by some way actually results in the midfield selection being more balanced

I don't know if it's DMK style or not, I feel it's just Kata lack of minutes at 13 that stops him from being played there.

Kelly I don't I would agree with him being a defensive leader, when him and Porter are played at 12 and 13 I feel our backline defnece has looked very unorganised. Certainly Moroni and Scott lead the defence at 13 in that season.

Kelly is a phenomenal passer and carrier though at 12, I feel the England training camp in the summer really messed with Kelly's and Porter's confidence. Both looked like half the player since then.

I dunno, that period when we won the Prem (upto Clermont away when Porter got a red card and then Kelly did his hammy) I thought we had a centre pairing that was already looking really good attack and defence and would only grow.

IMO that’s why SB thought it okay to lose Moroni.

I feel like that was because none of those teams where top 4 at the time though

[tripeandonions]

Would be no surprise if Tigers do not win another game this season, based on the two defeats to Gloucester. There could well have been a virus which has hit the squad, but there also seems to be some lack of cohesion, which may grow rather than reduce.

[bendy]

Anyone know the size of the crowd?

All the best for the season
Bob

They announced it as 20k and change.

[mol2]

You wonder if he's lost the changing room.

[Ian Cant]

Didn’t post last night as I was still seething at that performance.
Gloucester deserved their win and for me there are no excuses for Tigers playing like they did.
Like Scuttle, will be making the 6-7 hour round trip next Friday but dreading it could be another repeat of last year if we play like last night!
I felt many of the crowd and the Tigers turned up thinking they’d already won!

It would be helpful to us all to know why Pollard didn’t play!
Newcastle on a Friday night will be a huge challenge but realistically this is a game to really put out the best team and play like we did at Quins where I know we should have lost at the end but I walked away from The Stoop thinking we’d turned a corner.
What worries me more is that under the early tenure of Deano/Wellsy, Cockerill/ Howard, Borthwick/Sinfield, after a poor first half Tigers would come out and really get stuck into the opposition.

And lastly, I just don’t get this tired complaint, for goodness sake there are 6 less games and we have been one of the best clubs at resting players: you’d have thought having lost badly twice to Gloucester that as a player you’d be desperate to get out there and perform!
Still keeping the faith: just!

[sapajo]

Didn’t post last night as I was still seething at that performance.
Gloucester deserved their win and for me there are no excuses for Tigers playing like they did.
Like Scuttle, will be making the 6-7 hour round trip next Friday but dreading it could be another repeat of last year if we play like last night!
I felt many of the crowd and the Tigers turned up thinking they’d already won!

It would be helpful to us all to know why Pollard didn’t play!
Newcastle on a Friday night will be a huge challenge but realistically this is a game to really put out the best team and play like we did at Quins where I know we should have lost at the end but I walked away from The Stoop thinking we’d turned a corner.
What worries me more is that under the early tenure of Deano/Wellsy, Cockerill/ Howard, Borthwick/Sinfield, after a poor first half Tigers would come out and really get stuck into the opposition.

And lastly, I just don’t get this tired complaint, for goodness sake there are 6 less games and we have been one of the best clubs at resting players: you’d have thought having lost badly twice to Gloucester that as a player you’d be desperate to get out there and perform!
Still keeping the faith: just!

Pollard has the flu

[Delta5]

Gazelles versus Carthorses, Tigers were so slow, paint dries quicker.

It didn’t help that the time the team had played together is very low, nobody knew where to go or where to be, Gloucester knew exactly what to do a well deserved win for them, Tigers can only get better.

[Yorkietiger]

Last night’s failure in my view comes down to coaching deficiencies. Defensive lapses, lack of direction in attack, poor decision making, lack of conditioning, poor place kicking, poor box kicking, I could go on! We have good players playing at a level that is far below the sum of their parts.

I do not mind loosing to a better team, but Gloucester are not a better team. What they were though was a team that wanted to win, played for each other, and even after falling behind, had the will and energy to score that final try. Quite a contrast to our performance!

Clearly our lack of a proper attack coach for virtually the whole season has been an issue, but it is not the only problem. After 7 weeks off we looked sluggish and lethargic. We do not seem to be able to think on our feet. Our defensive structure is all too easily breached, as per the first two Gloucester tries, and Kata apart, our attack is predictable and easy to defend.

[Dr H Flashman MBE]

Got home from the game and thought I would pause before I posted as nothing said in anger would be constructive.
I am 100% happy clapper in old forum money, but that was as shocking performance. Defence had all the properties of a sieve. First up tackles were passive and non effective. And the attack was well not an attack. It was box kick poorly, don’t compete and allow them the run it back with interest.
We demonstrated 0 back line moves and looked flat and un motivated.
If there is a virus running through the squad, come out and say it. Be honest with the fans who spend good money don’t feel ripped off, or as my kids would say “mugged off”

There needs to be a full look at our coaching set up, not getting rid DMK as that is knee jerk, but start getting us playing rugby and not some poor version of the game.

[RagingBull]

If he came out and said it was the flu tbh most people would accuse him of making excuses.
IDK if it was a illness or not, If Pollard has the flu then a good chance a decent number of others have the flu.

But still doesn't take away from the fact the tactics just didn't seem to exist.
Especially which such bad kicking. I get we have a kicking coach but the accuracy of it was just shocking. Kick to corners and pin Gloucester