RugbyBits

Stormers complete SA sweep, Sanele Nohamba and Kooks versus Australia Round 3

Kooks, Shaun and Thala come together to discuss a bumper weekend of domestic rugby.
The boys first discuss the Stormers completing a sweep of victories against South African opponents in the United Rugby Championship this season, and the struggles the Sharks have without their Springboks. Can John Plumtree fix them?
Next is Sanele Nohamba kicking the Lions to a shock victory over the Bulls. The Lions win amid controversy about their team environment and we wonder why the Bulls have flattered to deceive this season. We round up the other URC Round 15 games and look forward to some pivotal matches coming up in the last 3 rounds in the race for the playoffs.
The lads then review the Super Weekend in Super Rugby Pacific where they debate Ardie Savea's throat slitting gesture and Kooks has some thoughts about Melbourne hosting the Super round. Then it's  a quick look at the form of the overseas based flyhalves for the Springboks in Handre Pollard, Elton Jantjies and Rob du Preez. We finish with some predictions for Six Nations Week 4 and Thala predicting doom and gloom for Wales, Scotland and England.
Our First Phase this week discussed which players will we never give up on with the likes of Johan Goosen, Pat Lambie and Wesley Fofana mentioned.

Chill out on Mohamed Haouas and let’s talk Six Nations

Jared and Shaun take the reigns and talk about the Six Nations. We look into how the last 3 rounds have unfolded and more specifically at Round 3 and the big talking points.
 
Why we think Mohamed Haouas is getting some unwarranted heat and take a detailed look at each game.
 
Jared turns Shaun into a forward focused thinker as they detail the good and bad from each of the teams.
 
Talking points around how deep the French loose trio chart goes, is the Huwipulotu pairing the real deal, what gives with all this Farrell hate and breaking down Italy's top down approach to the RWC year.
A look into the baby faced Welsh midfield and what Gatland is up to plus Jared call's Marcus Smith at 15 in the near future.

Thank Jake White for Manie Libbok, the Cash of van Rooyen and Six Nations Week 3 preview

Thala, Jared and Shaun deliver a two-part podcast for the week reviewing Week 14 of the URC and looking forward to Week 3 of the Six Nations.
In Part 1, Thala and Jared focus on the two South African derbies in the URC. In the Stormers victory over the Bulls, they rave over a mature defensive victory at Loftus with Deon Fourie being a ruck pest, Jake White thinking credit for Manie Libbok should go to Jake White and the return of Sbu Nkosi for the Bulls. In the Sharks victory over the Lions, Thala and Jared talk about the form of Curwin Bosch, the midfield battle between Rohan Janse van Rensburg and Marius Louw and the reports on a contract extension for Ivan van Rooyen.
Part 2 Shaun and Thala previewed the Six Nations. They discuss the Welsh players strike which threatens the clash with England. We discuss whether Scotland can pull off an upset in Paris or whether France will bounce back and if Ireland will rotate for their clash against Italy. We also discuss whether we will take Crusaders or the field for the upcoming Super Rugby Pacific.
In First Phase we discuss the best foreign imports a club names such as Schalk Brits, Freddie Michalak and Leone Nakawara are mentioned

Ireland top of the world, Finn Russell receipts in Six Nations Week 2 review

Kooks, Shaun and Thala are back podding about Week 2 of the Six Nations (and a bit of Week 1 as well).
The gents start with Ireland’s win over France and discuss whether Ireland are the undisputed best team in the world, if France should start worrying and how great the first half of the game was. The performances of Caelan Doris, Hugo Keenan and Antoine Dupont stand out in particular.
The conversation moves to Scotland’s comprehensive victory over Wales. Kooks calls out the Finn fans who were not there when times were tough. Shaun wonders if Huwipulotu will work against France and Ireland. Thala focuses on the impact Richie Gray has had on the Scottish pack and whether Wales should fully embrace real Warrenball.
We briefly look at England’s victory over Italy and compare which of the new coaches in Borthwick or Gatland will be the happier of the two and how the Farrell-Lawrence-Slade axis looks like.
Please note that we faced some technical issues which affected the recording of the podcast. Apologies if the final product is disjointed as we had to record in 3 different parts.

Sixmas, return of the Gats and Wales loose forward options with Will Owen

Jared and Thala are joined by Squidge Rugby’s Will Owen to do a deep dive discussion on how Wales look prior to the 2023 Six Nations.
We start by hearing Will’s thoughts on the state of the Wales Rugby Union after their CEO, Steve Philips, resigned amid allegations of sexism and racism in the WRU.
We then discuss what led to Wayne Pivac’s sacking and did a quick crash course on what to expect from Warrenball.
Will broke down the players that would benefit from Gatland coming back. We spend time discussing the likes of Tommy Reffell, Joe Hawkins, Christ Tshiunza and Kieran Hardy.
We finish with discussing predictions for the Six Nations, Taulupe Faletau versus Duane Vermeulen, RWC 2023 games we looking to attend, Santi Arata and why Damien Penaud would be a hit on the Six Nations Netflix series.
Follow Will Owen @will_owen9 and look out for his content on the Squidge Rugby channel on YouTube and follow the Owen brothers’ Squidge Rugby World Cup Retrospective podcast which looks back at the 2007 Rugby World Cup.

Eben Etzebeth versus Caterpillar Rucks; Champions Cup Round 4; Predictions for the rest of the tournament

Kooks, Shaun and Thala review the performance of the South African teams in round 4 of the Champions Cup.
We start with the Bulls loss to Lyon and discuss Jake White’s squad system and whether they have any chance against Toulouse in the last 16.
We move onto the Sharks entertaining loss to Harlequins, where we debate how to deal with caterpillar rucks, discuss Marnus Potgieter’s form and how the Sharks may fare in their last 16 clash against Munster.
We then look at the Stormers victory against Clermont and how unbeatable they are in Cape Town, the boost Evan Roos offers and how will the Stormers manage in the next 2 months without their Springboks.
Kooks and Thala look at the last 16 draw and predict an All-URC Champions Cup final. Kooks is already applying for leave to watch Finn Russell face the Lions in Joburg in the Challenge Cup last 16. And this week’s First Phase was making up a team with club positional combinations.

2015 Springboks, Red Cards, Dave Rennie & Champions Cup

Jared, Kooks and Shaun take you through the weekends action and get started with our First Phase chat about some of the great teams we and the Dirt Trackers would like to have seen a Netflix Documentary on.
 
We dive into the Eddie Jones appointment and what it means to all parties plus the general reaction of surprise by the Monday morning news.
 
We all (mostly) agree that the weekends Red Cards were spot on but go through them in order to try and understand what the issue is and chat about the diabolical article in The Guardian that 'blames' Manie Libbok for the high hit that resulted in Ben Loader's red card.
 
Shaun slows things down a bit by reading every result from the Champions Cup (a bit too much so skip 10 seconds) but the squad talk about the South African sides, how they are set up for the last 16 and the Champions Cup as a whole especially Racing (12) 92 holding out against Quins with three yellow cards to end the game.
 
Enjoy

Explicit Scrum Talk and Baby Pigeons

Jared and Thala start off the year discussing the South African teams performances in Week 12 of the United Rugby Championship.
The boys discuss the Bulls victory over the Dragons, Lions being thrashed by Munster, a second-string Sharks side being beaten by Connacht and a last-gasp victory for Glasgow over the Stormers. They also reflect on the season so far for each side, look at how they doing in the URC stats table and what should be their goals for the remainder of the competition.
A preview of Week 3 of the European Champions Cup and Challenge Cup games is also done, which are must-win games for all of the South African teams for different reasons.
Our First Phase topic was best/funniest stories of meeting a rugby player in public, which include meeting Gurthrö Steenkamp at an ATM, Eben Etzebeth at Canal Walk and Butch James’ infamous party trick.

Memories & Final Show Of 2022

Thala and Shaun wrap up 2022 with a few great memories and plenty of laughs as we tackle this weeks first phase, the Champions Cup and a little more.
 
We are going to take a break and will be back ahead of Round 3 of the Champions Cup.

Champions Cup & How The SA Sides Did

Shaun, Jared and Thala make a welcome return after a few challenging weeks of no podcasts.
We kick off with an entertaining FirstPhase as we pick professional rugby players occupations in an alternate universe 
We get stuck into the South African teams round one performances as they make their debut in Europe and take a stab at the round 2 predictions while looking at a few mouth watering fixtures.