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Bottom side Newcastle include Pumas duo while Bristol change five
By Liam Heagney
Los Pumas centres Matias Orlando and Matias Moroni have been named to start by Newcastle in Friday night’s Gallagher Premiership home game versus Bristol. Moroni, a try-scoring sub in round five of The Rugby Championship, was last week promoted from the Argentina bench by Michael Cheika to take over in Durban from club colleague Orlando in the Test midfield versus the Springboks.
Both centres will now start for the Falcons having arrived in England on Monday night and trained with Dave Walder’s team on Tuesday. For Moroni, his selection heralds a Newcastle debut after he joined the club following last season’s Premiership title victory with Leicester.
Newcastle will surely benefit from having The Rugby Championship duo in their team for a round four match they come into having lost their opening three games - including last Saturday’s disspirited hammering at crisis club Worcester who have since been suspended from the Premiership.
Walder said: "When players of that quality become available you have just got to pick them. They landed on Monday evening, they were training with the team on Tuesday and they have just slotted straight in.
"Matias Orlando is obviously familiar with a lot of what we do having been with us for a couple of seasons already, and even during their time away with Argentina I have been speaking to them both regularly and communicating around what we’re trying to do with the team here. It’s a big boost to have those guys available to us.”
Table toppers Bristol make five changes to their XV for the trip to bottom side Newcastle, midfielder Jack Bates among the changes that also sees the first start this season at scrum-half for Andy Uren while Jake Woolmore deputises for the rested Ellis Genge at loosehead.
NEWCASTLE: 15. Tom Penny; 14. Adam Radwan, 13. Matias Moroni, 12. Matias Orlando, 11. Mateo Carreras; 10. Brett Connon, 9. Sam Stuart; 1. Adam Brocklebank, 2. George McGuigan, 3. Trevor Davison, 4. Greg Peterson, 5. Sean Robinson, 6. Will Welch (capt), 7. Connor Collett, 8. Callum Chick. Reps: 16. Charlie Maddison, 17. Logovi’i Mulipola, 18. Richard Palframan, 19. Sebastian de Chaves, 20. Jamie Blamire, 21. Josh Barton, 22. Tian Schoeman, 23. Pete Lucock.
BRISTOL: 15. Rich Lane; 14. Luke Morahan, 13. Jack Bates, 12. Piers O'Conor, 11. Henry Purdy; 10. AJ MacGinty, 9. Andy Uren; 1. Jake Woolmore, 2. Will Capon, 3. Kyle Sinckler, 4. Ed Holmes, 5. Joe Joyce, 6. Chris Vui, 7. Jake Heenan (capt), 8. Magnus Bradbury. Reps: 16. Harry Thacker, 17. Yann Thomas, 18. Max Lahiff, 19. John Hawkins, 20. Dan Thomas, 21. Harry Randall, 22. Callum Sheedy, 23. Sam Bedlow.
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Latest Comments
No he's just limited in what he can do. Like Scott Robertson. And Eddie Jones.
Sometimes it doesn't work out so you have to go looking for another national coach who supports his country and believes in what he is doing. Like NZ replacing Ian Foster. And South Africa bringing Erasmus back in to over see Neinbar.
This is the real world. Not the fantasy oh you don't need passion for your country for international rugby. Ask a kiwi, or a south african or a frenchman.
Go to commentsDont complain too much or start jumping to conclusions.
Here in NZ commentators have been blabbing that our bottom pathway competition the NPC (provincial teams only like Taranaki, Wellington etc)is not fit for purpose ie supplying players to Super rugby level then they started blabbing that our Super Rugby comp (combined provincial unions making up, Crusaders, Hurricanes, etc) wasn't good enough without the South African teams and for the style SA and the northern powers play at test level.
Here is what I reckon, Our comps are good enough for how WE want to play rugby not how Ireland, SA, England etc play. Our comps are high tempo, more rucks, mauls, running plays, kicks in play, returns, in a game than most YES alot of repetition but that builds attacking skillsets and mindsets. I don't want to see world teams all play the same they all have their own identity and style as do England (we were scared with all this kind of talk when they came here) World powerhouse for a reason, losses this year have been by the tiniest of margins and could have gone either way in alot of games. Built around forward power and blitz defence they have got a great attack Wingers are chosen for their Xfactor now not can they chase up and unders all day. Stick to your guns its not far off
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