What a training session it turned out to be. We welcomed back Max with his happy, smiley face and welcomed Kai who had transfered over from another club and quickly slotted straight in with his jinky runs to evade defenders.

The players were tasked with setting and running a warm up activity which allowed Dustythefitnesspainmaster to set up the triangle of pain! (We think he showed too much of his gooey insides last week)

They were split into 3 groups and at each corner of the triangle they completed various exercises for a pain busting 60 seconds before sprinting off to the next corner for the next 60 seconds of intensity... even Gareththedefencecoach was breaking out into a sweat! (We think he wanted to reinstate his "hard as rocks" image after last week's test match).

Mission should players choose to accept it is to do these same exercises at home to see if they can improve their strength in their "guns" and "core" as it will help them with those low tackles, competion for the ball and getting back into the game.

Apparently Frankiepitchsideconsultant has a hidden crib sheet for all those burpies, press ups and sit ups... funnily enough there is no score for Andywackysocks2 as he is clearly a trained Olympian!

Game time and bibs v non-bibs commenced. It was good to see players remembering what they did well in last week's test match and carry it into the training game that unfolded in front of them.

There were plenty of positive support lines, attacking of space through, around or over the defence lines, offloads and quick rucks. There were also plenty of opportunities to counter ruck, manipulate spaces, keeping hips square to the try line and low tackles in the green zone.

Frankiepitchsideconsultant had devised some activities that concentrated on both defence (getting the ball back) and attack (beating the defence). We think he got a wee bit carried away after his national team got narrow but significant win during last weekend's M6Ns!
The defence activity was centred around making the tackler ‘roll away and get back into play’ so that they were onside and in that feared Mackie wall. This was then spiced up by getting the attackers to run ‘hard, straight lines’ at the defenders making it harder for them to roll away, get back into play and get onside.

This was then switched to attack as the players stayed connected in groups of 4 where the ball carrier went to ground following a tackle, the supporting player was first to the ruck, wins the ruck, scrum halves got the rugby ball away quickly to the connected support runner who changed the angle of attack to stress defenders.

Short drink to think and then it was back into the bibs v non-bibs to see if they had taken onboard all the feedback they had received throughout the session.

There was definitely an improvement in their defence and attack at the breakdowns.

Remember to ask your rugby brain what is the one thing I need to stop doing and the one thing I need to start doing to improve my rugby skills?

TackleruckpassrunrepeatTASTIC Peeps!

Dustythefitnesspainmaster
Gareththedefencecoach
Frankiepitchsideconsultant
Andywackysocks2