ARMIDALE will be looking to restart their season when they host Robb College to complete what has been an enthralling first five weeks at Moran Oval today.
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After a great start, the defending champions were outplayed and out-enthused by Barbarians last outing.
They’ve had the bye to mull over that and are fired up to make amends.
“It’s shaping up as a very big game for our boys,” Blues co-coach Luke Stephen said.
With everyone knocking each other off, the competition has really opened up.
Stephen said the Baa Baas’ loss was a bit of a reality check for them.
It reiterated to them that with the experience and size they’ve lost they can’t play that bullocking forward game they have for the past few seasons, especially against the bigger sides like Baa Baas.
“Our set piece was (also) exposed in terms of our lineout,” Stephen said.
“We’ve been working on that as well as our scrum.”
Robb will offer a different challenge to the Baa Baas and Stephen pointed to the breakdown as being critical.
“We always know games against Robb are won and lost at the breakdown,” he said.
“They’ve always been exceptional on the ball.”
“It’s all about our guys making sure we are providing the backline opportunities.”
It is one of their strengths.
They do get back Brodie Rigby but have pushed him to five-eighth.
“For us, it’s about playing to our strengths,” Stephen said.
“When you’ve got outside backs like John Roberts and Dan Ah-See you want to see them in a position where they can be the most damaging.”
Peter Cummings also returns although that is offset by the loss of Alex Barrett who was impressive on debut two weeks ago coming in for Cummings.
Armidale’s loss to the Baa Baas has Robb wary.
“I’m expecting a pretty tight game,” Robb coach Sam Ditchfield said.
“I think they were really disappointed with their performance against Baa Baas.”
“That’s what makes me very wary.
“Historically you don’t see Armidale play two bad games in a row.”
After the uni break they have hit the training paddock with a vengeance this week, and with a renewed self-belief.
That was the biggest thing they took out of last week’s win over Baa Baas.
“It’s been good to train,” Ditchfield said.
“We’ve done a lot of work on the set pieces and trying to get them better.”
They’ll also need to be strong in the midfield, with Ditchfield expecting the Blues to look to run a lot of their starter plays off inside centre Navi Tiko.
“He’s a very strong player and runs a very good unders line,” he said.
“I’m expecting there to be a lot of traffic coming through the midfield.”
“Hopefully we’ve covered our bases there.”
It is going to be an interesting round with Albies hosting Baa Baas in the other game.
