Castres v Exeter Sat 1pm

[fivepointer]

CHIEFS SIDE TO FACE CASTRES

15 Phil Dollman
14 Jack Nowell
13 Henry Slade
12 Ian Whitten
11 Santiago Cordero
10 Gareth Steenson (capt)
9 Stuart Townsend
1 Ben Moon
2 Luke Cowan-Dickie
3 Harry Williams
4 Ollie Atkins
5 Wilhelm Van Der Sluys
6 Don Armand
7 Matt Kvesic
8 Tom Lawday

16 Jack Yeandle
17 Alec Hepburn
18 Tomas Francis
19 Sean Lonsdale
20 Toby Salmon
21 Jack Maunder
22 Joe Simmonds
23 Sam Hill

[Digby]

If Exeter don't win this then at least they can go back to capping Simmonds

[twitchy]

Battling performance from exe. Castres have some huge forwards.

[fivepointer]

Exe failed to make the extra man count. Immensely frustrating that they couldnt capitalise. A mix of good defence, questionable work at the breakdown (why cant some refs work out when a player is off their feet?) and Exe's own inability to keep the pressure on after a blistering start.
Thought Nowell and Slade were very good. Kvesic again right at the heart of the action.

[Timbo]

They keep stumbling in Europe so can’t blame bad luck, but it’s not easy to go away from home without your 4 best locks and no Ewers or Simmonds. The back 5 of their scrum has been seriously downgraded through injury.

I still fancy Exe to scramble through tbh. Get out of jail card is that their head to head is against another English team, which will hold absolutely no fears for them.

Glos are a decent team, but I fancy Exeter to get 9/10 points in the back to back games in December. Their systems and patterns are just perfectly suited to English opposition. Then they’ll have Castres at home, and the difficulty of that game will be entirely dependent on how Castres have gone against Munster...I reckon Exe go through as a runner up on 17/18 points.

[fivepointer]

Agree, missing key back 5 players was definitely a factor.
Wouldnt rule them out of progressing. They have the ability to win all 4 of their remaining games but they have made life hard for themselves.

[Oakboy]

I thought Castres were exceptional at the breakdown, judging to perfection how best to get away with things right on the edge of the referee's interpretation. Gaining maximum advantage there with non-GP referees is the biggest factor of all, IMO, in that English clubs are pretty useless at it. Surely, there must be a way to prepare better.

[Timbo]

I thought Castres were exceptional at the breakdown, judging to perfection how best to get away with things right on the edge of the referee's interpretation. Gaining maximum advantage there with non-GP referees is the biggest factor of all, IMO, in that English clubs are pretty useless at it. Surely, there must be a way to prepare better.

Castres were great over the ball. Vast majority were pretty clear cut too.

I do feel that Exeter’s clearing out was a significant step down on what you would normally see from them though, which comes back to their missing forwards imo. The turnovers at the ruck and a scrappy Exe lineout is what kept Castres in the game, which directly relates to the players who are currently unavailable to Exeter.

[Mikey Brown]

I can’t really remember who Exe have in that area. Skinner, Hill, Salmon, Dennis, Lees? All injured?

[Timbo]

I can’t really remember who Exe have in that area. Skinner, Hill, Salmon, Dennis, Lees? All injured?

Yeah, first choice would probably be Hill and Skinner, but might have gone with Lees against a big French pack. Then they’ve got Dennis too. Plus Ewers and Simmonds missing in the back row.

Not expecting g them all to be fit at the same time necessarily, but hard lines for them all to be out.