As others have said, much sterner test than last week. I actually thought we lacked cohesion at times but in the circumstances I thought we did well overall.
Thought the pack lacked power in the first half. Plenty of willing runners but we struggled to get going really. We looked good when we used our footwork and handling skills but not when we tried to just smash through them. Connors was particularly good in that regard.
I don't mean to be harsh on JGP because I'm aware that I criticise him a lot but I thought he was poor. His kicking was alright but I felt that he kicked a few times when running would have been much better, and while we did have an advantage it was very poor when he went the wrong way off a scrum. The really long pass to Daly was also poor. He took an age to move it and crabbed across the field when quick hands were needed. It was an amazing piece of skill but it left Daly having to beat Roko when he should have just been clear.
Conversely, thought McCarthy was great. Apart from the poor box kick he was excellent in most facets of play. I thought he improved the structure by having runners in place close to him. Whereas in the first half JGP's passes enabled Bath to line up our runners.
Carbery was sensational but thought Ross Byrne was also pretty good apart from the missed kicks. Joey played on the front foot more but even when he was in trouble his quick feet and skills to get out of it were amazing. One thing I didn't like was the way he was shifted to 15 again though, switching unnecessarily in a game like that doesn't bode well.
Adam Byrne didn't get much ball but really liked his take off the restart and hope it's a weapon that we use a lot as the season goes on.
Max Deegan confuses me a bit. His close in carrying can be very effective and he has a good work rate to get back up and go again, but he can also get smashed quite easily and he misses an awful lot of tackles. I counted at least four tonight and it's not like he's not throwing himself into them, strange for such a big guy. His skills are superb though, great take from the blocked chip. Doris was reasonably quiet with his carrying but thought his defence was great, made a couple of great cover tackles that he had no right to and he did well in the lineout. Very impressive performance for someone so young.
I still have absolutely no idea what team we'll put out and how we'll play next week tbh, that worries me. Set piece was mixed tonight and there isn't a settled pack to play again soon.
