PLEASING ASPECTS OF PERFORMANCE IN WIN OVER LEICESTER
“The composure at half-time; it is quite easy away at Welford Road to think the sky has fallen down at 16-12 down at half-time when you haven’t had much of the running in the game. How they were when I spoke to them, I always ask them out on the field first and foremost was one of it ‘We have got this if we execute the gameplan’ and they were very confident in terms of the physical abilities and what they were feeling out on the park not to panic. That is the biggest improvement I would say that this group has made in terms of distance travelled from the team that we were last season.”
VIEWS ON SLOW STARTS AND BEING BETTER IN SECOND HALVES
“I think it is a good sign of resilience. Looking at the kind of team we are and our style of play. How physical attrition wears teams down as well. We are a very physical team. There is only so long you can put your thumb on the dam when people like the du Preez twins continue to run at you. I think it is a bit of everything; it’s game style and a bit of resilience. There is a growing belief that they have got the minerals, stamina and nous to come through in those second halves. Since last Christmas that is something we have addressed strongly. We weren’t winning the second halves for the first half of last season and then we won the majority of them after Christmas. I haven’t put my finger on why but the best teams have the ability, not that we are the best team but we aspire to be one of the best. Part of the skillset and armoury you need is to be able to break teams down and to break them over the course of a game and that is done through a multitude of ways.”
RETURN OF SUPER RAFFI QUIRKE
“I don’t think anyone did (expect him to play so brilliantly on first game back after long-term injury), I don’t think he did. I had a quiet little word to him just before half-time and said to him ‘Don’t force it, do the basics well, if there’s quicker ball it will open up for you’. That was basically it, do the basics well but there was nothing basic about what he did. He was exceptional in every area, both sides of the ball. I think he surprised himself in terms of his performance.”
AVAILABILITY OF BEN CURRY AND DAN DU PREEZ THIS WEEK
“If it (last weekend’s game) was a Cup Final, and as I said last week it wasn’t a Cup Final it was just another Saturday, they would have played, with the understanding that we have got another 9 months and 20-odd games of the season. There is a duty of care to look after these lads over the stretch to make sure that we are still firing at the end. With the strength in depth that we have got in that area with both Curry’s and both du Preez’s, Jono Ross and Sam Dugdale, who is playing really well, we thought it was best to play those who are 100%, fully fit and who had trained all week. They are up for selection (this week).”
Big, statement news coming tomorrow (Wednesday 12th October)
IMPACT OF ARRIVAL OF JONNY HILL
“I think we haven’t seen the best of him and that is saying something because he is playing really well. He got 2 or 3 lineout steals the other day and he was everywhere, very very athletic. Even by his own admission I think there is more in him still. Certainly a great bloke, you never truly know someone until you get into the trenches with them and he is the guy I would go in the trenches with every time. I love him, loving what he is about and he has got a quiet way about him. His ability around the park is excellent, his athleticism and movement in the line-out as you saw last week is second to none and there were big moments. Physically and in defence is where I think we can make some of the biggest strides with him, I think he can start smashing people because he wants to.”
TOM CURRY
“This is the best he has played for us while I have been here. He affects the game in every facet; in kick chase, scoring tries, making breaks, winning turnovers. He has been absolutely outstanding and I think that has been a direct result of how he came back in the pre-season. He was quite a different character to what I had witnessed. I think he has a handle on himself better in how he can sustain his level of physical and mental preparation because the amount he does he totally ends himself so that is really difficult physically to be able to do it but also to get to that level of application mentally I don’t know how he does it.
“We have worked out a playing and rest plan for him that takes him right through to the second week in January. I won’t divulge it because it will be obvious which games he is missing out. He won’t play more than 4 games on the bounce which gives him that bright light at the end of the tunnel where he can see a week where he can recover, boost and refresh. I guess it opens himself up to ending himself like he does so that is part of it. I think in the past he has just been put on a treadmill until he is broken. So we addressed that, he seeks help like all the best players do from outside the club to better himself in terms of his mental resilience. Where we can we try to deload him cognitively and physically. He doesn’t miss sessions but we just manage him so he doesn’t burn himself out. It is quite a collective approach which he has full autonomy but we have decent input from our side and what he feels works for him.
“When it gets to that cutting edge we don’t have anyone in house who can help lads with that. We have experts like Wayne Hoyle and Jamie Langley but he has gone outside to see someone because he wanted it to be separate from the club, hence why I probably shouldn’t be talking about it because that is a thing he wants for himself.
“There is a break and there is a break. Getting motivated is a skill, let’s talk about some mental resilience but then able to have proper time off is also a skill that you have to learn. He got off to Kenya this summer and really got away from it so maybe that was a period of reflection for him where he has come back that bit fresher.
“It takes his international responsibilities into account (not playing more than 4 games on the bounce). I meet with Eddie (Jones) on Friday to see if he agrees with this plan as well because it has to be aligned. It is planned out but it is not rigidly planned out because there are many caveats to having a long-term plan for someone due to injury, illness and all those other things that could be a factor. This is a good plan but it can only ever be a loose plan in principle and we will take each week as it comes but in principle it is mapped out for him until mid-January.
“I would like to think so (the evidence being there that the plan is working). He is highly motivated and at the moment playing out of his skin. He made about 17 tackles at the weekend, let’s just say he made 25 which is well within Tom’s capacity, you might have to change that plan then. He might then have to have a week off after if he is carrying a knock. So we constantly have to have a reappraisal of that. But some certainty particularly for someone of Tom’s personality traits likes to have a plan and have things set to get his focus on is a positive one for him and enjoys the process of doing it.”
WHAT ‘MORE THAN A RUGBY CLUB’ MEANS
“It’s a home, it’s a rugby club to dip your toe into or in professional terms it’s a place of work. It is more than all of that, it’s a vocation and a home. It has to be more than a club if you want to aspire to good things, to leave legacies behind you have got to go that little bit extra than other clubs and teams do. We are building a bit of a family here, we are very tight at the moment and long may that continue. It is easy to be that way with the results we have been getting. Therein lies the challenge for me in the middle of the season to be just as tight and together as we are right now.”
WORKING ON IMPROVING THE DISCIPLINE
“We are working on it. Yellow cards have improved dramatically. I think we were 11th for the number of yellow cards we received last season compared to the most the season before that. So you can see how we have improved in that area. There is an increase generally in the number of yellow and red cards for obvious reasons in regards to contact to head. It’s something you have to mitigate for in terms of your training methodology as well.”
TOGETHERNESS OF THE SQUAD IN DEALING WITH ADVERSITY
“Togetherness is one thing, the change of the plan, the adaptation and flexibility within the chaos is something we have trained from Week 1 of pre-season. There is thinking on your feet, how we can communicate what’s next and to be able to shelve what has just happened and come up with a new plan. We have been at a ‘disaster training’ camp for 3 days in Wiltshire during the summer. I spent some time with Sir Andrew Strauss who adopted similar principles when he trained his side to win the World Cup and that Super Over. Every Tuesday we look to embrace chaos, we put the players under it and we make them fail and understand the calculated risks within that failure. It is part of our process on a weekly basis and through pre-season to be able to deal with these moments of adversity and come out the other side just as tight and together. It’s not by fluke.”
OTHER POINTS
Wouldn’t get rid of draws in the Premiership despite drawing both games against London Irish last season
Situation of Worcester and Wasps not a good look for the Premiership, described the situation as tragic as lots of people becoming unemployed. Hopeful that this is an opportunity to change the game for the better
Ex-players Curtis Langdon and Cam Neild still in contact, still have a very good relationship with them, Langdon was at one of the Prem Rugby Cup games, still part of the Sale family
4 of the youngest coaches with the most potential went to Australia for 2 weeks over the summer to learn from some of the best environments in the Southern Hemisphere that Sanderson has experienced in the past- came back empowered. Gaining insights into different teams across a number of sports for example teams in the AFL in Australia. Sharing with Melbourne Storm, whose high performance director was at Carrington today (Tuesday 11th October)
Winning games and becoming a winning side brings crowds in, knows the crowds are out there to come and support Sale and fill out the AJ Bell Stadium
Some negotiations were had with South Africa over the fixture that Bristol have but it didn’t work out in terms of using Old Trafford
Negotiation of buying the AJ Bell outright is still ongoing but pain-staking
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