Nottingham Rugby

Doncaster Knights travel to play Nottingham at Meadow lane on Wednesday 20th January with a kick off time of 7.30 pm.

Directions are linked HERE via Google Maps.

After Bedford Blues 5-point demolition of Nottingham last Saturday 51- 19, the Blues have moved up to 3rd place, but the telling statistic is that they have played an extra game more than the 2 teams above and below them. Cancellations due to the snow will have increased calculator sales within Rugby Union this winter.

This Wednesday evening is the Knights first game this year; Nottingham’s first game was that game against Bedford last Saturday and showed the effects of being out of match practice can have on a team.

Back in late December, when we were due to play, Nottingham were 3rd in the Championship with a game in hand. After so many games have had to be postponed, it’s a very different story. They are now 6th with 2 games in hand over every team above them but 3 against third-placed Bedford Blues.

Fourth--placed LW are only 4 league points and a points difference of 7 above/better than them. I think that Nottingham would expect to win at least 1 of their 2 games and amass a points difference of at least 8 in the process considering that in the 13 games they’ve played, they’ve won 8 and lost 5 of them (win % - nearly 62%). Effectively this puts Nottingham in 4th, they are 6 league points and a points difference of 134 behind Bedford, again with 3 games in hand, so it’s a target for them to rise higher. Even if they managed 3 bonus point victories, they couldn’t catch Exeter Chiefs in 2nd. They would love to go 4th or aim for 3rd in their first game in hand, which is against the Knights. Likewise the Knights need 5 points over 3 games in hand to get out of the relegation zone and into 8th, 8 points in 3 games to go 7th (win % - nearly 43%) so it’s everything to play for.

The Knights are now 9th, having played 14, won 6 and lost 8, to reiterate, we’ve got 3 games in hand over every team above us except Nottingham and 1 game against Bristol. On their respective journeys, the Knights have gained 4 bonus points (1 winning/try), Nottingham have gained 7 bonus points (5 winning/try).

On 3rd October Nottingham beat the Knights at Castle Park 7 – 23, so we’ve got to prevent them doing the double over us at their place. Not easy as they beat us 18 – 9 in Nottingham last season but not impossible as we’ve played 4 in Nottingham since we’ve been in rugby’s 2nd tier and both won and lost 2. The encounters are always hard-fought, as Justin Bishop would testify when he was injured against Nottingham, never to play again.

Nottingham have scored 44 tries (over 3/game) to the Knights’ 24 (less than 2 per/game). Averaged collectively Nottingham’s forwards rank higher in the Championship than their backs. Individually Luke Sherrriff (flanker) and Ben Johnston (centre), followed equally by David Jackson (wing) and Tim Streather (wing) are Nottingham’s top try scorers.

Defensively, Nottingham have had 35 tries scored against them (2.5 per/game), the Knights have had 22 tries scored against them (just over 1 per/game). Again scaled up to 16 games, only the Bees have had more tries scored against them. The Knights need to defend well against very strong try-scorers and attempt to score more than their average number of tries scored.

Nottingham’s tries tend to be scored throughout the game with a few more in the second half than the first half and the majority (about 36%) in the last quarter. Unfortunately about 61% of them have been scored at home. Positionally Nottingham’s try scoring has been back row followed by wingers and centres, then half backs, full backs etc. They haven’t been awarded any penalty tries yet.

Try leakage - Nottingham have had 35 tries scored against them (Knights 24) and these have been scored by back row, then wing, then front row, followed by the rest of the backs. Nottingham have also had 2 penalty tries awarded against them (Knights 0). Perhaps defence, particularly by the forwards is an slight weakness for the Knights to targe, while defence and the setting of a good platform is seemingly the best tactic to take on Nottingham at Meadow Lane..