'I never thought I'd say this, but I miss Mike Blair'
It was always going to be tough to win in South Africa against a Sharks side that has found its groove.
Edinburgh didn’t play that badly and we definitely improved on our previous performance in Durban. Even the margin of defeat tells that story pretty concisely. A six-point difference as opposed to a 10-point one and three tries apiece as opposed to 3-1 against.
Unfortunately it means little in a practical sense. We are still out of the Challenge Cup and we are rapidly running out of games and chances to ‘take the learnings’ from what has gone before.
It's not too difficult to see what this Edinburgh team is missing. A cursory glance at the statistical involvements of Sharks' wingers - Makazole Mapimpi and Werner Kok - compared with Edinburgh's - Duhan van der Merwe and Jake Henry - tells you everything you need to know.
I never thought I'd say this, but I miss Mike Blair. At least under his watch we were entertaining. I was totally prepared to sacrifice such frivolities but only on the proviso that we start winning, but we really aren't doing that often enough to make up for how one dimensional we look.
This week it’s back to the URC and Scarlets are the visitors to the Hive. They have only won once away from home this season and even that was still in Wales. We also have a recent victory against them to point to when, despite seemingly stopping playing in the second half, we ran out 19-31 winners.
Five games remain of the regular season. Last year 48 points were required to make the top eight. The year before it was 50 points. We are currently on 34 so you’d have to say three wins in those remaining games is the minimum target.
It has to start this weekend.
You can read more of Sandy's work on his blog The Burgh Watch
