It’s always a great honour to lead the regional side, but as last season, injury has meant that this honour has been passed around a few of the team now. We would all like to get a bit more consistency on the pitch and our injury count has unfortunately had a big impact on that.
We were gutted with the result on the weekend, maybe a lot of people didn’t rate our chances before the game but we certainly believed that if we played well were in with a good shout in that match.
Obviously against a team of Toulouse’s calibre, you can’t afford to give away 21 points in cheap penalties. If we can sort out our penalty count and build on the positive aspects of the game then we should get a good performance and a good result tonight.
Well done to Will and Dan for getting called up into the Welsh squad for the Autumn internationals. I thought Brewie (Aled) and Douggie (Gavin Thomas) were unlucky not to get in with the way they have been playing this season but hopefully some more good performances will see a few more of our boys in the Six Nations squad.
Although we haven’t played Aironi before, they have a lot of seasoned Italian internationals who I’ve been lucky enough to play against and I’m sure they are going to provide a very tough test.
It’s great to see ground being broken on the new stadium. Our supporters have been really dedicated and it’s great to be able to reward them by building a quality facility for you to enjoy on matchday. On a personal note, I was promised a new stadium when I signed for the Dragons and many of you will know just how long I’ve been around so I’m perhaps more excited than most about this development!
For those of you worrying about Joe Bearman’s return to fitness, he has been working very hard on his rehab – although judging by his golf swing when I thrashed him the other day, he perhaps has a way to go yet…
Enjoy the game
Luke Charteris
