Seems the media explosion has begun following his debut for Wales vs South Africa in the close loss on Saturday. The Western Mail has, predictably, tipped him for the Lions… backed up by comments from Barry John and Martyn Williams.

Interesting. Not very accurate though. Indeed calling his game exceptional is pushing it beyond the realms of belief. Through my beer induced haze I admit I thought him the best player on the park and was confused why Mr Warren Gatland appeared to pour cold water on that by commenting on his lack of rucking. Then I took a second, more sober, less passionate look – and it was obvious.

First the positives. Powell gave us go forward the likes of which has been missing since Ryan Jones was on form. His quick feet and power in contact regualrly put the powerful bokkes on the back foot. For a debutant he lacked any fear which was great to see.

But a closer look shows a couple of things

1. Gatland was right, instead of hitting and clearing rucks you could usually see Andy Powell hovering around the centre, wing positions. He is an 8 and needs to do dog work before the fancy stuff.
2. The first try showed he was caught out of position. Ryan Jones protected the fringe of the ruck but Andy powell wandered off into midfield thinking RJ was covering a runner rather than watching for 9 snipes or forwards pick and go.
3. Lack of control at the base of the scrums

Thats not to say he had a bad game he played well. But it does show there is huge amounts of his game yet to work on and its the sort of thing that Gatland, Shaun Edwards et all demand. See how quickly Popham disappeared after what many people thought was a good sub appearance vs England last year.

Hopefully though Gats can fix it because with the sort of power shown by Andy powell in both that Welsh rugby game and for the Cardiff Blues he has a lot to offer us.

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