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Davies: Blues ready to kick on

Davies: Blues ready to kick on

Bradley Davies

Bradley Davies reckons Cardiff Blues can “kick-on” this season after enduring a painful return to the Arms Park.

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The Blues returned to the iconic ground at the beginning of the last campaign amid huge support from fans.

But with an inexperienced squad, they were unable to produce the goods on the pitch and slumped to ninth in the RaboDirect PRO12 .

This time round though, Davies is confident the Blues will flourish in the new season.

“We haven’t spoken too much about it (goals for the season) yet, last season we talked about constantly improving and gaining more consistency and I think we did that towards the end,” said the Wales second-row.

“We got a lot of stick and flak throughout the season which was disappointing because if you look at most of our games we only lost by one score, so it could have been a lot different.

“Last year it was well documented that we lost 16 players and we were coming to end of a cycle really.

“It is going to be a bit of pain first but hopefully we have gone through that now and if you look at our squad we have got a really nice mix.

“There were boys last year who hadn’t played any first class rugby.

“But now we have played Toulon way in the Heineken Cup and we have played Toulon at home and big Leinster teams and big Munster teams.

“So the boys who haven’t played much rugby have played against these teams now, and they are a year wiser and a year stronger and know how to deal with it and hopefully we can kick on.”

The Blues kick-off their pre-season friendlies against Worcester Warriors tomorrow and Davies admits there is a feel-good factor buzzing around the region – something heightened by the installation of a new artificial pitch.

“This year is about building blocks and getting a good start which is Glasgow away and then two home games,” said Davies.

“We have a fantastic new field and it will be interesting to see how that goes because we try to play a fast flowing game and that will suit us.

“It was difficult to play on before, but that is no disrespect to any of the ground staff there, it is just down to the amount of rain we had and no field could have stood up to that.

“I think it is a wise decision to put in the new field and it has put a bit of a feel-good factor around Cardiff.

“I think a lot of people are looking forward to coming to watch us play rugby on a state-of-the-art pitch.”

On a personal level Davies hopes firing the Blyes to greater success will lead to further Wales honours.

But with the likes of Alun Wyn Jones, Ian Evans, Luke Charteris and Andrew Coombs providing intense competition, Davies knows he has his work cut out.

“I have always got ambitions to play for Wales and obviously to lead them over the summer was a massive honour,” he added.

“But rugby is so swings and roundabouts that one minute you are on top of the world and then the next you are injured or banned or something happens and you have just got to deal with it. 

“For me, the key is playing well in the Blues jersey.

“If I play well in blue I get a red jersey which Phil (Davies, Blues director of rugby) keeps saying, so if I am playing well week in week out for the Blues and high quality then it might mean that Wales cannot not pick me.”

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