One aspect that we've touched on before, but is becoming more prevalent as a tactic, is the deliberate feigning injury. Its being used especially against us by teams that are packed with big blokes in order to give them regular breathers so they can maintain the fast line-speed in defence and allow them to give their all in briefer spells. It also disrupts the flow of the game to stop us getting on a roll.
Given McNamara's background at Bratfud, whose entire gameplay was steamrollering the more skillful opposition, it's no surprise that Catalans deployed this [cheating] tactic against us. The game was stop-start throughout, with much of that down to injuries that miraculously cleared up after the requisite time that allowed their big guys to recover some energy levels.
But what can we do about it? Just as Cas (last season) and us (this season) have brought back flair rugby to replace the boring, monotonous grind of big blokes slamming into each other, the coaches who adhere to the 'let's pack the team with big blokes' mentality have come up with a new, cheating way to nullify skill and we're heading back to square one.