**Official** 2005 Lions tour of New Zealand

[Blaze]

I don't know whether I should commend Sir Clive and the Lions management or not , for turning a week that should've been about the domination of the All Blacks into a week of discussion about spear tackles, illegal tackles and failure or not of the Citing Official !!

Anyway getting onto the Test at Wellington - weather expected to be fine from what I have heard !!

I expect Lions to win by drop goal or a penalty by Johnny W. against a 14 man All Blacks !! ( I predict one AB player to be sent off early at the first given opportunity for no obvious reason other than to appease Sir Clive !! )
Worst case scenario would be for a Full Punching Melee to erupt very early in the game and for several players to be sent off !!

I hope the players put on a decent show for the Royals and everyone without turning this game into a farcical game of 12 vs 13 or some such silly thing like that !! (Which it has a potential to become if the referee and match officials lose control of the game !!)

Ref tonight is Andrew Cole, a Sydney Dentist , but he doesn't have too many Big Test Match refereeing under his belt although he has done a very decent job in the Super 12 !!
He could easily be put under pressure and end up penalising or sending off players, because from what I've seen of him , he does not tolerate nonsense from any body !!

Come on Jason give the All Blacks and the ref some credit. They know exactly what Clive Woodward and Alistar Campbell are trying to do. Only two players have been sent off in the all blacks history I would be very surprised if that figure became 3 by the end of the night.

Andrew Cole will ref the game how he sees it and won't send anyone off unless they deserve it.

 

[Blaze]

A puzzling thing for me is why does Manawatu a second division Team play the Lions , but Waikato a Super 12 franchise and first division Team, doesn't get a game against the Lions ?

To spread the tour throughout the country probably. The people in the Waikato had the NZ Maori game to go to

 

[JASON]

Come on Jason give the All Blacks and the ref some credit. They know exactly what Clive Woodward and Alistar Campbell are trying to do. Only two players have been sent off in the all blacks history I would be very surprised if that figure became 3 by the end of the night.

Andrew Cole will ref the game how he sees it and won't send anyone off unless they deserve it.

Hope you are right, because I think everyone wants to see a Good AB v Lions Test, and no one wants this to be remembered as a Farce !!

 

[Blaze]

Hope you are right, because I think everyone wants to see a Good AB v Lions Test, and no one wants this to be remembered as a Farce !!

I am 100% sure that Cole will ref it as he sees it. We live in the profesional era after all.

 

[KennyD]

Andrew Cole = Good referee. He'll be right mate.

 

[Blaze]

What a game so far.. Lions are really up for it. Could go either way. 21-13 at the break

 

[BoyBrumby]

Meh.

Better from The Lions (if it was worse I'd have been reaching for the pills), but we're still more than a converted try behind at the break. Henson fell off the tackle badly in the break for Umaga's try & O'Connell was a divot charging into the ruck to concede the pen when we were winning the ball anyway, but other than that we've looked fairly solid. Line out has worked & we actually took a scrum against the head.

Whole thing seems slightly like a damage limitation exercise tho. Kelleher has looked the ABs best player, which is something I thought I'd never type!

We need an early score....

 

[BoyBrumby]

F*ck it. That's the dream over. Great try from Carter tho, wonderful skills.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Good strength from Easterby there, pity Jones never looked like making the conv.

@ 34-18 it looks little more than a consolation tho.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Fair play to the ABs. Really showed the gulf in class & quality in the 2nd half. Carter's performance in those 40 was simply out of this world. Shame he couldn't have gone over for his hat-trick at the end there, 'cos he really deserved it.

Ah well, always The Ashes!

 

[Sir Redman]

Brilliant...almost flawless in the second half. I missed the first 10 minutes of the game (working, but got off early) and it sounds like the Lions were good then but from there on we always looked most likely to score, and our defence solid. We put in some huge hits (poor Shane Williams, hammered twice within 20 seconds!!) and managed to get turnovers whenever the Lions were threatening.

Little left for the Lions to play for except pride...about the only positive they can take from the game would be their improved lineout

 

[Blaze]

Stick that up your **** Steven Jones (the writer)

By the way.. both of the Lions tries came about from dubious referee decisions. From the opening kick off the ball came off McCaw's shoulder and bounced into Umaga's hands. The All Blacks were away only for referee Cole to call it back and the Lions scored shortly after.

Their other try came as a result of a lineout from a penalty given for a Jerry Colins late tackle. The tackle was perfectly legitimate and advantage had accrued regardless.

In all fairness though the Lions did try hard and should be proud of the way they stuck at it even though the All Blacks were in a class of their own

 

[JASON]

What an absolutely brilliant performance by the ABs.

Credit to the Lions for battling hard all the way, despite the score line.

Carter, Umaga, McCaw, Kelleher were standouts IMO.

For the Lions, skipper Thomas, Steve Thomson, Williams, Peel played well.Henson hardly had any ball or did very little when he got it that he was hardly noticed.

Andrew Cole had an exceptional Game refereeing !!

Felt sorry for Sir Clive - after spending so much money (was it 9 million pounds or 90 million pounds) he should've produced a better result. His glum facial expression as he stood near the touch line close to the end said it all . But instead of wasting so much time on spin doctoring and playing mind games, he should've spent more time on picking the best Team and devising strategies to beat the ABs IMO.
IIRC,Did he not claim after winning the Rugby World Cup that he could coach any sport ? or Did he offer his services to the England cricket Team, then ?

The England cricket Team is on the up and I hope they don't let this guy come anywhere near them and spoil it for them .

Felt sorry for Prince William as he sat next to Jock Hobbs. Looked pretty sad. Also felt sorry for the British and Irish fans (10-20,000) who had spent a lot of money and their once in several year holiday on this Lions tour. Hope the Lions can do domething in the third Test so they can have something to cheer about !!

 

[shaka]

Great All Blacks backline, they did extremely well, one bad thing was they did not get hold of more lineout ball that they could have. Kelleher had a great game, as did Carter. Carter's kicking in play was awesome and as perfect as possible, Wilks missed a dropkick and a penalty and was disappointed in that.

 

[Tim]

Its been great to see recently particularly in the rugby & netball, the players getting tough & really hammering their opposition in a ruthless fashion.

The Lions can go back home with their tails between their legs, some of their reputations in tatters..particularly the much hyped forward pack.

No excuses this time...Sir Clive, I don't think he's as good as he's made out to be.

 

[Tim]

Dan Carter is THE #1 player in any position in the world. The good news is that he's only 23 and still has alot more to learn.

 

[shaka]

Auckland have a good shot at beating the Lions. i reckon Mehrtens or Carlos should play some part in the last game, as a swansong to their NZ based careers, anyone agree, since NZ have the series wrapped up.

 

[BoyBrumby]

Its been great to see recently particularly in the rugby & netball, the players getting tough & really hammering their opposition in a ruthless fashion.

The Lions can go back home with their tails between their legs, some of their reputations in tatters..particularly the much hyped forward pack.

No excuses this time...Sir Clive, I don't think he's as good as he's made out to be.

No, very fair point. In fact we were only really the best team in the world for about 2-3 months; SCW's England had peaked after our Australasian tour in '03 before the WC. I really think if the ABs had've made the final you'd have won. Martin Johnson & Jonny Wilkinson's left boot were the two main reasons we were a force.

I think in all fairness The Lions outscrummaged the ABs today, but that's scant consolation. I do wonder whether Jonny can be a major force again, it's easy to forget he's only 26 himself. Dan Carter was really magnificent today, his 2nd half was as good a half as I've seen in a test. Wilkinson won't have enjoyed that.

 

[Tim]

It'll be difficult for the Lions to get up for the Auckland match, and to be honest it's probably one of the worst possible warm-up matches they could have asked for when their heads are already down.

If I were Auckland i'd be pretty keen to get out there and play them. Particularly Joe Rokocoko. There's rumours about that he & Sivivatu could be our wingers for the Tri-Nations and Grand Slam tour later in the year.

 

[Tim]

England are in deep trouble if you ask me. It still appears that their players are stuck in the mentality of playing defensive rugby & with Wilkinson clearly off his game, there doesn't seem to be anyone else to give them direction.
Im not convinced that Andy Robinson is going to lead them to anything great, anytime soon either.

Ireland look as though they have a few good players hanging around and with a bit of time they could do very well. I think they're trying to play the same type of rugby as Wales and its no surprise they're winning more than their fair share of games.

Scotland, well..only 3 players in the Lions team. They're not going to going to threaten any half decent team in the next while.

Wales have the most potential I think. Their team is looking the most youthful and have the attacking flair.
Im not convinced about Henson in big matches. I think he's a bit of a girl to be honest, but he may just need some more years to mature. If he thought he was on par with Dan Carter then he's well off the pace.