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Official Rugby Thread
- Thread starter KennyD
- Start date
England deserved more than 3pt from the half but will have to tighten up the discipline to avoid the second forty being a long one.Think it's why I'm really enjoying the 6 nations, I've no dog in the fight, beyond whoever is playing England.
Simple little crash ball on half time makes the 2nd half fun again.
Annoyingly I won't catch the 2nd half, been a fun game.
Him and Ramos having a go at each other somewhat ironic. Use that energy when tackling...
England line outs in their own half have been France's strongest set piece.
Molehill
Cricketer Of The Year
Some strange reffing in that game too, seemed like virtually every pen given to them came from someone other than the ref, including the decisive one.
Good game though.
He also took over a minute to spot the kick, which gave France a much easier defensive set of phases after the kick off.
BoyBrumby
Englishman
Think the final table actually ended up being a relatively fair reflection of where the nations are currently too, with maybe only England being ahead of Scotland the difference in my own completely unscientific rankings.
Welsh be buggered though; provincial sides have gone to shit too.
Welsh be buggered though; provincial sides have gone to shit too.
Uppercut
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I’m much more worried about England than Scotland going forward. Scotland strike me as a team that’s not so well coached, but where the coaches stay in place by taking credit for a much better generation of players. England really look like they’re building something. I’ve been told that Borthwick has a great reputation among top level players and that Townsend, uh, doesn’t.
France are a mess, but the good thing about being awful at the basics of team organisation is that it should be easily fixable. So I’d expect them to bounce back next year.
wpdavid
Hall of Fame Member
England ended up being rather better than I'd expected, especially after somewhat uninspiring wins in their first two games. Even the defeat in Scotland, who were reputed to be streets ahead of us, didn't feel like a disaster as we dominated the first quarter, scoring an unusually fluent try in the process, before conceding a slightly soft try to get the Scots up and running and then being on the wrong end of a world class performance by their winger. I felt the performance against Ireland was great even if Marcus hadn't popped over that last-minute winner. And we went far closer in France than I'd expected. My immediate response reading about the deciding penalty was same old English indiscipline costing the side, but maybe that's unfair.
Given how many people were writing off Borthwick as being out of his depth a few months ago, I'll take that as an improvement.
Given how many people were writing off Borthwick as being out of his depth a few months ago, I'll take that as an improvement.
Furball
Evil Scotsman
I fear England will absolutely ****ing smash us at Twickenham next year. The recent record has been too one-sided in our favour in the last few years and I think there's a reckoning coming for Townsend in the not too distant future.
I thought the game on Saturday was fairly similar to our pool game against South Africa; didn't disgrace ourselves by any means but we were absolutely toothless in attack and had no answer to superior opponents.
Our game management in the 2nd half is shocking; we'd have been a point away from a Grand Slam if we were only counting first half performances, and I'm pretty sure we'd have lost all 5 games if we only counted 2nd half performance.
We've got absolutely **** all coming through the youth ranks as well.
Certainly England were playing cleaner attacking rugby by the end of the tournament. Not sure they've got the D sorted though. A long way even from the WC, where we were a whisker away from making the final.
Furball
Evil Scotsman
Italy are the intriguing team for me. It's not inconceivable that they could have ended the tournament 2nd with an identical win loss record to Ireland and only failed to win due to lack of bonus points. I thought they were also incredibly impressive for 79½ minutes against Wales and had a great second half against us; they've also got a lot of genuinely impressive young talent which is actually home grown and not imported.
Scotland v Wales for the wooden spoon next year is actually quite a depressing proposition.
Scotland v Wales for the wooden spoon next year is actually quite a depressing proposition.
Uppercut
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France kinda make everyone’s attack look great while making their defence look terrible.
I was thinking over a longer period than just yesterday's match.
Molehill
Cricketer Of The Year
Interesting looking at how teams progressed through the comp:
Ireland - Excellent to start off with, maybe made to look a little better than they actually were by opposition off form. Gradually regressed and didn't look that far ahead of the others by the end. That may have been more to do with the tournament being all but won, but losing in Twickenham will have hurt. Suspect they come back stronger again next year.
France - Dreadful start but improved as they got over the loss of Dupont and found a decent new scrum half. The size of that pack is going to cause big issues for opposition.
England - Pretty poor in opening 3 games, but signs of things starting to come together in final 2. Looks like they've found a star in Martin whilst other youngsters also shone. The future looks brighter than it did at the start.
Scotland - All a bit meh really. What's the point in beating the team you most want to if you lose to Italy in the next one? Doesn't feel like they're going anywhere and are getting overtaken by others who are improving.
Italy - You do get some odd results post World Cup, but this definitely looks like they're improving. Only in Dublin did they get outplayed, will be interesting to see where they go from here.
Wales - I was surprised Gatland came back. Everyone could see their best players were retiring whilst the domestic teams were in crisis. This was not a surprise, the concern for them is, I'm not sure they've hit rock bottom yet.
Ireland - Excellent to start off with, maybe made to look a little better than they actually were by opposition off form. Gradually regressed and didn't look that far ahead of the others by the end. That may have been more to do with the tournament being all but won, but losing in Twickenham will have hurt. Suspect they come back stronger again next year.
France - Dreadful start but improved as they got over the loss of Dupont and found a decent new scrum half. The size of that pack is going to cause big issues for opposition.
England - Pretty poor in opening 3 games, but signs of things starting to come together in final 2. Looks like they've found a star in Martin whilst other youngsters also shone. The future looks brighter than it did at the start.
Scotland - All a bit meh really. What's the point in beating the team you most want to if you lose to Italy in the next one? Doesn't feel like they're going anywhere and are getting overtaken by others who are improving.
Italy - You do get some odd results post World Cup, but this definitely looks like they're improving. Only in Dublin did they get outplayed, will be interesting to see where they go from here.
Wales - I was surprised Gatland came back. Everyone could see their best players were retiring whilst the domestic teams were in crisis. This was not a surprise, the concern for them is, I'm not sure they've hit rock bottom yet.