England obviously lost in the Lomu semi of 1995, but I had to look up what happened in the 3rd/4th play off. I'm not sure we can really count those fixtures.
I think it was me who mentioned the stop start, I was more referring to the tackles and lack of competition at the breakdown. It just all seems rather repetitive, although you could certainly accuse of Union of being similar when a team is 5 yards out trying to get over the line.
English rugby has its own issues (the distribution of wealth seemingly being the biggest one), but losing players/fans to League probably isn't one.
I prefer to phrase it as "By the time of the next world cup it will be twelve years and counting since the Wobblies made a semi final".
He's now married to a racehorse trainer, incidentally.
Ireland are allowed to develop new players
Tough to replace those who got them to the number one ranking though. Either Ireland have developed a production line like NZ/SA or this was a team of generational talent (and some well pilfered backs).
Would be 16 years if there had been a competent ref in 2015.I prefer to phrase it as "By the time of the next world cup it will be twelve years and counting since the Wobblies made a semi final".
Tough to pick your worst post on this topic, but this one might be up there.
No, because Scotland would of been penalised 4-5 times at the scrum for angling in and the game already gone before the correct offside decision was made at a poorly executed lineout throwing to the back instead of the front when securing the ball was priority.
His son, as well as being a very talented keeper-batsman, plays for the NZ men's hockey team.
I deal in facts, you’re just baffled by them!!
I think a fair bit of it comes down to the club system too. Having all the International players essentially play for just 3 clubs (and mostly 2) creates so much understanding. Joe Schmidt also had a huge role to play and created the environment for Farrell to come into.
It's always confused me why the two best English coaches of the past twenty years - Edwards and Farrell - have never coached England.
Could probably add Rob Baxter to the list (is two names a list? Anyway...) as he's always largely absent from these discussions and has a far more compelling body of work than, oh I dunno, Steve Borthwick, say.
We can probably thank Eddie Jones for that. Farrell was part of the ill fated Lancaster regime and was sacked when Jones arrived (despite being well regarded by Gatland on the Lions Tour). Edwards could've come to the England set up after leaving Wales.....but you know.....Jones!!