Rugby Union (was 2014-15, now an ongoing thread)

[PaulWinch again]

Showed decent heart from 60 minutes onwards, pity they were terrible before that. Goode, Twelvetrees and Tom Youngs shouldn't be near the team. But I bet it's Joseph that gets binned. Very disappointing and it's clear now that as soon as Farrell is back Cipriani will be out of the squad.

[Pete3206]

Rubbish

[Proposition Joe]

WTF?  Marginally forward at best.  Half the AB's passes are more forward than that.

[PaulWinch again]

Twelvetrees is terrible every time he plays, he has to go. What an awful sporting weekend.

[paul_e]

England haven't been helped by some ropey decisions at key times, giving Ireland the put in to the scrum on their line when there was nothing there being the worst.

Forward pass there when 4 or 5 irish ones have been allowed to go sums it up as well.

However the game plan was shit,  Goode is a waste of space and twelvetrees isn't good enough either.

I seriously hate losing to Ireland, they're fucking shit but kick well and get away with fucking about on the floor.  For some reason we always go down to their level and make them look like world beaters.

[Proposition Joe]

Twelvetrees is terrible every time he plays, he has to go. What an awful sporting weekend.

Chelsea to win the League Cup to wrap it up probably.

[PaulWinch again]

England haven't been helped by some ropey decisions at key times, giving Ireland the put in to the scrum on their line when there was nothing there being the worst.

Forward pass there when 4 or 5 irish ones have been allowed to go sums it up as well.

However the game plan was shit,  Goode is a waste of space and twelvetrees isn't good enough either.

I seriously hate losing to Ireland, they're fucking shit but kick well and get away with fucking about on the floor.  For some reason we always go down to their level and make them look like world beaters.

They're not shit really though, you don't win 10 test matches in a row if you're shit. However we let them play it wasn't good enough. Goode shouldn't be anywhere near the squad. Also I'm getting sick of England teams giving away shed loads of penalties.

[paul_e]

On the highlights they've just shown a penalty against Robshaw but how can he be offside when that ball was clearly out, lying on the floor 6 inches behind the ruck with the scrum half pissing about.  10 minutes later they came round the side in exactly the same way and it was played on.

[paul_e]

England haven't been helped by some ropey decisions at key times, giving Ireland the put in to the scrum on their line when there was nothing there being the worst.

Forward pass there when 4 or 5 irish ones have been allowed to go sums it up as well.

However the game plan was shit,  Goode is a waste of space and twelvetrees isn't good enough either.

I seriously hate losing to Ireland, they're fucking shit but kick well and get away with fucking about on the floor.  For some reason we always go down to their level and make them look like world beaters.

They're not shit really though, you don't win 10 test matches in a row if you're shit. However we let them play it wasn't good enough. Goode shouldn't be anywhere near the squad. Also I'm getting sick of England teams giving away shed loads of penalties.

Compared to where we should be they are. They've got half  backs who can kick but have very little else to their game, centres who have no footwork and run predictable lines, 2 wingers who are defensively solid and will chase kicks but have no real pace or ability to beat men.  That's not a backline that we should be terrified of but instead of getting right in the faces of Murray and Sexton to force them to pass it on we let them play the kick and chase game which is the one thing they're good at and then when we get the ball we just kick back to them to give them another chance, it drives me mad.

They do have a decent pack but the key to playing against the Irish pack is to just run over the dickhead who rolls between the tackle and the oncoming players and give him a bit of a shoeing rather than taking a bit of care and letting their follow up players get in position over the ball, Ireland are masters of making sure the tackler gets his body in the way so you have to make sure they know you're not going to give them an easy time if they do.

The other Irish 'trick' is that they counter the ctach and drive by starting their counter drive before the catcher is on the floor, Robshaw should be highlighting that every single time and making sure the ref knows about it but he's just far too passive and let O'Connell do all the talking so the ref was always on their side, thats the main reason I don't think Robshaw should be the captain or guaranteed his place.

[Jon Crofts]

Joubert is fast becoming as bad as Steve Walsh.  Some shockers in there today.

My god, would you pay money to watch Ireland?  I wouldn't.

[cheadlevilla]

Too many penalties again. I thought Attwood  looked like what he is... 6th choice lock. The back row isn't right and I think Robshaw is too nice to be captain
The backs still have enough potential and when Manu comes back there will be another dimension
Alex goode tho... Like a bloody oil tanker. Nowhere near international class

[paul_e]

Joubert is fast becoming as bad as Steve Walsh.  Some shockers in there today.

My god, would you pay money to watch Ireland?  I wouldn't.

That's what I mean when I say they're shit, they've perverted the game to be something akin to gaelic football and then win on the back of being the only side that plays that way with any experience.

Too many penalties again. I thought Attwood  looked like what he is... 6th choice lock. The back row isn't right and I think Robshaw is too nice to be captain
The backs still have enough potential and when Manu comes back there will be another dimension
Alex goode tho... Like a bloody oil tanker. Nowhere near international class

Which is why Lawes should've stayed with the squad, when you see Lawes rip quins apart on friday and then watch Attwood and Krui struggle to compete 2 days later you have to think the manager has made a big mistake. I'm also still not convinced Haskell has the quality to play internationally, any thoughts of him keeping the shirt over Wood surely have to be dismissed now.

On Robshaw he works very hard and covers a lot of ground and he's a good tackler but I'm not really sure what else he brings, kicking to the corner at 6-3 when we'd had no territory was a mistake and indirectly led to a lot of the extra pressure we put ourselves under later on.

Fundamentally I can't work out how a team who are 12 points clear at the top of the league have less players in the squad than the teams who are 6th and 9th and have been poor pretty consistently all season.  I understand that Northampton have some injuries which mean Wood and Lawes weren't available but their player of the season so far is Clark who should be ahead of Croft and Corbs is the best prop in Europe and has to be in the 23 for me.  I'd also still put Dickson and Simpson as the best options at 9 right now.

[Dante Lavelli]

I can only assume that Lawes was given the opportunity to get some match practice before being reintroduced to the team.  I'm not sure it is reasonable to have expected him to be so 'match fit' (frighteningly so - those hits!) after two months out.

My opinion on Ire v Eng is that they're probably a year further advanced than us, better drilled and won their set plays/executed their moves better.  Sexton was a huge part of that (up and under for example).

[UK Redsox]

Too many penalties again. I thought Attwood  looked like what he is... 6th choice lock. The back row isn't right and I think Robshaw is too nice to be captain
The backs still have enough potential and when Manu comes back there will be another dimension
Alex goode tho... Like a bloody oil tanker. Nowhere near international class

Goode made one nice defensive gather near the posts while running backwards, avoided some tacklers and got back out to the 22.

However he also called for a mark when catching the ball behind the try line. Not sure what he was thinking.

36 looks poor at international level, which is hardly surprising because he looks decidedly average at club level.

[lovejoy]

Can't believe Twelvetrees is bring slated here, he was only on late in the game.

We were chasing the game and we had no pace Nowell on the pitch and try scorer unpredictable runner Johnny May unavailable. Thanks so much Lancaster you mug.