International Rugby

[paul_e]

Howley made a mistake by taking Moriarty off that early.

I know that the Welsh game plan involved kicking the ball in field but the players in the pitch should have ignored that and go pen row z with the kick that lead to the England try.

Also, what was my fellow Forester, Alex Cuthbert, doing by showing Daly the outside. Cuthbert's not got the pace to do that. He should have funnelled Daly back inside in the hope that cover was coming accross

Last bit, I said exactly the same to a friend, it's like he didn't know anything about Daly other than him being a centre so he gave him a gap.  Utterly ridiculous if you've seen Daly play.

[UK Redsox]

Having played a few seasons on the wing* for Lydney 3rds, I consider myself an expert in these matters


*yes....I was a winger....so stop laughing all those that know what I look like now

[UK Redsox]

Having just watched the try again, I don't think that Alex actually got close enough to be able to show Daley the inside. He was done for pace from the start.

[Jon Crofts]

Anyone see the France Scotland game?
What on earth was Russell doing at the conversion, can only imagine he was told time was about to run out after the try by the referee, 90 seconds isn't it?

France deserved winners, they managed the second half very well and could and probably should have been awarded another try according to the letter of the law.

Another enjoyable and close game, it seems Italy are letting the competition down, are they really as bad as they appear to be? Time to let in Romania in a few years maybe?

[peter w]

Wales - England women's is on right (sky sports 3) and is the most painfully 1sided game I've seen for a while, 0-31 on half hour and we've been toying with them. Touch more precision and we'd have 2-3 more tries, we've butchered 2 when it was easier to score.

Finished 0-63 and that flatters the welsh.

I missed the u20 game live but I've caught up now, Mercer at 8 was superb again, as were Randall and Umaga an 9 and 10.  The 2nd try showed why I think Cokanasiga will be special,  he got the ball with very little space and smashed through to make 10 yards and turn them and we just exploited the space.

Watched it also after remembering you mentioning hem last week. As you said Mercer was sensational. Not a million miles away from the first team.

[nigel]

Anyone see the France Scotland game?
What on earth was Russell doing at the conversion, can only imagine he was told time was about to run out after the try by the referee, 90 seconds isn't it?

France deserved winners, they managed the second half very well and could and probably should have been awarded another try according to the letter of the law.

Another enjoyable and close game, it seems Italy are letting the competition down, are they really as bad as they appear to be? Time to let in Romania in a few years maybe?

Yes, John,  I thought that, too, but after the game they run a timer on it and he still had a good 20 seconds left.
He seemed to look at the guy who bought the tee on, so maybe it was him that rushed it.
For me, though, why did he even need a tee for that kick?

I agree, France deserved it. Can't help but think that with all the Scottish injuries through the game disrupted their play.

[paul_e]

Anyone see the France Scotland game?
What on earth was Russell doing at the conversion, can only imagine he was told time was about to run out after the try by the referee, 90 seconds isn't it?

France deserved winners, they managed the second half very well and could and probably should have been awarded another try according to the letter of the law.

Another enjoyable and close game, it seems Italy are letting the competition down, are they really as bad as they appear to be? Time to let in Romania in a few years maybe?

Yes, John,  I thought that, too, but after the game they run a timer on it and he still had a good 20 seconds left.
He seemed to look at the guy who bought the tee on, so maybe it was him that rushed it.
For me, though, why did he even need a tee for that kick?

I agree, France deserved it. Can't help but think that with all the Scottish injuries through the game disrupted their play.

Scotland have, in 2 games, been exactly what I expected from them.  They have a lot of potential but they bits don't all fit properly right now.  Sometimes it will all click and they'll look brilliant, other times they'll just look out of sorts.  Either way they're defensively solid so I suspect mostly tight games.

As for Italy, it's really furstrating, every time they seem to turn a corner they end up going backwards again.  I'm starting to think that they do need to look at options for promotion and relegation.  I'd probably tie it to the world cup so the relegation happens in the world cup year (so 2019 next) and teams get a 4 year cycle to try to step up, changing it every season would just end up being a rotation of the whipping boys.  On top of that stretching it out a little longer would encourage teams to build gradually rather than throwing everything at a shot to nothing .  Right now Georgia would be the obvious choice to come in and I think they'd be a lot more competitive than italy have been in the last couple of years.

[nigel]

Although ireland played well I thought Italy were woeful yesterday.
It became a training session for the last 30 min.

Guarantee Italy will put in 80 min of fight vrs England, though 😊

[Risso]

Anyone see the France Scotland game?
What on earth was Russell doing at the conversion, can only imagine he was told time was about to run out after the try by the referee, 90 seconds isn't it?

To be fair if they were playing proper football it would have been a well taken penalty!

[UK Redsox]

Anyone see the France Scotland game?
What on earth was Russell doing at the conversion, can only imagine he was told time was about to run out after the try by the referee, 90 seconds isn't it?

On the radio this morning, the thinking was that Scotland were concerned that the try might be reviewed if they didn't quickly taken the conversion

I didn't see the game, so I don't know whether this view is correct

[Jon Crofts]

Anyone see the France Scotland game?
What on earth was Russell doing at the conversion, can only imagine he was told time was about to run out after the try by the referee, 90 seconds isn't it?

On the radio this morning, the thinking was that Scotland were concerned that the try might be reviewed if they didn't quickly taken the conversion

I didn't see the game, so I don't know whether this view is correct

I heard that as well, but there's also a recording from the refs mic where you can hear him tell Russell to hurry up.  So the tee boy turning up late, the ref telling him to hurry up and the threat of a TMO review of the try.  No pressure then.

[paul_e]

I actually missed that kick at the time, I caught the try as I was going out the door, came back from picking up my daughter a few minutes later and had 3-4 messages on facebook and whatsapp telling me it was the best bit of the match.  What I don't get though is why, given he was clearly rushing it, he didn't do a drop kick.  I played 8 or 12 so never had to do drop kicks in a game but I could reliably nail one from there, an international fly half should be able to do that with his eyes closed.  It was bizarre.

moving on the championship is already starting to take the sort of pattern I suspected, England and Italy as bookends either side of 4 very evenly matched teams who can all beat each other.  I think home advantage will be key next round though so I'm going for Scotland, Ireland and England, then Wales, France and England the follow week.  If it goes as I expect we'll win the championship that weekend with a record equaling 18th consecutive win and go into the no-pressure environment of Ireland away needing a win to get the grand slam and the consecutive wins record and push ourselves firmly up alongside NZ at the top of the rankings with a massive gap to the rest (which is a true reflection of where we and NZ are compared to the rest).  In no way is that the ultimate setup for Ireland to piss on our chips.

[nigel]

That's, more or less, what I was getting at, Paul. 
Why did he even need a tee from that position?
The pitches are so even these days that it's virtually impossible to miss at that level.

To the Elliot Daly try.
Cuthbert made a massive error in his positioning. I played on the wing for years and never worried pace wise, but, I can't remember ever leaving my opposite wing open like that.

[paul_e]

I think Cuthbert has got away with it in the press, all the blame seems to be pointed at the kick but even though the kick was awful they had the time to recover and they just didn't see the danger.  As they said in the commentary though, Wales had done half again as many tackles by that point and I wonder if they were just a bit off the pace.  The biggest thing to say about this England team is that, with the 'finishers' on the bench and the very high natural fitness levels of the squad we're still going at 100% at the end, not many teams can say that.

[nigel]

Agree, the kick was poor.
Sinkler is getting a lot of praise for forcing the kick error, and rightly so. It appears that the angle he attacked Davis forced him to alter his kicking angle.

It's funny how people reckon that Haskell could be playing himself out of the starting XV as his impact is so effective off the bench!!