International Rugby

[Gareth]

Would be good if the last action of the Saracens scandal would be to get that idiot binned....picking any Sarries in this 6 nations was a joke & disrespectful to the likes of Simmonds or Dombramdt ripping it up week after week in Prem

[paul_e]

Would be good if the last action of the Saracens scandal would be to get that idiot binned....picking any Sarries in this 6 nations was a joke & disrespectful to the likes of Simmonds or Dombramdt ripping it up week after week in Prem

Simmonds and Dombrandt are the tip of a huge iceberg of players who should've been involved. Marcus Smith should've bene starting at 10 all tournament, George Furbank got thrown to the lions far too early.

Odogwu, Randall, Mitchell and Ribbans were all dragged away from club rugby and given nothing and will now go back and have to fight back to fitness and form, Lawrence and Malins got a handful of minutes each and have both been setup to be scapegoated by him.

Ludlam and Harrison can both feel frustrated that they've been cast aside having done nothing wrong and there's 5-6 Props and Wingers that he's given a look for a few months and then abandoned.

There are a handful of positions where I feel for him, at Hooker we don't have much depth and at Lock losing Launchbury and Lawes is a big blow but he doesn't help himself by repeatedly picking out of form players and moaning about no depth of experience.

As I've said before he's making almost all the same mistakes that Southgate is/has because he did better than expected at a tournament and instead of realising he got a bit lucky has decided to go all billy big bollocks and assume anyone criticising him doesn't have a clue what they're talking about and can't see his genius. The big difference is that he hasn't been forced to give the world class player(s) he's been ignoring a look in the way Southgate was with Grealish.

[Jon Crofts]

Jones needs firing Monday morning, no excuse for that tournament performance.

[paul_e]

Moving on, France vs Wales has been a belter but Wales could easily be down to 11 men at this point.

[paul_e]

French win with a try deep in overtime, superb end to the game.

[JuanMartinez]

France win makes things better.

[taylorsworkrate]

Unbelievable end to the game. What on earth France were doing opting for scrums with 5 and a half minutes to go needing 2 scores is anyones guess considering the laughable amount of time that is routinely wasted at scrums.

Got away with it in the end.

[Jon Crofts]

Thank fuck for that, Wales have somehow managed to look half decent through this tournament playing 14 men week in week out not to mention the shambles of a referee when they played England.

[taylorsworkrate]

Wales have shown throughout the tournament how important keeping discipline is in these close games. Their discipline evaporated in the last 10 minutes and is ultimately why they lost.

[paul_e]

Unbelievable end to the game. What on earth France were doing opting for scrums with 5 and a half minutes to go needing 2 scores is anyones guess considering the laughable amount of time that is routinely wasted at scrums.

Got away with it in the end.

They were after another yellow and a penalty try.

The real takeaway from the game for me was how much better being able to hear the decision making process from refs. I've talked about it on the VAR thread before but when you see a match like that with so many tight decisions and come away thinking the officials did brilliantlyshows you how important it is to be able to understand why decisions have gone as they have.

[JuanMartinez]

Brilliant from France.

[taylorsworkrate]

More than 2 and a half minutes came off the clock with those scrums. The potential rewards were far outweighed by the negative of the time lost I think. They got away with it in the end so fair enough I suppose.

Spot on about the referee and use of technology.

[paul_e]

More than 2 and a half minutes came off the clock with those scrums. The potential rewards were far outweighed by the negative of the time lost I think. They got away with it in the end so fair enough I suppose.

Spot on about the referee and use of technology.

I agree they wasted a lot of time but I understand what they were trying to do. Also when a team is 2 men down scrums in their 22 are always dangerous because they normally go 1 short in the pack and 1 in the backs, which means you have space out wide and round the fringes so it's a good bet that you can score if you manage to the scrum well. I've picked up at 8 and scored like that lots and lots of times, you just drive directly at the inside shoulder of the 10 and make it look like you're going to pass as soon as he commits.

[nordenvillain]

With the exception of Italy who have an insurmountable distance to make up to be competitive, all the other teams except England have used the Autumn Internationals and this 6 Nations to blood some new players. Eddie Jones had no intention of disturbing his 'old guard' that got him to a WC Final. We have 2 years to get a team together to be competitive at the 2023 WC. At the moment, I would not be overly confident about getting through the Pool that also includes Argentina and Japan. I was hugely impressed with Sam Warburton and Jamie Roberts' comments after the game. Warburton was very complimentary about the match officials and said that when a referee has to see 2 players from each side tussling for the ball plus another 2 players from each side then coming in, a referee's peripheral vision has to be good. He thought the match officials got it right with nearly ever decision. As the father of a referee officiating at a decent level, it was good to hear such a respected ex player understand what a referee has to process in such a short period of time. Roberts said that he felt sure that a lot of people watching thought they had watched the best 6 Nations they had ever seen. In both cases, admirable statements from men that must have been gutted that their country had seen a 10 point lead turned into a 2 point loss and not another Gram Slam.

[UK Redsox]

The real takeaway from the game for me was how much better being able to hear the decision making process from refs. I've talked about it on the VAR thread before but when you see a match like that with so many tight decisions and come away thinking the officials did brilliantlyshows you how important it is to be able to understand why decisions have gone as they have.

Wayne looked really scary, masked up in a dungeon