International Rugby

[PaulWinch again]

England have so much potential now.

[West Derby Villan]

And such a strong bench as well

[Dante Lavelli]

The Saxons side yesterday would beat a few teams.

[paul_e]

Great by Haskell, Having a great game.

Great tactical move by Eddie Jones replacing Burrell, paul

The problem with that Burrell sub is that he's the sort of player who lets things get to him, that's probably ended his tour after 25minutes and largely because our backrow were completely incapable of slowing down the ball.  I don't disagree that the change did help us but I'm not sure if the cost is worth paying over the 3 matches given that I don't think Burrell was really doing anything all that wrong.  I get what they were saying at half time but I genuinely think our problem was much closer to the breakdown.

That brings nicely to the fact that, after 20-25 minutes Haskell was competing with Brown and Robshaw for the most ineffective player on the pitch, I agree that he had a good second half but he was never man of the match, Itoje pretty much kept us in the game single-handedly in the first 25 before we started to boss the set piece and use that to slow the game down and let their indiscipline get us back into the game.

It was a big win but that can't be allowed to stop rightful criticism and the main criticism I have is that we have no pace in our backrow which creates space out wide if teams can get the ball out quickly, we've conceded 2 tries in the corner because of it.  The current backrow is the same one that let us down so badly in the last world cup and their deficiencies are being covered by the quality of Itoje right now.  Fundamentally Haskell and Robshaw are both 6s and it should be a choice between them, then you pick someone at 7 who either gives you a bit of dog to slow the ball down and let your backs line up or you pick someone with the pace to cover round and fill in the line, Harrison and Clifford give you those options.

The Saxons side yesterday would beat a few teams.

Robson should be the first choice 9, he was immense yesterday.

Add in Mallinder who will clearly step up from the U20s to the main squad over the next year and Nathen Hughes who becomes eligible for the Autumn and we've got a lot of extra quality to come back into this squad.

[nigel]

Great by Haskell, Having a great game.

Great tactical move by Eddie Jones replacing Burrell, paul

The problem with that Burrell sub is that he's the sort of player who lets things get to him, that's probably ended his tour after 25minutes and largely because our backrow were completely incapable of slowing down the ball.  I don't disagree that the change did help us but I'm not sure if the cost is worth paying over the 3 matches given that I don't think Burrell was really doing anything all that wrong.  I get what they were saying at half time but I genuinely think our problem was much closer to the breakdown.

That brings nicely to the fact that, after 20-25 minutes Haskell was competing with Brown and Robshaw for the most ineffective player on the pitch, I agree that he had a good second half but he was never man of the match, Itoje pretty much kept us in the game single-handedly in the first 25 before we started to boss the set piece and use that to slow the game down and let their indiscipline get us back into the game.

It was a big win but that can't be allowed to stop rightful criticism and the main criticism I have is that we have no pace in our backrow which creates space out wide if teams can get the ball out quickly, we've conceded 2 tries in the corner because of it.  The current backrow is the same one that let us down so badly in the last world cup and their deficiencies are being covered by the quality of Itoje right now.  Fundamentally Haskell and Robshaw are both 6s and it should be a choice between them, then you pick someone at 7 who either gives you a bit of dog to slow the ball down and let your backs line up or you pick someone with the pace to cover round and fill in the line, Harrison and Clifford give you those options.

The Saxons side yesterday would beat a few teams.

Robson should be the first choice 9, he was immense yesterday.

Add in Mallinder who will clearly step up from the U20s to the main squad over the next year and Nathen Hughes who becomes eligible for the Autumn and we've got a lot of extra quality to come back into this squad.

Sorry Paul,  but, you must have been watching a different Haskell to everyone else who saw the game. 18 tackles and 3 turnovers
You seem to be very knowledgeable on the game, but I think your obvious dislike of him clouds your opinion.
Itoje was great, too, the lad just gets better and better.
There were some massive performances out there today.
I will add that I wish we had a Michael Hooper!!

[paul_e]

Great by Haskell, Having a great game.

Great tactical move by Eddie Jones replacing Burrell, paul

The problem with that Burrell sub is that he's the sort of player who lets things get to him, that's probably ended his tour after 25minutes and largely because our backrow were completely incapable of slowing down the ball.  I don't disagree that the change did help us but I'm not sure if the cost is worth paying over the 3 matches given that I don't think Burrell was really doing anything all that wrong.  I get what they were saying at half time but I genuinely think our problem was much closer to the breakdown.

That brings nicely to the fact that, after 20-25 minutes Haskell was competing with Brown and Robshaw for the most ineffective player on the pitch, I agree that he had a good second half but he was never man of the match, Itoje pretty much kept us in the game single-handedly in the first 25 before we started to boss the set piece and use that to slow the game down and let their indiscipline get us back into the game.

It was a big win but that can't be allowed to stop rightful criticism and the main criticism I have is that we have no pace in our backrow which creates space out wide if teams can get the ball out quickly, we've conceded 2 tries in the corner because of it.  The current backrow is the same one that let us down so badly in the last world cup and their deficiencies are being covered by the quality of Itoje right now.  Fundamentally Haskell and Robshaw are both 6s and it should be a choice between them, then you pick someone at 7 who either gives you a bit of dog to slow the ball down and let your backs line up or you pick someone with the pace to cover round and fill in the line, Harrison and Clifford give you those options.

The Saxons side yesterday would beat a few teams.

Robson should be the first choice 9, he was immense yesterday.

Add in Mallinder who will clearly step up from the U20s to the main squad over the next year and Nathen Hughes who becomes eligible for the Autumn and we've got a lot of extra quality to come back into this squad.

Sorry Paul,  but, you must have been watching a different Haskell to everyone else who saw the game. 18 tackles and 3 turnovers
You seem to be very knowledgeable on the game, but I think your obvious dislike of him clouds your opinion.
Itoje was great, too, the lad just gets better and better.
There were some massive performances out there today.
I will add that I wish we had a Michael Hooper!!

Not at all, as I said Haskell was very good for the last 55-60 minutes and the stats back that up.  The issue is that before that he wasn't competing at the breakdown to slow play down , he wasn't getting around the pitch to fill gaps and he looked like exactly what he is, a 6 who was playing out of position.  I don't dislike him anything like as much as you think, I just think he has a tendency to do stupid things when he gets angry (much the same issue I have with Brown, Youngs and Farrell, although Farrell has improved in the last year) which cause us to have a rep for being indisciplined.

Hooper (who you rightly pick out as being a great player) is exactly why our backrow was wrong, we had no way of nullifying his ability to be an extra back because we were letting them get quick ball but we weren't lining up our quick men out wide. To counter that they were all over everything (early on) and we had absolutely no quick ball so by the time we got it out they'd all realigned and we were running into a wall.  Unfortunately for them our extra physicality in the front 5 started to tell and made them to go a bit too far in trying to slow the ball which meant penalties, if they'd been a little more disciplined when they were on top I think the game could've been in a very different place at half time but once we had a decent lead we were always favourites.

[cdbearsfan]

Impressive for Ireland that. I flicked off for the football when they were down to fourteen men with three-quarters of the game left and thought no more of it.

Never expected to see they'd won.

[Jon Crofts]

Impressive for Ireland that. I flicked off for the football when they were down to fourteen men with three-quarters of the game left and thought no more of it.

Never expected to see they'd won.

Could have been by more as well, they were immense.

[paul_e]

Ireland were superb, fully desetved their win.

After that i watched the England U20 side demolish the scots, it was pretty embarrassing, dominated everywhere, scotland played ok but England were truly brilliant, finished 44-0 and that flattered the scots.

[peter w]

Interesting to see how the Aussies rated the players:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/rugby/who-starred-and-who-flopped-for-england-during-their-hoodoo-breaking-win-over-the-wallabies/news-story/0ec12c5fcd4dfd14a90bba412c45f7e8

[paul_e]

Interesting to see how the Aussies rated the players:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/rugby/who-starred-and-who-flopped-for-england-during-their-hoodoo-breaking-win-over-the-wallabies/news-story/0ec12c5fcd4dfd14a90bba412c45f7e8

Not a million miles off, I'd have had Robshaw as a 7 and I'd have swapped itoje and haskell.  I think they were generous to Brown who had another poor game, he's been out of form for about 18 months now and really shouldn't be on this tour.

[nigel]

Interesting to see how the Aussies rated the players:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/sport/rugby/who-starred-and-who-flopped-for-england-during-their-hoodoo-breaking-win-over-the-wallabies/news-story/0ec12c5fcd4dfd14a90bba412c45f7e8

Not a million miles off, I'd have had Robshaw as a 7 and I'd have swapped itoje and haskell.  I think they were generous to Brown who had another poor game, he's been out of form for about 18 months now and really shouldn't be on this tour.

I'd have had Haskell a 9.9 ...... just kidding paul :-)

For me they are about right.
Unfortunately, I have to agree on Mike Brown, bit of a fan of Brown, but, you're right, he hasn't been playing particularly well for 18 months. Surprised Alex Goode hasn't had a crack, or even a back line of Yarde, Nowell & Watson

[Pat McMahon]

Does anybody know where there are links to the highlights of yesterday's games? I don't have Sky so haven't even seen the tries.

[UK Redsox]

Impressive for Ireland that. I flicked off for the football when they were down to fourteen men with three-quarters of the game left and thought no more of it.

Never expected to see they'd won.

I did the same

Just watched the highlights. By then I'd heard that they'd won but as I watched the interception try by SA, I still could see how Ireland had hung on. Superb defence.

Definite Red Card for me. It might not have been deliberate but that charge was one of the most reckless things I've seen on a rugby field for a long time.

[paul_e]

Does anybody know where there are links to the highlights of yesterday's games? I don't have Sky so haven't even seen the tries.

Not sure how long this will be available for: