International Rugby

[paul_e]

If anyone wants to know why I dislike Ben Youngs so much compare the speed of the breakdown between him and JVP today. For the last 20 minutes we might as well have been giving them tackle drills in training, it was slow, predictable and too deep from the line so they just knocked us back on the gainline time and again until he box kicked it away or we gave away a penalty. We really need to move on from him because he's a fucking relic of a game that hasn't been played at the highest level of international rugby for years.


The Villa defeat annoyed me earlier but I could see things to be positive about. This hurt a lot more because we've changed coach but the same problems are there and I see no way they'll be addressed before the world cup.

[PaulWinch again]

I still think there’s been some erroneous decision making he needs to learn from. You can debate the merits of Farrell and he’s had some fantastic games for England, but making him captain has boxed Borthwick into a corner. If he thinks Smith should be 10 then Farrell should be on the bench, if he thinks Farrell should start he should be a 10. The combination is just unbalanced.

[paul_e]

I still think there’s been some erroneous decision making he needs to learn from. You can debate the merits of Farrell and he’s had some fantastic games for England, but making him captain has boxed Borthwick into a corner. If he thinks Smith should be 10 then Farrell should be on the bench, if he thinks Farrell should start he should be a 10. The combination is just unbalanced.

That's one of the problems. We need to have a proper plan for the 10, 12 and 13 positions because right now that area of the field is a fucking mess. Jones created the problem but Borthwick needs to come up with a solution and quick.

Then you've got 9 (which has been my bugbear with England for years) where Youngs having the amount of caps he has is a good indicator of why England have been poor for years, the odd decent box kick and a break round the fringe every few games isn't enough to keep him in the side but after years of allowing just that he's now about the only experienced option we have so he gets picked by default. If he played for almost any other club in English rugby he'd have about 5 caps, he should've been taken out of the side about the same time his brother was when he proved to be well below international quality. Ben mostly got the look in he did by standing on the shoulders of midgets like Wigglesworth and Care (and Care was a far better player even though he wasn't good enough for international rugby either).

I'm also not convinced by Malins as a winger. I know he scored twice and has huge talent but his decision making and positioning looks like someone who's being played out of position and it hurts us, I think he was really poor for the first scotland try for example, wanted to hang around on the blindside despite there being loads of cover there and Steward being on the floor meaning we had no full back, made the decision for them to a kick through a very simple one and it didn't need to be a particularly good kick, just needed to stay in play and they were scoring.

The backrow was a bit of a mess as well, Curry was uncharacteristically poor in defence and Dombrandt looked unfit and out of his depth.

[Steve67]

Borthwick is an average coach, coaching one of the largest institutions in the world.  Why are we unable to get world class coaches?  Jones was good a while ago and I don't really mean him but why did we not go for Gatland?

[PaulWinch again]

I think it’s a bit unfair to class Borthwick as an average coach. He did a remarkable job at Leicester, but he’s obviously unproven in the long-term or international level. I don’t mind him being hired, but like anyone he will need to be aware of his own errors and be prepared to correct them.

[paul_e]

Very unfair, he's a very well regarded coach. The problem he has is one of timing, like it or not he's going to be judged on the world cup which means he has 8 games in total to put together a team to be competitive. That means he's going to have to go for small changes to what Jones was doing rather than building from scratch over time.

If he gets through this without having his reputation shredded then the team he picks this time next year will be interesting.

[Jon Crofts]

Just a couple of observations on yesterday’s debacle.

1: Farrell offers nothing.

2: Youngs is shit.

3: Mitchell should be scrum half. His tempo would have been immense the last 20.

[paul_e]

Just a couple of observations on yesterday’s debacle.

1: Farrell offers nothing.

2: Youngs is shit.

3: Mitchell should be scrum half. His tempo would have been immense the last 20.

4. Dombrandt isn't the 8 we're looking for.

[Jon Crofts]

Just a couple of observations on yesterday’s debacle.

1: Farrell offers nothing.

2: Youngs is shit.

3: Mitchell should be scrum half. His tempo would have been immense the last 20.

4. Dombrandt isn't the 8 we're looking for.

He ran a few good angles that was about it.

[Steve67]

I think it’s a bit unfair to class Borthwick as an average coach. He did a remarkable job at Leicester, but he’s obviously unproven in the long-term or international level. I don’t mind him being hired, but like anyone he will need to be aware of his own errors and be prepared to correct them.

Ok, not up to international level.  Great club coach but sometimes the two don't marry up.   Hopefully, he proves me wrong.

[PaulWinch again]

You might ultimately be right or wrong, it is way too early to make an assessment after 1 game. He does need to extricate from is Farrell as captain, but I fear the resolution will be Smith being a sub.

[nigel]

Good game so far but what the fuck was Dombrandt doing in defence for their 2nd? I'd be embarrassed to get done like that and I'm 43 and playing in the 9th tier.

Aside from that things are going about as I'd expect, looking a bit disjointed with new coaching and a few players who look like they're only in to keep some continuity. I reckon the team for next years 6N will look very different to this.

If he’d have gone for legs VDM would have gone over anyway, so I guess he was trying to get his arms around to wrap him up, but hadn’t the speed to get close enough.

Looked embarrassing, but one of those that looks a lot worse than it actually was.

I’d be more concerned at the channel tunnel sized gap VDM went through at the start.

[nigel]

Borthwick is an average coach, coaching one of the largest institutions in the world.  Why are we unable to get world class coaches?  Jones was good a while ago and I don't really mean him but why did we not go for Gatland?

Gatland was always going back to Wales.
Would have been nice, but a non starter.

I mentioned earlier in this thread that Andy Farrell would have been a decent choice.

Borthwick has had one game, let’s give the guy a chance.

[UK Redsox]

The backrow was a bit of a mess as well, Curry was uncharacteristically poor in defence and Dombrandt looked unfit and out of his depth.

It was a different Curry playing than normal, I think

Ben, rather than Tom

[paul_e]

Borthwick has done the right thing and dropped Youngs for the weekend, hopefully that's a big step in the right direction.