The Rugby Thread

[jd1981]

Fiji are unlikely to beat England . They will almost certainly rise to the occasion , but they simply do not do the basics well enough to win a big match . Your penalty goals , your scrum , your mauls , your rucks and most of all your lineouts must be 85% right at that level , and for Fiji it's not .
They'll do the one handed off loads , they'll be tricky and they'll be entertaining as well , but they'll pull your hair out too far too often .

They beat England 2 months ago at Twickenham, England have made little progress this tournament.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

We threw it about a lot against Fiji and were a bad fumble bit of try butchery from it biting us on the arse. Fiji are dangerous but hugely inconsistent. They really need to be allowed into the Rugby championship now that the Drua are in Super Rugby. Annual regular tests against Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and Argentina would make them even better.

 

[jd1981]

I’d like to see some jeopardy in the 6nations to if you start poorly the rest of the tournament just becomes about pride.
You could probably have a second tier European league running co-currently involving Portugal, Spain, Romania, Georgia etc 1up & 1down scenario

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

Italy won’t agree to that having fought for decades to get in. There has never been jeopardy in the history of the tournament. I do like the idea of another tournament to expose the likes of Georgia and Portugal to more top rank opposition.

 

[Donegal Wolf]

I think when the new top tier competition involving 6N & SH sides plus 2 others which will take place every 2 years starts up there is a 2nd tier competition with promotion/relegation as well

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

I hope so as that is a clear progression path

 

[Donegal Wolf]

Unfortunately 6N is not a tournament based on merit to get in, it is a business which feeds rugby for rest of the year.
Whilst it's all well saying promotion/relegation is grand with Italy at the bottom, if Scotland/Ireland/Wales were to finish bottom & drop down would cause uproar and if England or France did (as France have in last 10 years) then it will be not allowed, as thst would be commercial model broken.
To drop Italy with 60m population for Georgia with 5m is never a goer for a commercial entiti, now if Portugal continue improving & Italy dont then things might get interesting.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

Scotland Ireland or Wales get relegated it would be more than uproar. It would destroy the competition just as much as England or France not being there. It will simply never happen that relegation could even be countenanced.

 

[1986]

Ireland v New Zealand . Who wins ?

New Zealand are fresh having played three handy matches with poor opposition leading up to this match . Ireland are coming in off the back of the South African bruising encounter and a tougher than it looked Scottish match . We looked tired in those final 7/8 minutes I thought v Scotland .
A win would be huge for us , a glass ceiling broken you could say .
We're going very well , but I still have doubts .

 

[sycophantia]

Ireland should win, NZ clearly aren't the team they've been in the past, but dangerous to write them off, they'll have a plan.
Ireland have this weird quarter final thing but I'm still expecting an Irish win.

 

[Donegal Wolf]

More week goes on have gone from undecided to thinking we will win, mainly down to noises coming from New Zealand side, about Ireland being arrogant, mouthy, unlikeable, Schmidt knowing the players weaknesses etc all mind games shite Makes me think they are very worried & desperate to gain something.
Then again could be all in my head

Useless fact of the day since Kiwi bookies started taking bets on rugby in 1996 (well officially) New Zealand have been underdogs in 4 out of 370 games (all of which were away to Springboks & they lost them all), this is 5th games that they have them as outsiders.

 

[sycophantia]

The All Blacks have never been afraid to use a bit of skullduggery and mind games to get an advantage, they are an inferior team to Ireland currently, it's all they've got.

 

[1986]

Ireland should win, NZ clearly aren't the team they've been in the past, but dangerous to write them off, they'll have a plan.
Ireland have this weird quarter final thing but I'm still expecting an Irish win.

Not sure if weird is the right word , but it's definitely a weight on our shoulders .

There were several World Cups where we were never in contention to win a quarter final and lost in a convincing fashion as predicted beforehand ( 1987 , 1995 , 2003 , 2019 ) . We didn't even get to the quarter final in 1999 or 2007 . In those six World Cups we simply were not good enough , it had nothing to do with bad luck or choking .

2011 - Choked on the day , had the beating of Wales , but just didn't show up having won our POOL .
1991 - Had Australia beaten with time almost up , only to concede a last minute try and blow it .
2015 - Won the POOL again , but picked up a fair few injuries against France in the POOL match . Lost to Argentina in the quarter final , with a lack of depth in the squad becoming very apparent .

 

[1986]

England v Fiji...........England .

South Africa v France......France .

Wales v Argentina........Wales .

New Zealand v Ireland..........Ireland .


If all of the above happens , it will be a clean sweep by the Six Nations teams . That would be very unusual , but things are shifting in that direction .

 

[BillyDee]

Farell to start for England in place of Ford on Sunday...

 

[sycophantia]

Farell to start for England in place of Ford on Sunday...

FFS why, is Ford injured, Farrell clearly has held us back in recent times.

 

[Paddingtonwolf]

Fiji 17 England 21
Ireland 23 New Zealand 21
France 38 SA 16
Wales 29 Argentina 19

 

[Dinowolf]

England: 15 Marcus Smith, 14 Jonny May, 13 Joe Marchant, 12 Manu Tuilagi, 11 Elliot Daly, 10 Owen Farrell (c), 9 Alex Mitchell, 1 Ellis Genge, 2 Jamie George, 3 Dan Cole, 4 Maro Itoje, 5 Ollie Chessum, 6 Courtney Lawes, 7 Tom Curry, 8 Ben Earl.

Replacements: 16 Theo Dan, 17 Joe Marler, 18 Kyle Sinckler, 19 George Martin, 20 Billy Vunipola, 21 Danny Care, 22 George Ford, 23 Ollie Lawrence.

This doesn't make sense to me.
Smith at full back and no Ford to give him the ball.
Daly at 11, Steward dropped altogether, still got Mitchell at 9 who keeps causing handling errors.
I could go on, but I'll just keep my fingers tightly crossed.

 

[BillyDee]

Doesn't matter who the backs are, you've got Farrell at 10...

 

[Tredman]

England: 15 Marcus Smith, 14 Jonny May, 13 Joe Marchant, 12 Manu Tuilagi, 11 Elliot Daly, 10 Owen Farrell (c), 9 Alex Mitchell, 1 Ellis Genge, 2 Jamie George, 3 Dan Cole, 4 Maro Itoje, 5 Ollie Chessum, 6 Courtney Lawes, 7 Tom Curry, 8 Ben Earl.

Replacements: 16 Theo Dan, 17 Joe Marler, 18 Kyle Sinckler, 19 George Martin, 20 Billy Vunipola, 21 Danny Care, 22 George Ford, 23 Ollie Lawrence.

This doesn't make sense to me.
Smith at full back and no Ford to give him the ball.
Daly at 11, Steward dropped altogether, still got Mitchell at 9 who keeps causing handling errors.
I could go on, but I'll just keep my fingers tightly crossed.

Its a team designed to face an opposition who don't kick (well or much).