Rugby - Hands Off, Wattle!

[Havak]

That would be actionable were it not true.

Confession time - haven't been able to read back at all but am back in Monday and will do so.

Bay of plenty gave it a good crack but didn't have enough up front in the final analysis. Plenty of work for the Lions to do though.

Oh and Dayglo has a dislocated ankle - tour almost certainly over for him!

[finbar]

Originally posted by Havak


Oh and Dayglo has a dislocated ankle - tour almost certainly over for him!

[LDiCesare]

I couldn't see the French half finals because I don't have Canal+, but reading the reports, both games looked great. Toulouse lost to the Stade Francais by one try, and Biarritz beat Bourgoin by one try. The Berjalliens had made a comeback to one point 10 minutes before the end of the match, but Brusque scored a try that doomed them.
So we'll have a final between Biarrits and Paris.

[ravagon]

Just read a write up on the Lions vs BoP.
Dalaglio fell down, dinged his ankle and his tours over?
How did he manage that one?
Sounded as though it would've been pretty good to watch though, all up.

Bad news for Lawrence, good(?) news for the Lions and entertainment for Havak?

I see the Warratahs are reacting to their defeat in the S12 final.
Apparently they're signing that master tactician Wendell Sailor...
Hmmm ... Time for finbar to throw his full support behind Italy?

[Havak]

Strangely Sailor played about the best game I have seen from him in the Barbarians game with England Juniors. He keeps flattering to deceive that guy.

Paul Hoeniss reffed the bay of Plenty game so it is hard to judge anything from it (although it was very entertaining) as he ruins every game he touches.

Dallaglio steamed in to support a ruck and turned his ankle - it looked nasty. It leaves Corry in pole position for the tests.

Some players failed to shine and some were surprisingly good - lardy Thompson has lost weight and looked quite good when he came on for example.

It's a totally different side for Wednesday - Wilko is on the bench and I am looking with interest at the combination of Greenwood and Smith in the centres. Murphy starts at fullback and has a lot to do after Lewsey had such a solid game there.

[Havak]

Olivier Magne has signed a two year deal with London Irish. Given they finished 10th from 12 last season and that this guy is one superb player the mind boggles at why he would choose to go there?

[child of Thor]

I've managed to miss all the recent rugby matches

Anyway found this article on the beeb sport website and thought they always sound like this for these kind of occasions(ref Laurie Mains dissing the lions). Let the rugby do the talking is my feeling when these type of things start.

From those that watched it was it a dissapointing opener for the lions? As bad as the man is saying?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/international/4610767.stm

[Havak]

There is a delicious irony to arguably the worst All Blacks coach in living memory calling this Lions squad the worst ever.

The guys a chump - take the views of Marshall and Hansen more seriously.

BoP asked a lot of questions of the Lions first time out but lets not get carried away - whilst they didn't play well they still won comfortably and some players set down huge markers for the tests.

[ravagon]

Bug in Galciv Re: +PQ?

Ran into something interesting the other day when puttering around with Galciv writer. I designed a party with something like +50%PQ, -50% Growth.
Every one of the majors picked it of course.
[At the time I didn't realise quite how unbalancing it'd be - I've since toned it back to +25%PQ, -50% growth and most of the others avoid it now]


At about the mid-point of the game (I was close to researching Star Democracy at the time) most of my planets decreased in PQ and morale, correspondingly, went down to 1 giving me a rather tough time for a while.
This happened to the Drengin at roughly the time too but both the Torians and Altarians seemed to avoid it.
My party didn't change as I checked it in the senate screen but my PQ was reduced to +25% ...
Does anybody know how or why this happened?
I know I didn't put anything about the PQ being decreased in the instance of the party losing an election and that hadn't happened anyway ...


[Edit: That was, erm, very clever . I blame tabbed browsing for the hiccup. ]

[ravagon]

Originally posted by Havak
There is a delicious irony to arguably the worst All Blacks coach in living memory calling this Lions squad the worst ever.

You're supporting the old adage of 'it takes one to know one' then?

Not that I am in any way qualified to really judge the veracity of either mind you ...

[Havak]

It's an adage in which there is a great deal of truth I suspect.

Judging the Lions on one game is pretty silly for anyone though. But in my healthy tradition of immediately contradicting myself I think the Maori game will be my barometer - the Lions must front up for that one or they can forget the tests.

Tabbed browsing is a pain eh?

[Havak]

Plenty of players can climb back on the plane after the Taranaki game. No Irishman will figure in the front row after this and O'Gara has dropped behind Hodgson in the fly half stakes (in itself amazing).

Most remarkable thing about the match? Kiwi ref talking to Taranaki all the time about their illegal play.

The Lions leaked a shocking soft try at the death (three missed tackles) - it goes without saying they really need to tighten up for Saturday - but then this won't be the team then by a long chalk either.

[ravagon]

Missed the game against Taranaki but it sounds as though your lot recovered towards the end?
Saturday would be the game against NZ Maori iirc?
They apparently have 9 AB's in the starting lineup plus another 3 on the bench.
Not as many as they've had in the past (I think there was one game a decade or so ago with 14 AB's starting) but it'll make things a little tougher for the Lions.


On another matter - I'm trying to get some data processed in London atm ... :aarrgghh: :head explodes:

And on yet another matter entirely - Ou est Tamerlin?

[Havak]

Actually Ravagon the Lions front five were pretty dire in the front five until Jenkins came on at about 55 minutes and added some stability to the scrum. I like to see second rows clearing out too and neither O’Callaghan nor Psycho were doing enough of that.

Having said that Taranaki couldn’t unlock a chastity belt – the first try came from a really laughable Lions error at a ruck and the second from pathetic tackling. Outside of that the defence was actually pretty good.

Basically when Taranaki tired from the huge effort they put in the Lions backs started to cut them to pieces. It could have been worse - the ref disallowed two for forward passes that other refs might have let go and Greenwood just missed touhcing down a great charge down too.

All in all it was most entertaining.

Saturday as you suggest is a big test (maybe it should really be a Test in fact?). Clive has kept his promise that by the fourth game every single tour member will have made a start and that makes this side VERY interesting.

British and Irish Lions team to play NZ Maori:

J Lewsey (England); T Shanklin (Wales), B O'Driscoll (Ireland, capt), G D'Arcy (Ireland), S Williams (Wales); S Jones (Wales), M Dawson (England); A Sheridan (England), S Thompson (England), J White (England), S Shaw (England), P O'Connell (Ireland), R Hill (England), M Williams (Wales), S Taylor (Scotland).

Replacements: S Byrne (Ireland), G Jenkins (Wales), B Kay (England), M Owen (Wales), D Peel (Wales), R O'Gara (Ireland), S Horgan (Ireland).

That front five is immense – it’s a powerful pack of beef in actual fact. And two Welsh wingers get their last chance to impress I think – watch out for the whippet that is Shane Williams because this is not the game where I would have thrown him in first up. Jones also makes his first start at Fly half – and Jonny remains protected.

Never trust Londoners btw – anyone with any sense is far north of that hole.

Tamerlin is still ‘busy’ isn’t he?

And where is Finbar? Two weeks after he arrives the Italian government has declared they are officially in a recession – so what has he been doing??

[finbar]

They're now out of recession. I've just funded their deficit by getting on line with ADSL! Actually, it's a bit cheaper than cable was in Oz, and much much less expensive than the horrendously costly short-term dial-up service I was using. It was sh*tloads of fun battling through the installation instructions completely in Italian. Unfortunately, somewhere along the way, transporting Firefox between Mrs finbar's computer and mine, I lost all my Firefox preferences. I shall have to rebuild the entire massive collection of bookmarks all over again!

First up, the BBC rugby website and the Sydney Morning Herald's rugby website. Perish the thought that I should take as gospel anything said about the game in this thread!