Rugby - The Game They Play In Heaven II

[finbar]

I'm being dragged off to Spain for four days, holidays with some friends. I've had to set the Sky Box thingy to record a few matches. Back on Friday in time for the weekend's big matches. England's disciplinary problems are just bizarre. It's not as if they're new. There are clearly some very very stupid players wearing white. As for Haskell demanding non-contributing players be named and shamed in team meetings - dearie dearie me. So ironic that I don't know where to start. Decent English effort, six tries are nice in any game. Flood with some space and time makes a difference.

France? Who knows. Clerc is just class, though.

See you chaps on Friday!

[Havak]

Not to worry Finbar - Tommy the tank engine has raced out to the rescue. All will be well now.

Does that mean you missed Italy's destruction of Russia today? Hope your box got it.

I take your point kOC - England missed at least seven points but the margin would have been squeezed. However personally speaking I can't see a six tries to one victory as flattering - it is what it is, which is reasonably comprehensive. They weren't pushover scores but rather well crafted and well taken ones. Discipline is a very real problem - but they can also play some very nice rugby at times.

I just don't think England deserve quite as much grief over it as they have attracted. Particularly irked by Pienaar laying into them afterwards as his Bok side strangled opponents and wouldn't have known expansive rugby if it came up and kicked him in the happy sacks. Thank goodness Fitzy is there to bring some balance to proceedings as Francois and Dayglo exchange "in my day..." all the time.

[LDiCesare]

Parra as 10...
Not that he's been bad, but he hasn't played a match as fly half for two years and a half. Seriously? There are several fly halves in France, not just Trinh-Duc. I can understand not picking him after his last matches, but... And Traille full back again when we've got both Medard and Heymans? After the match he played against Canada, being, well, average at best, under high balls?
I think I should try to see if a random number generator would give more surprising results than Lièvremont's selection choices.

[kittenOFchaos]

Parra as 10...
Not that he's been bad, but he hasn't played a match as fly half for two years and a half. Seriously? There are several fly halves in France, not just Trinh-Duc. I can understand not picking him after his last matches, but... And Traille full back again when we've got both Medard and Heymans? After the match he played against Canada, being, well, average at best, under high balls?

I think I should try to see if a random number generator would give more surprising results than Lièvremont's selection choices.

It is not only hilarious, it is desperate, but it may just work.

[finbar]

Logged in from Granada on a wireless network belonging to some Spaniard who doesn't believe in network security. Bless him. Delightful place is Granada even if I've discovered my very basic Spanish is next to useless. My pretty reasonable Italian gets me nowhere. Same grammar as Spanish but the vocab and pronunciation leave me literally speechless. Great food, but, and the Spanish do siestas in even greater style than Italians. And, as many told us, much cheaper to live here than Italy.

Recorded the Italian try feast. Looking forward to seeing it. Heck, if they can roll the Paddys it will make for an interesting group.

The mad Frog coach has struck again. You'd have to think he's looking beyond the ABs but who knows? Parra is quality. He will cope at 10. Better than Traille at 10, but then Traille will probably finish up there.

Mmmm. It's Spanish beer o'clock.

[Havak]

beer o'clock is my favourite time of day!

My word it is an interesting RWC. If only becuase we now have Finbar war-driving during his sojourn around Europe.

Spain and Italy both being in the Eurozone I would expect Spains COL will catch up Italy fairly soon. Interesting times lay ahead for the European federal experiment. But I'll stop now before kOc shouts "rugby" at me, and rightly so.

Like the rest of us I keenly await NZ-France on saturday. No doubt LDiCesare is hoping his eccentric coach can deliver a similar result to his stint as a player in 1999? Eccentric is a polite English way of saying "mad".

Unfortunately I have to get up a stupid o'clock again to watch England underperform against Romania.

*edit* I see Australia just about flopped over the line then?

[finbar]

Back home again. Nice to be able to understand what people are saying again. Yes, Wallabies flopped over the line. Taped the game because I was still in that other place this morning. Flopped over the line at great injury cost - Horne, fractured jaw; McCabe, dislocated shoulder; Cliffy Palu, hammy problem; Beale, a lesser one. They ended up with hooker Polota-Nau playing flanker with lock Simmons on the other flank, and Samo on the wing. Horne will be the big loss. Very classy young player who has fought endless injuries, he would have featured later on. At least it gave Berrick Barnes an opportunity to display his wares, including goal kicking. Barnes went to 10, Cooper to full back in place of Beale. I expect there will be a midfield replacement called for - either Matt Giteau or Ben Tapuai from the Reds.

Oh, and I've tipped the French by a handful of points. And the Argies to roll Scotland by a few more points.

[kittenOFchaos]

Pretty weak French defence today...NZ looking like champions as per usual in this stage of the RWC...onwards!

Scotland Vs Argentina tomorrow - far too close to call.

[finbar]

Not just ordinary French physical defence but they hadn't done enough - or any - homework on the ABs. So much of the ABs' good work was classic ABs, straight off the training paddock. The French weren't prepared.

England ran in lots of tries against Romania. So did the Wallabies against America. Meaningless stuff in the scheme of things, really. Still, at least England avoided a raft of injuries.

[Havak]

I hadn't clocked the injury tally. Very sorry to hear it. OZ will need to be full strength to trouble NZ in the semi.

I have to say I found it a typical French performance - great pressure early on, hit by a NZ try and instantly absolutely falling to pieces for a crucial twenty minute period that lost them the game. Much better in the second half but all too late and still cut apart by a class NZ side when the game broke up. Far too Many french handling errors too.

I hand it to NZ however that they executed superbly and taught a powerful french unit a real lesson at the breakdown.

If fixtures pan out that way England-France will be fascinating. The main negative I took against Romania was an inability to clear the breakdown quickly. Apart from a bit of poor discipline early on and some silly forcing of the game with reckless passes later on I thought England did quite well. They played with intent and pace, offloaded well and ran good lines.

Manu is noted by the layman for his line breaking runs but he actually works very hard - the effort he puts in around the paddock is quite phenomenal. He still rushes up out of the line at inopportune moments but he is developing all the time. I am very glad he chose England over Samoa. Ben on the other hand has worked hard to stop crabbing but it still drifts into his game. Really need him to stop so we get quicker ball.


Of course it all can look good when what is in front of you is second tier.

The Sweaties will surely raise their game for us massively so we must apply ourselves to the task.

[LDiCesare]

These lapses in French defense are really annoying. NZ will, of course, score tries when given such opportunities. They had a very good game. A pity we had to wait for the second half, replacing Ducalcon and Szarzewski, before our scrum actually became good. Still, too many mistakes. The coach would have to play the same team for the next match as what he expects to play in the QF, in order for them to play together and avoid spilling so many balls, but I strongly suspect he'll jsut rotate everyone again.
Too bad all our players don't defend like Clerc. He had a very good match I think. And also a pity NZ's 6 didn't get yellow carded for elbowing Yachvili in teh face. That's really something I don't like to see, even though I suspect Yachvili rolled on the ground a little bit more than needed (I mean - he's a 9).

[Havak]

The Kiwi blindside (Kano?) did what most forwards would do in that situation and, having slightly caught Yachvilli on the throat and jaw with his elbow, I was curious to see Yachvilli go down clutching his EYES. I think it was reasonable not to show a card for that. Let's leave the play acting to footballers shall we?

The farcical Premiership continues as Sarcens (missing their Namibian flanker) put fifty points on Tigers at Welford Road (Tigers are of course missing over half their first team squad though the RWC and injuries).

Truly nonsensical - it devalues the Premiership entirely for this fan.

[finbar]

Yachvilli's theatrical response was s***** stuff of the highest order. It wasn't cardable anyway. Kano threw out an arm to impede Yachvilli without looking. More problematic was Jane tackling the French player in the air after losing the contest for the ball.

The premiership does tend to be distorted when extended events like the WC are on. The clubs should follow the French line. The mad French coach called up Doussain from Toulouse, Toulouse told him to get knotted, he could wait a week while they played him against Biarritz.

[kittenOFchaos]

Someone mentioned the Premiership?

Sorry Havak: http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport1/hi/rugby_union/9595844.stm

[kittenOFchaos]

Wayne Barnes...seriously?

Every game there seems to be controversy. That penalty for Wales, of course 2007 in Cardiff and today...missing a very blatant and significant offside

Andy Robinson...poor chap has had so many games like this where Scotland conspire to lose games they had in their grasp. The worst was that Wales Vs Scotland game where Thom Evans got injured.

I'm not too upset though as it was a good game and Scotland played well. However, there is little or no chance of Scotland proceeding and even if we did we'd definitely play against NZ and it'd be game over.