All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2
-
@Stargazer said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
Hmm, and then the Rugby Onslaught comes with this:
Well, anyone whose ancestors were smart enough to look elsewhere for food during a famine...
-
13 years since we last lost and were held tryless at the same time. Can't help but think though that 14 men or not, we still should have won from 18-9 up. Did they think they had it won at that point and eased off?
-
@JC said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
@pakman said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
@Wairau said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
@Bones
@reprobate
@taniwharugby
In relation to the SOB forearm, I think you guys are being too nice and have got it wrong.
I went through this in the other thread
When you slow it down, it is pretty obvious that SOB tensed his hand and arm for a hit, he made a half movement to line up the jaw, then the full hit. Completely on purpose. Furthermore, he at no time tried to engage in the tackle. He stayed stooped but held back behind his teammate, let the tackle fall to the ground. He also did not try for the ball which was hidden in Naholo's lap.
Both Vunipolo and this were intentional. Both might have seen red, definitely yellow.
The hit on Naholo cost us a lot in the game, although the boys had a chance to win it and so can only look at themselves in the end.I agree. Makes one wonder what SOB told the nice men of the judiciary panel?!
Nothing, his mouth was full.
I'm happy SOB was spared. I want no excuses when we smash them in the mouth on Saturday
-
@Stargazer said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
Hmm, and then the Rugby Onslaught comes with this:
It's a gentle push in the shoulder/face with the forearm. Nothing wrong with that.
Ridiculous over the top reporting though. Similarly I've seen quite a few screaming about O'Brien's "thuggery". All pretty lame really.
-
@Wairau said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
@Bones
@reprobate
@taniwharugby
In relation to the SOB forearm, I think you guys are being too nice and have got it wrong.
I went through this in the other thread
When you slow it down, it is pretty obvious that SOB tensed his hand and arm for a hit, he made a half movement to line up the jaw, then the full hit. Completely on purpose. Furthermore, he at no time tried to engage in the tackle. He stayed stooped but held back behind his teammate, let the tackle fall to the ground. He also did not try for the ball which was hidden in Naholo's lap.
Both Vunipolo and this were intentional. Both might have seen red, definitely yellow.
The hit on Naholo cost us a lot in the game, although the boys had a chance to win it and so can only look at themselves in the end. -
Having had the weekend to absorb the loss I thought I would throw in my 2 cents.
Firstly well done the Lions you got there in the end. Plenty of teams would not have gotten over the line but you found a way to win ugly.
For the ABs I have to say even down to 14 I thought we would still win it. Mostly due to what I thought was tactical brilliance from Hanson. Subbing a forward was clearly something they had planned for as it happened almost immediately. It sucks for Kaino but our 7 man pack was more then competitive against the Lions 8 and that is purely down to conditioning. Every one of those blokes put in a shift and they got so close. I suspect if Cruden had passed that balls to the forwards and asked them to hold it for 5 minutes they would have.
But thats not us we play to win not to draw, was still a shitty option.
I can understand people are frustrated with SBW for what happened but I think people need a little perspective. He is not even close to being a serial offender wasn't his last card in 2011 that was 6 years ago. If you balance it up against the good stuff hes done I think hes still the kind of player you want around. So this talk of him never wearing Black again or people booing him needs to be put to bed. Its over no one will regret it more then him.
Vunipola on the other hand should count himself very lucky, in my view that was a straight up targeted shot. He saw it was Barrett and he went hard in on him. It was cheap as well as Barrett was rolling out of the ruck, and there was no other defender so he had no need to even enter the ruck, the ball was available. I think if the contact was any heavier we could have been down a fly half. I would be surprised if he was selected for the 3rd test, he didn't really bend the line and his discipline sucked.
For the SOB incident, it makes me really wonder if the way the Refs are implementing the head high rules needs some adjustment. One thing in common with a lot of the rulings that have been very inconsistent is that its not normally the tackler that is at fault, but more often the tackler assist. We see it here with Sean, with Sonny and even the Cane incident in Ireland. He was coming in as the assist but Henshaws spin caught him. I think as the assister there is a much greater risk of these sorts of accidents. For one you have a player who is in the process of being tackled that will normally be lowering there head as they move toward the ground. This puts it right in the tackle zone for anyone attempting the assist. Then you have huge amounts of force in the collision and the way that acts on the players is not easy to predict, making any assisted tackles a lot messier. The inverse is also true in a one on one tackle with two players colliding both have a good idea of where their bodies should be, to effect a safe tackle at impact.
I really don't know how to deal with that. I would like to see slow motion replays used less as I think reducing the time gives the impression that the players have a choice in their actions and for a lot of cases in the assist I don't think they have much of one. What they committed to 2 steps away is what they have to go through with.
I was happy with Laumape, thought he was good considering the circumstances. Reiko needed to be busier. He can't afford to run hot cold like that and needs to go looking for the ball a bit more rather then wait for it.
One final thing all of the international French Refs are totally fluent in English, please don't give them this excuse as a crutch for a poor performance. They don't need it if they are not communicating with their team properly its not down to language skills.
-
@mooshld yeah I liked what Laumape bought to the table, although Will GReenwood who usually makes sense reckons the Lions exposed him, which is true to an extent, but I thought he acquitted himself in the match well, which TBF was the most unusual match to start your AB career off with.
http://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=11885188
-
@Catogrande thanks, as I said in the other thread, pull up the video and stop it at the right spots. The video you linked shows very clearly the way he tenses up his right hand for a chop/hit action. If he was trying to grab as in making a tackle, he would have an open palm reaching around. Then he does a half movement as a sighter, then a full hit to the jaw. Then he moves backward away from the tackle area rapidly, since all his forward momentum went into Naholo's jaw, and since he at no time tried to lower his body weight to engage the tackle.
You say it is a gentle forearm to the jaw, I say it is a hard cold cock, on purpose. Look at the result.
I disagree with mooshid. None of SOB's actions look like he is trying to make a tackle. You need to freeze frame it to see his actions clearly. He has a history of hitting player's heads, so giving him the benefit of the doubt and only looking at it real speed from the wrong side is insufficient. We are Kiwis, we don't BS nor whinge. Tell it like it is.
I don't want to keep rehashing this, it's over, and he got off (miraculously). Time to move on and beat them on the field this weekend.
-
@Wairau said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
@Catogrande thanks, as I said in the other thread, pull up the video and stop it at the right spots. The video you linked shows very clearly the way he tenses up his right hand for a chop/hit action. If he was trying to grab as in making a tackle, he would have an open palm reaching around. Then he does a half movement as a sighter, then a full hit to the jaw. Then he moves backward away from the tackle area rapidly, since all his forward momentum went into Naholo's jaw, and since he at no time tried to lower his body weight to engage the tackle.
You say it is a gentle forearm to the jaw, I say it is a hard cold cock, on purpose. Look at the result.
I disagree with mooshid. None of SOB's actions look like he is trying to make a tackle. You need to freeze frame it to see his actions clearly. He has a history of hitting player's heads, so giving him the benefit of the doubt and only looking at it real speed from the wrong side is insufficient. We are Kiwis, we don't BS nor whinge. Tell it like it is.
I don't want to keep rehashing this, it's over, and he got off (miraculously). Time to move on and beat them on the field this weekend.
I'd love to see the reasoning of the dismissal and the defence put forward. Not because I want to pick them apart but because I am astounded how that incident was deemed not a RC under the directives.
SBWs was deemed a RC presumably because the ref either decided there was intent or a complete lack of care. The judiciary decided reckless which upholds the RC. How on earth was SOBs not reckless?
I have said I think it was an accident, but I also see SBWs as one as well. It was an avoidable accident though and both players did not need to make the actions they did.
I guess we'll never know but it is certainly perplexing. Almost as perplexing as the ref team looking at it and seeing a hard forearm to the jaw and deciding it wasn't even worth an action. -
@Catogrande said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
McBride
I thought I had heard all the trivia about Willie John McBride until yesterday:
he played more games for the Lions (70) than for Ireland (63)!There were a lot of provincial games on those long tours in the 60s/70s!
-
@MiketheSnow said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
Faletau's try was top drawer.
Having seen a step-by-step review of it today, I think it was a far, far better try than the try in the first test by O'Brien.
The first Test try needed a bit of luck/opportunism - Read's charge was maybe worth a gamble because it might have made a fullback panic, but Williams stepped inside and there was a nice arrangement of players on both sides for the Lions to capitalise through the neat exchanges between Davies/Daly/Davies/O'Brien.
Four players contribute to the attack. The distance makes it unexpected/dramatic/spectacular - but overall it made no difference.However, the Faletau try was more like a Joe Schmidt-planned try. It starts with the scrum-half in the lineout at the front and O'Brien at 9, then Murray drops back to take the tap, O'Brien keeps the focus close-in from the AB-tail, but Murray skip-passes to Sexton who gives a short pass to Farrell.
Farrell and Davies tie in the AB midfield, Sexton loops and Daly comes in from the blindside-wing, just evading ALB and feeds Williams who puts Watson away on the right.
Watson is tackled but Murray rolls Dagg and O'Brien has the strength to resist the combined counter-ruck of Cane and Barrett.
Daly acts as 9 to get the ball out to Sexton and Itoje trucks it up, supported by George. Murray feeds Sexton who has inside options from Furlong and Lawes with Davies running a hard line from centre, but Sexton pulls it back deep to Farrell who has had time to size up the ABs improvised defence.
Farrell wisely skips Warburton to get the ball to Williams in midfield and passes to Faletau who is 5m in from touch. Faletau is not in the clear and has to use his power/experience to get through the Dagg tackle. I've seen several Lions backs not score from better chances this tour.
That's what I call a team try!That's all 7 backs involved and (depending on how you do the maths) the ball going through about 16 pairs of hands &/or significant contributions leading up to that try, going 40m up the pitch but 2 x 70m widths, so it is a total of about 180m of play.
Also it happened when it was 14v14, so was not simply down to numerical difference (although the effort of the AB-14 from minutes 25-60 might have been starting to catch up on them).
Above all - it made a difference: it got the Lions back in the game after 20 minutes of trying to throw away the series by giving away dumb penalty after dumb penalty.
So far, by far, that for me is the try of the tour (and several other tours!).
-
@Megweya said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
@Catogrande said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
McBride
I thought I had heard all the trivia about Willie John McBride until yesterday:
he played more games for the Lions (70) than for Ireland (63)!There were a lot of provincial games on those long tours in the 60s/70s!
Old style tours were magic
-
May have missed if already posted, but excellent analysis by the42 of how Lions defence neutralised ABs at 21 all. http://www.the42.ie/analysis-lions-defence-all-blacks-test-two-3475729-Jul2017/
That said I think it shows, which the analysis attempts to gloss over, that Sinckler ought to have been penalised for clear offside fairly early in sequence. Kick would have been three yards in Lions half, but at very least would have given ABs field position. -
And an attack analysis, including the 'tricks' the Lions used to part the black sea for Murray: http://www.the42.ie/analysis-sexton-farrell-lions-all-blacks-2-3474564-Jul2017/ .
-
@pakman said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #2:
May have missed if already posted, but excellent analysis by the42 of how Lions defence neutralised ABs at 21 all. http://www.the42.ie/analysis-lions-defence-all-blacks-test-two-3475729-Jul2017/
That said I think it shows, which the analysis attempts to gloss over, that Sinckler ought to have been penalised for clear offside fairly early in sequence. Kick would have been three yards in Lions half, but at very least would have given ABs field position.I don't think that is a big issue, we often see that allowed if the defender retreats back which Sinkler did.
However, watching the other one I think it's more preposterous that Farrell was allowed to get away with holding TJ, and anyone who claims that didn't have an effect on TJs decision making is deluded.
-
Also I think the whole 'the42' best balanced rugby journalism out there reputation took a hit with that second one. They're basically applauding the Lions for blocking defenders when this whole tour has had scuttlebutt about blocking defenders aimed at the ABs.
-
Nz had 61% possession and 58% territory this match.
With 7 man pack for 50 odd minutes.
Also the NZ lineout was statistically the better in this match, after a shaky first test. Tbf, I expect the nz lineout to be good but it was minus their 4th jumping option for the 50 odd minutes. 9 out of 10 (90%) on own through, so the missed one was the not straight when Taylor got flustered waiting for Garces to move Itoje out of the middle.
Lions were 8 out of 10.Nz scrum was 100%.
VIDEO: O'Brien cited yet Sam Cane gets away with THIS in Eden Park? | Rugby Onslaught
