Has Hansen gone stale?
-
I feel super-shitty depressed the ABs lost to a very good Ireland side, but not yet ready to jump off the bridge or hide the razor blades. It’s a loss. Learn from it; move ahead.
Wasn’t that long ago that an undefeated AB side that included BBBR, Whitelock, Read and even McCaw required a MIRACLE to beat Ireland in Dublin in November, 2013. That miracle might have papered over some deficiencies then, too, but we were mostly elated and didn’t talk too much about what a has-been Hansen was, and we even bounced back and won another World Cup title. I really don’t see any reason we can’t do it again. Sure, we’re not as dominant as we’d like to be, and maybe that loss if going to feel like a sharp rock under the towel at the beach all summer. But we’re at least as good as anybody else, and more likely better than them all. If other teams want to believe the ABs are shot, let them.
-
@nepia said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
@mariner4life said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
@nepia said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
@mariner4life said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
That's a decent amount of evidence that things aren't going perfect, yet i see very little evidence of any changes in thinking.
Due to his record, I'm willing to give Hansen enough rope and believe his comments to think that 'changes in thinking' may actually be contributing to this years results.
I'll be there waiting with the rope if it all goes pear shaped next year though.
2014/15 is giving Stevo a heap of rope isn't it? So lets hope behind closed doors he does know what he's doing.
I still fucking hate playing shit rugby in pursuit of some future goal. A 3rd World Cup means less to me than putting teams back in their box.
I guess for me, living through that late 90s early 00s era I've never got back to we should win every match by right so the losses don't hurt as much as they use to, I didn't even break anything at the final whistle. Don't get me wrong, as good as Hansen has been he's still the guy who let Ireland bust through the door and get their first wins so he's at least looking at 5 years hard labour when he steps down.
It depends what stage of life you are at I think. Like you, the early 00s era, the longer we went not winning the RWC, there was a time when I lived and died on each game. That culminated with our shock loss in 2007 and led me to the Fern (thank goodness!!). Once we won in 2011, it felt like that moment the character from Fever Pitch (Nick Hornby) experienced, when Arsenal finally won a title all of his angst flew away. 2015 was an even bigger hit, we have truly been spoiled over the last 7 years. There are some fans out there who have no idea what it was like losing in cruel and excruciating ways to Gregan/Larkham/Eales, and choking like dogs at RWCs 1995, 1999, 2003 and 2007
-
2011 was cathartic for me. Going back to back in 2015 made me as happy as Test rugby could. If we do the three-peat in 2019, I'd suggest the RWC could be irrevocably damaged.
-
@antipodean said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
2011 was cathartic for me. Going back to back in 2015 made me as happy as Test rugby could. If we do the three-peat in 2019, I'd suggest the RWC could be irrevocably damaged.
Let it burn
-
So thinking about strategies. Barret's first two drop goals of his AB career occurred..maybe unnecessarily...in the last 2 games. That to me seems like a deliberate tactic, get some practice nailing drop goals in a tight game in a hostile environment.
-
@rembrandt said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
So thinking about strategies. Barret's first two drop goals of his AB career occurred..maybe unnecessarily...in the last 2 games. That to me seems like a deliberate tactic, get some practice nailing drop goals in a tight game in a hostile environment.
Except the Saffa game fit a bit better than these two - after the buzzer drop goal to win game - get back in the pocket, everyone knows its on, take the pressure kick. These were under penalty advantage, so there was really no pressure.
-
@rembrandt said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
So thinking about strategies. Barret's first two drop goals of his AB career occurred..maybe unnecessarily...in the last 2 games. That to me seems like a deliberate tactic, get some practice nailing drop goals in a tight game in a hostile environment.
Absolutely. CF Snr was at the Tin and watched the SA test that we lost. He reckoned that we could have taken a penalty kick and hung on with defence for the last couple of minutes but we went for a try instead. It almost feels like they are using some games as live ammo training sessions
-
@antipodean i SAID ELSEWHERE us winning next year may not be the best thing for the tournament, maybe thats why the fish heads are trying to create another tournament, played in the NH to try and negate some of our dominance!
2011 was huge...prior to it, I was never fussed by the RWC, only just being a teen when we won it first time, but I downed half a bottle of JD's in the 1st half of that final, and didnt touch a drop the 2nd half!
I still dont think the RWC is the be all and end all and dont like how matches in between are seen as development type matches with the RWC the focus...but it is what it is, just like some of the daft rules we have now, deal with it.
-
@act-crusader Yep. Not a Foster fan and not sure if he is the problem. Seemed like a good person to blame but we are a little stale.
-
@mariner4life said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
@taniwharugby said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
@mariner4life what if the powder dry 'alley' is in that we had stuff we were trying to achieve in order to unleash these masterful moves that would wow the world, but cos our kicking was shite and we coudlnt catch, we were unable to get ourselves in a position to unleash/try this magical moves?
When you guys are talking about the "powder" you aren't talking about moves are you? If you are, then we are talking about different shit.
I am mostly talking about moves and changing plans from chip kicks, and changing strategies mid game.
I'm talking about moves that involve 6 or 7 rucks that lead towards a gap opening. Like what Ireland and England achieved. I'm talking about 3 second rucks that we didn't try for. I'm talking about a change to up the guts etc.
A feature of the win in Boerland was the changing of tactics during the game
I'm not convinced about powder dry but apart from tiredness and mental alacrity, how else to explain such an insipid and one dimensional approach to a massive game?
A huge game where we hardly fired shots, how to accurately describe that?
Live adversity training? Hmmm maybe ( seems spurious though)
-
@rembrandt I don't see it as a tactic at all rather cashing in on the fact that there was zero downside as a penalty had already been awarded in both instances.
The only 'tactic' I could observe was to channel Luke McAllister - which is not one I am in favour of.
-
-
@mokey uncontested lineouts...
-
@taniwharugby 3 man scrums
-
-
@mokey said in Has Hansen gone stale?:
George Gregan leaning down to murmur sweetly: Four more years...
Fuck you George, how does 20 years sound? And as they won't win next year either, add four fucking more to that.
-
@mariner4life Can you imagine trying to explain those years to kids nowadays.
Well, poppets, we had some rough times. The Wallabies were on top of the world. Locks kicked. Richie cried. Anton couldn't count. The French routed us. John was on a journey... -
Regardless of strategy and game plan you still have to do the basics first, these don't change. The stupid penalties is just poor discipline. The Irish forwards were just better as a unit, they were simply better than us. Even if Shag rolled out this super secret RWC winning game plan I doubt it would work behind a pack that was dominated.
I often wonder if changing game plans frequently messes with the players minds. Ireland appear to have a game plan that they have drilled into the players whereby they don't think too much, they just act. They lost a few front line players yet the replacements appeared well drilled and it didn't appear to cause any major disruptions.
I think this result has been good for the game and builds a genuine rivalry with Ireland. The RWC really is going to be a competitive tournament.
