2019 under 20's
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@98blueandgold said in 2019 under 20's:
Will be interesting what comes out of this, if we want to compete we need to probably play more games like Sth A who do tours to NH. Can’t see us centralising system.
This year is the first time South Africa have had an extended U20 program though. They, along with Argentina, are the most geographically isolated major rugby nation so usually turn up under-cooked. This year they hosted a quad tournament with Argentina and Georgia U20s plus some sort of Namibian senior team, and then went to UK pre-tournament and played some friendlies.
I don't now how SAF have gone, from what I have read out of SAF they're not a particularly promising crop of U20s this year that they are particularly hopeful for anyway.
Anyway. I am advocating absolutely no changes to the NZ U20 fixtures structure. 3 games in an Oceania tournament is plenty of prep.
This tournament happens every year. It's not a once every 2 years or every 4 years thing The U20s play 3 Oceania games and 5 world champs games every year (until Philpott gets us relegated to the World Trophy which is only 4 games each ....)
8 U20 tests per year is plenty. In fact it's heaps. The 6N teams playing 10 U20s per year is just overkill. Better that our players also get some time to rub shoulders with those grizzly 22 year old veterans running around in club rugby (while there's still some 22 year old rugby players actually left in this country).
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@Rapido said in 2019 under 20's:
@98blueandgold said in 2019 under 20's:
Will be interesting what comes out of this, if we want to compete we need to probably play more games like Sth A who do tours to NH. Can’t see us centralising system.
This year is the first time South Africa have had an extended U20 program though. They, along with Argentina, are the most geographically isolated major rugby nation so usually turn up under-cooked. This year they hosted a quad tournament with Argentina and Georgia U20s plus some sort of Namibian senior team, and then went to UK pre-tournament and played some friendlies.
I don't now how SAF have gone, from what I have read out of SAF they're not a particularly promising crop of U20s this year that they are particularly hopeful for anyway.
Anyway. I am advocating absolutely no changes to the NZ U20 fixtures structure. 3 games in an Oceania tournament is plenty of prep.
This tournament happens every year. It's not a once every 2 years or every 4 years thing The U20s play 3 Oceania games and 5 world champs games every year (until Philpott gets us relegated to the World Trophy which is only 4 games each ....)
8 U20 tests per year is plenty. In fact it's heaps. The 6N teams playing 10 U20s per year is just overkill. Better that our players also get some time to rub shoulders with those grizzly 22 year old veterans running around in club rugby (while there's still some 22 year old rugby players actually left in this country).
I disagree with the Oceania Championship being a sufficient preparation. The only good team we're playing in that tournament is Australia. The other opponents, who seem to be different every year, are just not strong enough. Those 2 games are more opposed training runs than test matches. So bascially, NZU20s play one serious test match in preparation of the JWC.
S Africa played Georgia and Argentina (serious opposition; the Namibia XV game was opposed training game), and England and Wales. The travelling adds an extra dimension. Four test matches against good opposition.
South Africa has done well again this year. They'll be playing for bronze again.
Similarly, Argentina has also benefitted from their SA tour (IIRC they also played games against South American opponents, but not sure). Argentina is South Africa's opponent in the bronze final. Last year, they finished 6th (although, obviously home advantage may have helped a bit, too).I'd be happy if they would turn the Oceania Championship into an extended U20 Rugby Championship tournament, with NZ playing Australia, S Africa, Argentina and Fiji (and/or whichever other team from the South Pacific that has qualified for the WR U20 Championship and/or Trophy). At a different venue every year, alternating between S Africa, Argentina, Australia and New Zealand.
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So I’d suggest we are underdogs vs Ireland.
Which is not far off suggesting Trump has decided to a make the US a socialist state.
Some things you just don’t expect to read in your lifetime.
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@Stargazer said in 2019 under 20's:
@Rapido said in 2019 under 20's:
@98blueandgold said in 2019 under 20's:
Will be interesting what comes out of this, if we want to compete we need to probably play more games like Sth A who do tours to NH. Can’t see us centralising system.
This year is the first time South Africa have had an extended U20 program though. They, along with Argentina, are the most geographically isolated major rugby nation so usually turn up under-cooked. This year they hosted a quad tournament with Argentina and Georgia U20s plus some sort of Namibian senior team, and then went to UK pre-tournament and played some friendlies.
I don't now how SAF have gone, from what I have read out of SAF they're not a particularly promising crop of U20s this year that they are particularly hopeful for anyway.
Anyway. I am advocating absolutely no changes to the NZ U20 fixtures structure. 3 games in an Oceania tournament is plenty of prep.
This tournament happens every year. It's not a once every 2 years or every 4 years thing The U20s play 3 Oceania games and 5 world champs games every year (until Philpott gets us relegated to the World Trophy which is only 4 games each ....)
8 U20 tests per year is plenty. In fact it's heaps. The 6N teams playing 10 U20s per year is just overkill. Better that our players also get some time to rub shoulders with those grizzly 22 year old veterans running around in club rugby (while there's still some 22 year old rugby players actually left in this country).
I disagree with the Oceania Championship being a sufficient preparation. The only good team we're playing in that tournament is Australia. The other opponents, who seem to be different every year, are just not strong enough. Those 2 games are more opposed training runs than test matches. So bascially, NZU20s play one serious test match in preparation of the JWC.
S Africa played Georgia and Argentina (serious opposition; the Namibia XV game was opposed training game), and England and Wales. The travelling adds an extra dimension. Four test matches against good opposition.
South Africa has done well again this year. They'll be playing for bronze again.
Similarly, Argentina has also benefitted from their SA tour (IIRC they also played games against South American opponents, but not sure). Argentina is South Africa's opponent in the bronze final. Last year, they finished 6th (although, obviously home advantage may have helped a bit, too).I'd be happy if they would turn the Oceania Championship into an extended U20 Rugby Championship tournament, with NZ playing Australia, S Africa, Argentina and Fiji (and/or whichever other team from the South Pacific that has qualified for the WR U20 Championship and/or Trophy). At a different venue every year, alternating between S Africa, Argentina, Australia and New Zealand.
I just think we're losing perspective of what a JWC is all about. I don't want that much (monetary) resources allocated to prepping for an annual JWC.
3 games prep (1 hard match and 2 cake walks) . Then the pool stages of the actual JWC itself. If its a good year we'll win or come close to winning the JWC on that. If it's not we'll get taught some lessons. Even if that lesson is for those selecting the coach.
The problem, from my POV, is that in the year between finishing schools (and the schoolboy scrum laws etc ), there isn't enough good forwards coaching going on for the U19s so that when they reach U20s a Cron is having to be pulled into the camps to teach a crash course for the the forwards to try to learn how to forward.
Are there too many second-year 7ths (forwards) hanging around schoolboy rugby as 19 year olds .... ? Sort of a genuine question.
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@KiwiMurph They're doing fine, yes. But maybe they would have been much better with a few better matches during their preparation? Who knows? I just see a difference in preparation between NH and SH nations. We can't change the fact that a lot of those NH players are already playing professionally (and only a few of ours), but we can change the difference in preparation.
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I'm not really suggesting that the Oceania comp is sufficient preparation, but it's almost good enough. The better value IMO is getting everyone, not just an annointed 28 at U20 level, better prepared at domestic U19 level.
Because our young forwards are always shit.
At the moment we accept that this is low hanging fruit that can be caught up as the players move through the 20 to 22 aged bracket.
But, it may be time to re-assess. Starting to see some All Black packs get dominated on occasions the last 2 or 3 years.
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@Rapido said in 2019 under 20's:
I'm not really suggesting that the Oceania comp is sufficient preparation, but it's almost good enough. The better value IMO is getting everyone, not just an annointed 28 at U20 level, better prepared at domestic U19 level.
Because our young forwards are always shit.
At the moment we accept that this is low hanging fruit that can be caught up as the players move through the 20 to 22 aged bracket.
But, it may be time to re-assess. Starting to see some All Black packs get dominated o occasions the last 2 or 3 years.
Agree that our U19 youngsters, particularly forwards, aren't that good. I wonder whether that has to do with schools' preference for the big, fast-maturing (physically) boys, instead of the more skilled ones that bulk up later?
Also good to note that in the NH, there is an U18 Six Nations tournament. This year, it was played for the second time.
I also mentioned in an earlier post about Australia that their Australian and U18 Schools team toured the NH, late 2018.
The South African Schools team plays countries like England, Wales, France and Italy.
So even at those younger levels, they already play more test matches.
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From a monetary funding POV. I'm pretty sure the Oceania U20s is a World Rugby funded comp - as it forms a part of the JWC / JWT qualifying process.
A Sanzaar U20 comp would have to be paid for by the respective unions.
Also, for a Tier 2 perspective. Fiji plus one of either Tonga or Samoa getting some games v NZ and Aus is good for them. The contact between NZ and Fiji at a junior level is at a factor of x to the power of zillion compared to NZ v Fiji at senior test level.
However - a SH U20 comp would be great if it could be paid for.
Here is my fantasy pitch to get it World Rugby funded.
Make it a JWC/JWT qualifying funnel for Oceania, Southern Africa, South America
8 teams: 2 pools of 4 > then Final (PLus play offs for 3rd, 5th , 7th) = 4 games compared to current 3. Almost guaranteed 2 hard games each for the Sanzaar big 4.Top 5 qualify for JWC.
4 SANZAAR nations (permanent members, coz we have the votes ...)
plus- 2 Oceania (Fiji, Sam, Tga play off for the 2 spots)
- 1 Africa (Nam and Zim playoff for the spot)
- 1 South America (probably Uruguay, but playoff v Brazil, Chile, Paraguay etc form this spot)
Have achieved:
- a funded tournament
- harder tournament, than current, for the big 4
- exposure for 4 Tier 2 nations v Sanzaar big 4
- Existing Continental qualifying at T2 level for those who don't make it to the SH comp.
and Uruguay would probably give a harder match than the watery custard that Samoa and Tonga put out at youth level.
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@Stargazer said in 2019 under 20's:
The only good team we're playing in that tournament is Australia
And that's no sure thing, given some of the past results
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@taniwharugby said in 2019 under 20's:
had heard from someone in the know that the team was lacking in a number of areas a month or so back, turns out he was on the money.
Discipline seemed to be the biggest thing lacking
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@KiwiMurph and in the past it’s worked for us playing in the Oceania rugby championship..would like to us take on a couple of super rugby development squads as well..I know when my nephew played against the Blues Dev back in 2017, it was a really good physical contest for the Baby Blacks .
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@MajorRage Unfortunately, Finau seems to be prone to making controversial high tackles. Remember South Africans complaining about the hit in the tweet below?
@Stargazer said in 2019 under 20's:
South Africans on twitter are complaining that Finau wasn't carded here.
His technique may need some work; he won't be escaping a red card forever. But looking at the tackle in the Welsh game shown, the tackled player just landed from a jump, so moved downward when he hit the ground. Finau seemed to try going low, just not low enough, which may also have to do with the fact that he's probably somewhere between 1.90 and 1.95m tall. I assume this was the tackle he got yellow-carded for and the Welsh wanted red?
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@Stargazer said in 2019 under 20's:
@MajorRage Unfortunately, Finau seems to be prone to making controversial high tackles. Remember South Africans complaining about the hit in the tweet below?
@Stargazer said in 2019 under 20's:
South Africans on twitter are complaining that Finau wasn't carded here.
His technique may need some work; he won't be escaping a red card forever. But looking at the tackle in the Welsh game shown, the tackled player just landed from a jump, so moved downward when he hit the ground. Finau seemed to try going low, just not low enough, which may also have to do with the fact that he's probably somewhere between 1.90 and 1.95m tall. I assume this was the tackle he got yellow-carded for and the Welsh wanted red?
Yeah, correct. The usual suspects talking about black invisibility cloaks etc. Quite a few safa's too ... although I guess the same that saw no problem with the coat hanger on Perenara.
I can see why some say red, for this, although I'm happy with the yellow. He was bloody low when he went in.
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All those moaners in the NH media got what they wanted ...
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So, according to the high-tackle sanction framework:
- it's a high tackle
- direct contact between shoulder and head
- degree of danger: arm swings forward prior to contact, active/dominant tackle, high speed, tackle completed, so high risk
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I think the first two mitigating factors may apply and yellow was correct, but obviously the citing commissioner didn't see it that way:
If the judiciary agrees that it should have been a red card, Finau will be looking at a mid-range suspension of 3-4 weeks.
