All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham
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Haven't read the thread (not sure I can be arsed today with the attacking/fluffing of individual players that match threads have descended into these days - will read back over the week) so here's my dump of thoughts I can remember.
I really thought it was going to be two losses from drop goals in two days for NZ test teams.
Thought we were the much better side in the first half and honestly thought we were getting the rough end of the calls. Annoyingly that's what most of my comments are about.
I was disappointed our captain didn't point out the English players were running decoys and that was why we were hitting them off the ball.
On replay looked like BB was tackled in the air by the Eng 6, something you'd expect the TMO would pickup. Especially if it went the other way.
What’s this “allow the access” call by refs? Players don’t need to move out of the way, they just can’t change their line to impede.
In that last 10 minutes Eng killed our ball multiple times and didn't get carded. It goes back down the other end and we get the same player carded twice. Ironically one of the cards was an actual straight up tackle without the ball with the England player not being a decoy. Then Gardner allowed himself to get bullied by his officials team into a card for a call he claimed wasn't foul play. Rugby's legislators seem intent on creating mismatches rather than contests these days - but you only need to read NH comments around the 20m reds to see that fans up there want that in the game.
I'm glad we've ditched playing behind the line so much. We looked better in that first half due to that.
I assume Vai'i was injured? How lucky did the coaches get with Sititi, back up number 8 becomes the 6 we need. Reminds me of Mils in 2003.
Itoje and Smith's tight riding high shorts are funny. It's like they want to play AFL.
Ah well, at least we got the win, played some decent rugby in parts, and it's helped ease my anger over the pathetic Kiwis last night.
Edit: Oh yeah forgot to say, that 20 odd minutes where they muddled up the audio and we got the ref loud and Nisbett quiet was great.
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@Chris-B I agree. It looks like the ambition to play dazzling, fast and beautiful rugby exceeds the individual abilities of most of the players. It speaks perhaps to a lack of clarity of communication, pragmatism and honesty at the coaching level. Something isn’t working internally, I suspect.
Aside from the messy execution of an overly idealised game plan, I’m also alarmed at the players’ seeming inability to maintain discipline under pressure. This has been going on all year, and may reflect the frustration they feel at the gap between the coaches’ grandiose vision and the reality.
With that in mind, we shouldn’t overlook the distorting factor of money. The Silverlake private equity investment was in an AB brand built on fast, flowing and attacking rugby that is beautiful to watch. Those sort of investors are notoriously impatient, which leaves me thinking Robertson feels he must deliver on that in every game, and those pressures are getting to the players.
What’s needed is a greater sense of pragmatism - of building the strategy around the team, rather than the team around the strategy. I still wonder at what was behind Leon Macdonald’s early exit from the coaching set-up and whether NZ Rugby’s almost panicked early appointment of Robertson has created a culture where people are now frightened to question the boss.
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@His-Bobness said in All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham:
@Chris-B I agree. It looks like the ambition to play dazzling, fast and beautiful rugby exceeds the individual abilities of most of the players. It speaks perhaps to a lack of clarity of communication, pragmatism and honesty at the coaching level. Something isn’t working internally, I suspect.
Aside from the messy execution of an overly idealised game plan, I’m also alarmed at the players’ seeming inability to maintain discipline under pressure. This has been going on all year, and may reflect the frustration they feel at the gap between the coaches’ grandiose vision and the reality.
With that in mind, we shouldn’t overlook the distorting factor of money. The Silverlake private equity investment was in an AB brand built on fast, flowing and attacking rugby that is beautiful to watch. Those sort of investors are notoriously impatient, which leaves me thinking Robertson feels he must deliver on that in every game, and those pressures are getting to the players.
What’s needed is a greater sense of pragmatism - of building the strategy around the team, rather than the team around the strategy. I still wonder at what was behind Leon Macdonald’s early exit from the coaching set-up and whether NZ Rugby’s almost panicked early appointment of Robertson has created a culture where people are now frightened to question the boss.
That is one perspective. Mine is that BB can't drive a team and makes silly decisions.
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@mariner4life You're probably right. But, the same thing applies that we're not executing the attacking kicks and recovery with sufficient skill - or stringing together the subsequent phases.
In the first couple of minutes we certainly made two or three kicks and ended up back in our 22 after various bungles - I remember that, because it was the first, but not the last time that I said FFS!
I also recall with about 20 minutes to go thinking we need to put the kicks away and keep ball in hand - and about the same time thinking Beaudy needs to be hooked.
I think Telea made a couple of nice recoveries of offensive bombs.
The chip that Ratima recovered and then got pinged off his feet another - potential try gone begging.
But, there were probably half a dozen instances where we'd opened space to put someone through the hole for a major bust and possible score, but managed to bungle it.
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@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham:
Ratima hesitation
In Ratima's defence, I think that the English player next to him at the ruck obscured his line of sight for that pass.
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We did some good stuff. And yes, that chip that left to the Ratima penalty was a real "fuck no! Wait, oh sweet!" moment.
Sititi puts a pass to Vaa'i instead of way in front of him is another. Shit even the intercept was on the back of us piling through.
To me the worst one was early in the 2nd half we put together a few phases, started to get real go forward and BB kicks not only aimlessly, with no one on the same page, but puts it dead. Unfathomable how he lasted another second after that.
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@His-Bobness Hard to know what's going on inside the camp.
Seems to me that Robertson's giving them a lot of license to play what's in front of them and find the space - but, we're overplaying our hand with miracle offloads - and the pace of it all means too often the support players are a yard behind the play - or not on the same page - or lacking the skill to deal with what they're delivered.
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@mariner4life The one where Rieko cut his hand. And later when he should've passed, but didn't.
Jordan trying to force the pass on the 22 line.
I think Patty T. made a linebreak that we fucked up.
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The Reiko one was a good defensive play. I don't remember the one where he should have passed.
Nothing seemed to go in to his hands clean though, it's not happening for him this year.
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@mariner4life said in All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham:
The Reiko one was a good defensive play. I don't remember the one where he should have passed.
Nothing seemed to go in to his hands clean though, it's not happening for him this year.
Different game but a big contrast in what Tupaea and Lam did in the midfield for AB's XV compared to the 3 All Black midfielders.
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@mariner4life said in All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham:
The Reiko one was a good defensive play. I don't remember the one where he should have passed.
If it’s the one I am thinking of it was around 73/74 minute mark, in 22 and attacking right. We scored shortly after.
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I thought we played quite well for much of the game, aside from too many handling errors and tackling guys without the ball. They have to be more selective with their offload game, but the last 10 minutes we were generally pretty good taking it to the line and pop passing to a runner. Better than trying to play in behind and getting caught way behind the advantage line. The subs made a good impact and did a decent job closing out the game. In Gardner's defence I liked some of his more pragmatic decisions and the way he told the TMO and some of those whining Poms to buzz off when they tried to influence him to rule against us
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@mariner4life said in All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham:
The Reiko one was a good defensive play. I don't remember the one where he should have passed.
Nothing seemed to go in to his hands clean though, it's not happening for him this year.
By the time he gets the ball it always seems to be a crash, even if he wanted to there is no time to pass the ball outside
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Mate I'd hate to live with a lot of you blokes. Seems a few watched this thread rather than the game.
Positives:
- We won
- Our back three + Jordie had a great game under the high ball, won a huge majority of the contests
- BB kicked well to that, seemed like a plan they'd worked on - many kicks were just at the far end of contestable range, so perfect to run on to with speed.
- Sititi played a blinder
- Telea played a blinder
- We had lots of forwards running into holes followed by forwards running onto offloads
- Both wings played well with ball in hand
- Great leg drive from a few key forwards - Ardie, Pat T, Sititi in particular
- Excellent bench scrum - good signs for Tosi, and impressive by Aumua after 70 min
- 4/4 goalkicking with none of them easy
Negatives
- Kicking tactics:
- chips, although one was regathered and almost led to a try. That was under penalty advantage, debatably the only good time to try it
- couple of aimless kicks by BB and Jordie. Need calmer heads or more tactical clarity.
- Discipline. Need to find a solution/train harder to stop tackling off the ball. Yes they're running decoys but you can't full-on tackle them. A lot of the other penalties were unlucky/fairly standard
- Cane poor. Certainly true of his carrying and the tackle off the ball hurt. I didn't study his work in the tight stuff though, so not writing him off yet.
- Handling. I think this was by far our biggest issue. The amount of times we had opportunity let down by poor hands/forced 50/50 offloads/passes poorly located was frustrating. Need to work on the basics more, catching/passing in contact at pace.
- Midfield distribution. Jordie had an off game, but Rieko just doesn't do it for me as a midfielder. So so much better as a wing, ALB can fill the midfield role till Proctor/someone else comes through. I think we've given Rieko enough time there to prove himself.
Mixed
- Jordan. Moments of brilliance, couple of brainfades. High effort though.
- Ardie? Made some metres no one else in world rugby would've made, but anonymous elsewhere. Not sure why, tackling stats (1/3) are weird and suggest a role I didn't spot at the time.
- Scrum. Bad early, good late. Keep working on it.
Overall stoked, we had a gameplan that we executed at times, and we gritted out the win - we scored points where we needed to.
This is year one of a four year process - way too early to throw out the baby with the bathwater.
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is it possible the English just don't have good scrummaging depth?
I read these comments and it sounds like there were only 15 men out there.Razor apparently said:
“Because of how much effort and care [was displayed by the players]. Every game we have been in this year, we have either led or had our chances to win it."Rather optimistic way of looking at 2024 performance.
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@canefan said in All Blacks Vs England, Twickenham:
Right on halftime Vaaii gets pinged for side entry at maul time. I didn't hear him get a warning to get out?
Doesn't need a warning. He joined wrong, thus penalty.
But compare to incident in second half when Angus kept calling "no" to Pom who was blatantly playing the ball when he shouldn't. He should have just penalised him. There is no requirement to warn.
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Razor apparently said:
“Because of how much effort and care [was displayed by the players]. Every game we have been in this year, we have either led or had our chances to win it."Rather optimistic way of looking at 2024 performance.
This team/coaching group really just aren't learning a thing. Mistakes and dumb penalties have kept opposing teams in games all year. We're 11 games into the season and we're still our own worst enemy. It's so incredibly frustrating to watch.
