2016 End-of-year internationals
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Italian EOY squad (30 players):
Props
Pietro CECCARELLI (Zebre Rugby, 4 caps)
Lorenzo CITTADINI (Aviron Bayonnais, 50 caps)
Simone FERRARI (Benetton Treviso, debutant)
Andrea LOVOTTI (Zebre Rugby, 8 caps)*
Sami PANICO (Patarò Calvisano, 3 caps)*Hookers
Ornel GEGA (Benetton Treviso, 5 caps)
Leonardo GHIRALDINI (Stade Toulousain, 81 caps)Locks
George Fabio BIAGI (Zebre Rugby, 11 caps)
Joshua FURNO (Zebre Rugby, 36 caps)*
Marco FUSER (Benetton Treviso, 13 caps)*
Quintin GELDENHUYS (Zebre Rugby, 66 caps)Flankers/No 8
Simone FAVARO (Glasgow Warriors, 30 caps)*
Maxime Mata MBANDA’ (Zebre Rugby, 2 caps)*
Francesco MINTO (Benetton Treviso, 28 caps)
Sergio PARISSE (Stade Francais, 119 caps)
Andries VAN SCHALKWYK (Zebre Rugby, 5 caps)
Alessandro ZANNI (Benetton Treviso, 99 caps)Halfbacks
Giorgio BRONZINI (Benetton Treviso, debutant)
Edoardo GORI (Benetton Treviso, 53 caps)*
Marcello VIOLI (Zebre Rugby, 2 caps)*First-five eights
Tommaso ALLAN (Benetton Treviso, 24 caps)
Carlo CANNA (Zebre Rugby, 12 caps)Midfielders/wings/fullbacks
Tommaso BENVENUTI (Benetton Treviso, 34 caps)*
Tommaso BONI (Zebre Rugby, 1 cap)*
Andrea BUONDONNO (Benetton Treviso, debutant)
Michele CAMPAGNARO (Exeter Chiefs, 25 caps)*
Angelo ESPOSITO (Benetton Treviso, 7 caps)*
Luke MCLEAN (Benetton Treviso, 81 caps)
Edoardo PADOVANI (Zebre Rugby, 3 caps)*
Leonardo SARTO (Glasgow Warriors, 30 caps)**Former member of the Italian Rugby Union academy “Ivan Francescato” of Tirrenia.
More info (with a bit of help from Google Translate):
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@Wurzel said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
Does Sergio Parisse have a chance of overtaking Richie McCaw with 150 caps? How old is he? If he plays through to the next RWC he'll get to the mark easy.
Yeah, when Richie went there was a thread on this, I think he'll do it at a canter.
And I've got no problem with that, he's a superb player & has carried Italy for 10 years. Massively under-rated down south. He would have got 100 caps as an AB - admitedly mostly off the bench & covering Kaino when off shore & Read when injured, but still...
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Underrated ? ? ? ? He got nominated for player of the year for fucken years on end despite not exactly leading his pretty shit team to any sort of tangible rewards. If anything he's quite the opposite.
I shouldn't cast too many aspersions given Stephen Bates and Daniel Braid got caps but 100 caps for the ABs ? ? ? ? Farrrrrrrrkkkkkk offfffffff........
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always hard to judge stand-out individuals in shit teams - it's not like there is a loose forward alive that could have led italy to success given the other players in the side.
even more so in some positions - you could be a super powerful scrummaging hooker, put every dart on the money, a rampaging ball runner and a clean-out machine and still look like nothing special if the rest of your team is shit.that georgian godzilla chap, the namibian with the many broken noses and parisse would be an interesting trio to see in action - much rather see that sort of best of the minor nations team than the north vs south on the other thread.
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@MN5 said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
Underrated ? ? ? ? He got nominated for player of the year for fucken years on end despite not exactly leading his pretty shit team to any sort of tangible rewards. If anything he's quite the opposite.
Under-rated DOWN SOUTH, up north he's viewed as one of the finest players of his generation, down in NZ he's seen as the 5th Whitelock brother
As for leading his team to tangible reward.. its kind of a 15 man game... by that standard Jonathan Davis, Gavin Hastings & Pat Lam were all shithouse too
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@Bones i rate parisse, but creevy even more so. as unbelievably good as coles has become - often a standout in arguably the greatest AB team - you can see situations where creevy's extra strength and work at the breakdown would be an improvement. a similarly brutal player to bismarck when he was playing at his very best, but more skilful.
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@reprobate said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
@Bones i rate parisse, but creevy even more so. as unbelievably good as coles has become - often a standout in arguably the greatest AB team - you can see situations where creevy's extra strength and work at the breakdown would be an improvement. a similarly brutal player to bismarck when he was playing at his very best, but more skilful.
Yeah, Creevy for 50 minutes then Coles subbing on to run wild would be brutal... A bit like an elevated version of Anton Oliver doing it for 50 mins & then Mealamu subbing on & running about like an enraged midget for 30 minutes as we had a few years back
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Why would it be better? What's going to improve? Our scrum? Our lineout? It's not like our forwards lose the physical exchanges.
Then think about what we lose in attack. I think Creevey would be a step back, or would change the way we play.
I've seen that a bit recently "Creevey is the better hooker because of the "tight stuff"" which I think is bullshit living in the past thinking. Coles is an excellent set piece hooker with incredible attacking gifts unmatched by any other hooker. Why by rump steak when fillet is on offer?
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Coles is excellent at his core roles, the added bonus of being very good at pretty much averything els ehe is asked to do and with a running game that is unrivalled at International level, I see no upside to selecting Creevy over him.
Creevy is an outstanding player, but I'd take Coles over him.
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@gollum said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
@MN5 said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
Underrated ? ? ? ? He got nominated for player of the year for fucken years on end despite not exactly leading his pretty shit team to any sort of tangible rewards. If anything he's quite the opposite.
Under-rated DOWN SOUTH, up north he's viewed as one of the finest players of his generation, down in NZ he's seen as the 5th Whitelock brother
As for leading his team to tangible reward.. its kind of a 15 man game... by that standard Jonathan Davis, Gavin Hastings & Pat Lam were all shithouse too
Big Gav beat the ABs two times more than Parisse ever did ( and ever will ) albeit with the Lions and World 15.
Parisse is like BOD was, obviously good but lesser players make him look heaps better. BOD probably had 5-6 oposition midfielders playing in his era as good or arguably better than he was.
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BOD had two seasons IMO where there was no doubt he was the best centre in rugby. For the rest of them he varied between Test standard and very good.
Parisse on the other hand carries Italy. I think he'd have been genuinely brilliant if he had the benefit of New Zealand coaching.
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@reprobate said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
always hard to judge stand-out individuals in shit teams - it's not like there is a loose forward alive that could have led italy to success given the other players in the side.
even more so in some positions - you could be a super powerful scrummaging hooker, put every dart on the money, a rampaging ball runner and a clean-out machine and still look like nothing special if the rest of your team is shit.that georgian godzilla chap, the namibian with the many broken noses and parisse would be an interesting trio to see in action - much rather see that sort of best of the minor nations team than the north vs south on the other thread.
Keith Wood was bloody good in a team that was often going backwards. As for the other two you mention are they genuinely good players or just "cult hero" types ? Not having watched much of Namibia or Georgia I'm not the best person to comment.
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You've summed it up in your last sentence. You watch fuck all rugby and claim to know just how good Parisse is and where he sits in the echelon of players?
He's nothing like bod. No one is saying he's the best. But he's not crap, he's very, very good. If he was available to NZ he'd be in every squad - you can't say that about too many overseas players...there aren't any in the Scotland team for example.
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@Bones said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
You've summed it up in your last sentence. You watch fuck all rugby and claim to know just how good Parisse is and where he sits in the echelon of players?
He's nothing like bod. No one is saying he's the best. But he's not crap, he's very, very good. If he was available to NZ he'd be in every squad - you can't say that about too many overseas players...there aren't any in the Scotland team for example.
Standard MN5 bulshit
"I don't watch any rugby, but still find time to critisise players I've never seen on a forum dedicated to the sport"Parisse is awesome, a phenomenal athlete who would definitely have been a long term AB in my opinion
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While he's undoubtedly a very good player (very very good) would he have made a heap of teams? Read is better. And we haven't carried a 2nd out-and-out 8 in the squad all that regularly. Is he a good enough 6/7 to make the bench (seeing as Read has rarely been unavailable)?
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@mariner4life said in 2016 End-of-year internationals:
While he's undoubtedly a very good player (very very good) would he have made a heap of teams? Read is better. And we haven't carried a 2nd out-and-out 8 in the squad all that regularly. Is he a good enough 6/7 to make the bench (seeing as Read has rarely been unavailable)?
He's older than Read. He would have been battling Rodney nad hence been picked earlier than Read.
Federazione Italiana Rugby
