Six Nations 2017
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@gollum said in Six Nations 2017:
@profitius said in Six Nations 2017:
Connacht won the pro12 last season by playing the NZ way. They've far less playing resources than Leinster (just one player in the Ireland squad at the weekend) but they ripped Leinster apart in that final.
Connacht played that way by bringing in a stack of kiwis in key positions. If they tried playing "NZ rugby" with the basic Connacht team it would have been the same result as any other club team doing so.
The "NZ way" relies on guys trained from childhood to look to avoid contact & look to pass from contact, players with fast hands who run support lines. Teams without that base cannot just switch to playing that way. Its not like going from rush to slide defence.
England have moved on a lot by picking a 1st five / 2nd five combo - something NZ has done forever, and picking ball playing forwards - Mako Vunipola in particular, but also Jamie George, Launchbury, Robshaw & Itoje. They are all the type of ball playing forwards that are produced continously in NZ. But you can only pick the players you have.
It's not a case of picking a hooker with Dane Coles pace - if you don't have any hookers with his pace. Equally you can't take a slow hooker & go "we'd like to play like Coles"
Scotland got round it by just picking Glasgow. If you have the talent base you pick guys who will run great lines & know guys will be there, if you don't have the base you pick combinations who know what line to run because they practice with that combo every week.
The big difference between north & south is not style, its basic skills.
In that final there were 4 kiwis in the squad. The 19 others also have to be some bit comfortable playing that way.
There's stacks of kiwis in french teams too and you should see how they play.But its going a bit off point because i was originally talking about the style of play, not the quality of player.
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@profitius said in Six Nations 2017:
@Crucial said in Six Nations 2017:
@canefan said in Six Nations 2017:
@Crucial Total rugby
Yep. It's a concept that hasn't taken hold up north yet. The teams up here tend to prefer to play very positionally which results in very structured attack. If the expected players aren't in the expected positions you see hesitation..
That's not to say one way is vastly superior to another, it is different styles of playing the game and makes it very interesting.
As NH teams have shown in the past a committed and organised defence that can keep its concentration for 82 minutes can frustrate a creative attack.
Crucial, i would argue that the NZ way of playing is far superior. The results are there for all to see. For the sake of argument, let's ignore NZ teams and look at a different examples.
Connacht won the pro12 last season by playing the NZ way. They've far less playing resources than Leinster (just one player in the Ireland squad at the weekend) but they ripped Leinster apart in that final. They wanted another Kiwi coach to continue that way of playing so they signed Kieran Keane.
The Scots have also moved in that direction and had their best 6 nations in 11 years. Glasgow layed the groundwork for that. They won the pro12 two seasons ago playing some very good rugby.
I think teams are starting to change but in the NH once winter comes and the ball gets slippy, the coaches go back to their comfort blanket of bosh rugby. In Ireland, Leinster are playing a more unstructured way this season ( brought in Graham Henry for a few weeks over the summer) and they've already beaten the pro12 try scoring record with 5 games to go. Munster play a kick chase game and Ulster try to play ball but look badly coached. Joe Schmidt is starting to get criticism now for Ireland's lack of tries.
In Wales, the Scarlets and Ospreys play a nice brand of rugby that's more SH in style. Wales though pick the most defensive side possible. As with Ireland, fear of losing overrules attacking rugby. I'd say too that it would help to move the 6 nations back a few weeks. It's over just as the weather is just starting to change for the better.
I was impressed by the U20 teams. Compared to the past, most teams are trying to play good attacking rugby.
The weather argument only holds water (no pun intended) in the puggy uneven fields at lower grades. Although we have a few of those in NZ as well.
Believe it or not it does actually rain in NZ (that's why our grass is green as well). We use the same ball and have access to the same turf management knowledge. The difference is not weather, it is attitude. -
The other advantage to playing this way is the need to train a quick transfer from attack to defence and regular practice of it. Teams like the Canes and Chiefs will take chances in attack yet if a ball is spilled or turned over will cover quickly on Defence.
The risk averse methods of play in the NH mean that when turnovers occur they are often slow to regroup and leave holes and mismatches to be exploited by a good attack. As they often don't play against good attacks then the get away with it. -
@Crucial said in Six Nations 2017:
The other advantage to playing this way is the need to train a quick transfer from attack to defence and regular practice of it. Teams like the Canes and Chiefs will take chances in attack yet if a ball is spilled or turned over will cover quickly on Defence.
The risk averse methods of play in the NH mean that when turnovers occur they are often slow to regroup and leave holes and mismatches to be exploited by a good attack. As they often don't play against good attacks then the get away with it.This area has been exploited massively in the post-Henry era. Don't get me wrong the 2009-2013 ABs and NZ Super Rugby teams were good counter attacking teams, but the last 5 years have been next level. And only so much of that can be done in the AB set up, especially given the assembly generally a week before their first fixture. The bulk of the work is done at lower levels, so even if Schmidt and Cotter or Jones are keen to play that way they don't have enough of the cattle to do it.
I think the cohesion between the AB set up and the 5 SR teams (and to a lesser extent M10 Cup teams) is huge here. There is a lot more knowledge sharing and resource borrowing that goes on elsewhere. It does help having a concentrated playing base, but it can work the other way when you get a Lam/Kirwan/Hammett/Nuciforia-at-the-end scenario where one rogue coach can take 1/5th of the playing populous offline.
But once you get enough of the franchises on side it does kind of become a survival of the fittest type thing and to keep up you have to adapt.
Also so many resources and such a focus is being put into the transition game. It seems Smith's role is pretty much exclusively this with the ABs and they were desperate to keep him. I've seen tutorials with Rennie that hint that it is his core focus with the Chiefs.
A lot of the northern unions and clubs I think still delegate the role of a defensive coach as primarily tackling skills and setting the defensive pattern etc.
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@Frye said in Six Nations 2017:
That article is something else.
Spiro has well and truly lost it.
Agreed - he uses his bully pulpit to be as much of a twat as Jones is.
It's kinda funny watching the two of them go at each other over the last few years. Although Spiro does tend to rage a lot more about Jones than the other way round.
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@gollum said in Six Nations 2017:
@profitius said in Six Nations 2017:
Connacht won the pro12 last season by playing the NZ way. They've far less playing resources than Leinster (just one player in the Ireland squad at the weekend) but they ripped Leinster apart in that final.
Connacht played that way by bringing in a stack of kiwis in key positions. If they tried playing "NZ rugby" with the basic Connacht team it would have been the same result as any other club team doing so.
Hmmm. Nibble, nibble. Does that stand up?
Who are these "stack of Kiwis" that Connacht brought in to key positions that had them playing like they did last season?
Let's assume that you're going to say Bundee Aki and Tom McCartney. Who else? Heenan - who was injured for half the season?
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Seems Jonesy is in full on deflection mode:
England coach Eddie Jones compares Ireland loss to All Blacks World Cup drought | Newshub
England coach Eddie Jones has compared the Ireland loss to NZ's struggle for a second RWC.
Dragging up results by another team from 14, 10 and 6 years ago, and repeating and outright and utter lie, thus:
"They lost the semi-final against Australia in 2003 and they lost the quarter- final in 2007. They got to the final in 2011 and they had to have a very kind referee to get them home."
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@booboo said in Six Nations 2017:
Seems Jonesy is in full on deflection mode:
England coach Eddie Jones compares Ireland loss to All Blacks World Cup drought | Newshub
England coach Eddie Jones has compared the Ireland loss to NZ's struggle for a second RWC.
Dragging up results by another team from 14, 10 and 6 years ago, and repeating and outright and utter lie, thus:
"They lost the semi-final against Australia in 2003 and they lost the quarter- final in 2007. They got to the final in 2011 and they had to have a very kind referee to get them home."
He's going full gobshite now. I preferred him as affable coach of plucky Japan
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@Frye said in Six Nations 2017:
That article is something else.
Spiro has well and truly lost it.
This is not a recent thing " it" disappeared over the horizon quite a while ago and search efforts were in vain . Aussie Spiro really isn't a whole lot better than the manatee
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Just on the style of play thing, it was quite apparent that Ireland on the weekend didn't really know what to do with all that ball. They played a lot of slow ball, one-off runners, but there didn't seem to be a purpose to it. And by purposely initiating contact, they slowed their own ball down, and required a number of their own players to make sure they kept it, meaning they weren't generating much out of it other than tired defenders, and good stats. Their two best attacks came from the one loop play that actually worked; and Payne being the recipient of a nice bit of lenient reffing with respect to the "held in the tackle" law.
They weren't creating space, they weren't sucking in defenders, and if they did go quick to the backs, the midfielders hit it up anyway. At one point Sexton resorted to a bomb for a winger that didn't even know it was coming.
England looked the "better" side throughout, but their error rate was appalling, and their energy rate was low. But, they looked dangerous with the ball (for the little they had it) and their defense re-organised really well. Ireland had the ball and the field position, but didn't know what to do with it.
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@mariner4life said in Six Nations 2017:
Just on the style of play thing, it was quite apparent that Ireland on the weekend didn't really know what to do with all that ball. They played a lot of slow ball, one-off runners, but there didn't seem to be a purpose to it. And by purposely initiating contact, they slowed their own ball down, and required a number of their own players to make sure they kept it, meaning they weren't generating much out of it other than tired defenders, and good stats. Their two best attacks came from the one loop play that actually worked; and Payne being the recipient of a nice bit of lenient reffing with respect to the "held in the tackle" law.
They weren't creating space, they weren't sucking in defenders, and if they did go quick to the backs, the midfielders hit it up anyway. At one point Sexton resorted to a bomb for a winger that didn't even know it was coming.
England looked the "better" side throughout, but their error rate was appalling, and their energy rate was low. But, they looked dangerous with the ball (for the little they had it) and their defense re-organised really well. Ireland had the ball and the field position, but didn't know what to do with it.
I thought it was a quite deliberate rope a dope by Ireland/Schmidt. England didn't know quite what to do with so little possession and were hammered at the breakdown. As a couple of them said afterwards, they were stunned by Ireland's ferocity over the ball. An echo of what Ireland did to NZ in 2013 in the first half of that match that I never discuss.
They deliberately stayed away from lineouts and decided to go up through the middle a lot of the time. I would have moved Farrell to 10 a lot sooner as he would have controlled the game a lot better than Ford when England did get the ball.
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@Frye said in Six Nations 2017:
Appears to be at least four Kiwis in the management team. I'd imagine they might have an influence about how a team is drilled.
Absolutely - big influence. And why they sought out another Kiwi to replace Lam.
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@Pot-Hale that could be a fair assessment, but it very nearly came unstuck because Ireland weren't generating points. In the end, that lineout steal by O'Mahoney was huge, because if that turns in to another English maul, it was probably going to be another English penalty. The entire momentum of the game swung on that, England never got another sniff.
The breakdowns were a ferocious shitfight, green jerseys were diving at everything at terrific speeds.
Your final point its probably the biggest stick to beat the English with over the course of the whole tournament, they are slow to adjust on the track. The weekend's game, and the Italy game required changes in thinking and execution, but they couldn't do anything. Italy lacked the quality to do anything about it, Ireland just kept at them the whole game.
