Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions
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@Stargazer said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@pakman said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@Stargazer said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
So, bring on West; send DMac to fullback, Lowe to the left wing, and Rieko to 13.
That would have been the obvious starting configuration.
The question is, did they start Dmac at 10 at the request of Hansen and co? Or was this Cooper's bright idea?
Cooper's. In the post-match interview he sees him as a 10. Says his skillset suits that position.
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@antipodean said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@Stargazer said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@pakman said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@Stargazer said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
So, bring on West; send DMac to fullback, Lowe to the left wing, and Rieko to 13.
That would have been the obvious starting configuration.
The question is, did they start Dmac at 10 at the request of Hansen and co? Or was this Cooper's bright idea?
Cooper's. In the post-match interview he sees him as a 10. Says his skillset suits that position.
Well we didn't see any of that tonight
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@pakman said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@taniwharugby said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@Crash if they had a proper 7 out there...
Like Pryor?
He wasn't until the 70th minute...certainly woulda been a sight better 7 than Dixon
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@taniwharugby said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@pakman said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@taniwharugby said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
@Crash if they had a proper 7 out there...
Like Pryor?
He wasn't until the 70th minute...certainly woulda been a sight better 7 than Dixon
Looked a better balance once he came on. Wasn't hard to improve over Messam...
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@MiketheSnow said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
Thank fuck they yanked North.
Blown his chance.
McGeechan agrees and selected Daly as a test starter. I doubt it though.
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No line speed and no intensity from the Maori. It wasn't the lions that caused that the Maori just never brought anything near the kind of ferociousness that would be needed to win a test. Was an easy ride in the end. Gatland probably would have preferred more of a workout for his team
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@MiketheSnow said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
Shut up Barnes you fucking idiot.
What up?
BTW we'll swap you Barnes for Marshall ...
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Having time to reflect on the match just increases the disappointment.
This promised to be such a great contest, however it failed to be one. The Lions totally dominant at pretty much everything and the Maori barely gave anything to this match, Lions kept kicking the ball to them, and when the Maori did actually catch it, they either kicked it back or took a poor option with where to run or to pass to someone in a worse position.
Yes this can be put to the pressure the Lions put them under, but some of the decisions and errors weren't really under any pressure other than the score board or statistically, that try aside, they failed to fire a shot or even get thier big guns into the game, which given only about 20% possession or territory isn't surprising.
But that isn't unusual for NZ teams to get dominated, not quite that dominated, and still manage to create things, but unfortunately last night errors and poor decisions killed any opportunity of counter attack or even continuity.
It was a handy super forward pack, with a world class backline, so should have acquitted themselves much, much better, I expect this match has given the Lions plenty of confidence, but I expect they aren't stupid enough to think that this match was even close to the intensity they will get next week, in fact that probably sits below the Baabaa game for that.
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I just wonder , just a suspicion , if the Maori got a little sidetracked with all the peripheral s , media , emphasis on the history , culture , hype etc etc
And not enough work went into how to play the game itself , they seemed a bit directionless to me .
Not intending to take anything away from the lions , who carried out their game perfectly.
But I reckon even they , they would've been a bit surprised how directionless the Maori were -
@kiwiinmelb surely cooper and umaga aren't that stupid to allow that to happen? Cooper in particular has been around long enough to know how to deal with the peripheral shit?
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@taniwharugby probably right , but they did seem to have a deer in the headlights look about them when it came to doing what they were there in the first place for .
Haka looked nicely well rehearsed though .
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Once they realised they were under real pressure up front the Maori looked lost imo. Only half the kicks they put up had any sort of chase, and that just handed the Lions a succession of set piece restarts. Did Reiko actually touch the ball??!
DM at 10 didn't work, and Lowe just kicked, and kicked, and kicked. I know it was wet weather but when you have sweet F all possession why would you just kick it back?!
Well done to the Lions - played to their strengths and locked the game down. On attack they looked dangerous at times, but their backs don't seem to have gelled as well as the guys up front.
If we can get any sort of equity up front we'll have our noses well in front. The AB's will punish the Lions for some of the mistakes they got away with in the Maori game.
ps agree with posts on TKB, worst game from him in a long while, and he was right on the verge of a red card. Jaco sounded like he was looking for a reason not to go red!!
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@taniwharugby said in Māori All Blacks vs British and Irish Lions:
Yes this can be put to the pressure the Lions put them under, but some of the decisions and errors weren't really under any pressure other than the score board or statistically, that try aside, they failed to fire a shot or even get thier big guns into the game, which given only about 20% possession or territory isn't surprising.
But that isn't unusual for NZ teams to get dominated, not quite that dominated, and still manage to create things, but unfortunately last night errors and poor decisions killed any opportunity of counter attack or even continuity.
It was a handy super forward pack, with a world class backline, so should have acquitted themselves much, much better, I expect this match has given the Lions plenty of confidence, but I expect they aren't stupid enough to think that this match was even close to the intensity they will get next week, in fact that probably sits below the Baabaa game for that.
There's probably a tipping point somewhere on how much lack of possession you can withstand and still compete (by counter attacking etc). I feel 20 odd % is too low, have seen ABs do it (and comfortably) with mid to low 30%.
Just smothered.
