England vs All Blacks
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I dislike Itoje as a player! I reckon he is let away with so much at the breakdown, always putting hands in the ruck to slow it down, but I guess good on him, he gets away with it.
One of these ones where you could say ABs played shit and where luck but actually in reflection did pretty good. Hard place to win, pooring rain and down 15 after 20min Eng played as well as they could, but still stayed calm and tightened the screws. One thing you can guarantee this week and next is how hard teams will come out but absolutely shocking start from us.
England for me this was your chance and you blew it, too predictable and ABs adjusted and they didnt. -
@stargazer said in England vs All Blacks:
@tordah It's as if they've been trying to justify his contract. When he re-signed, there were already doubts about the length of his contract extension and whether he'd make the 2019RWC.
I'm sure the selectors will continue to look at his performance as 'playing his way back into form' as they always do.
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@akan004 I think it's due to the coaches trying new structures and new player combos. They've been experimenting. The question is, will they continue experimenting right until the RWC, so that our RWC opponents have no idea what we're going to bring, or will they use the shortened Rugby Championship to consolidate the new structures and combos that worked well?
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Quick post game comment on my very frustrating phone
ABs did well to win. Executed kicking very poorly in the first half, played into the hands of the English.
English looked very well drilled. Knew what they were thing to do and did it. Didn't give nz any chances to play to their strengths.
Skill execution in the first half was woeful. Poor technique and dumb rugby exacerbated this, but the passing kicking tackling and catching was very averageRead did well to call a scrum before half time. Brave but paid off
We defended the maul twice in the second half! It's a huge work on
English rush defence disappeared as the game went on, and then we got going.
Just so frustrated with the kicking options taken. Ball in hand we looked good, we just keep giving them the ball
Modern rugby laws are terrible. And hard to referee. Itoje was offside, but how do you call that, and not the no arms tackle last week? We also get tries rubbed out regularly for marginal forward passes, or knock ons a long way back to the field, so I'll take it. Seems to be modern rugby
Great tussle, but this was England's chance. We're going to face a game like this in knockouts next year and need to play this well. With the weather and the Twickenham factor, it's a good win. Played poorly and won,
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@stargazer I really hope you are right, mate. I feel that it's also partly due to the NH teams having improved since the last wc cycle. We still have the ability to construct tries better than anyone else but I think our defence has regressed badly.
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@sparky said in England vs All Blacks:
Sam Underhill scores a try for England after a charge down. Weak defence by Beauden Barrett.
Oooh aaahhh - Underhill made Barrett look just awful there.
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@akan004 I wonder about our defence, it looks bad but I think we defend different to other teams. Teams like SA, Eng, Ireland look to play narrow, shut outside channels and Dominate physicality at all times but do not have a plan B. I think our D is more of a reaction to what we see, a bend but dont break mentality. When teams are in our 22 all of a sudden we get very aggressive. we are very good at giving teams space and then waiting until they don't have the numbers and get turnover rather than be aggressive from the start, yet we can bring line speed when needed.
Its not comparing apples with apples I think we are trying to be smart with what we are doing.....I think. Hansen talks about innovation rather than doing the same as everyone else, maybe this is an example. -
@nzzp said in England vs All Blacks:
Great tussle, but this was England's chance. We're going to face a game like this in knockouts next year and need to play this well. With the weather and the Twickenham factor, it's a good win. Played poorly and won,
Spotted them 15 points, on their turf, played mostly like shit, got the W. I’ll take it.
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@98blueandgold You might be right but teams do seem to be fnding a lot of holes against us this year. That first English try was just so soft and should never have been scored.
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@sparky said in England vs All Blacks:
According to ESPN, Owen Farrell missed ten tackles for England.
Poor return on attempted tackles for Farrell, but where's the arm in it?
I'll get my coat
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Although Farrell did put one great Wilkinsonesque tackle in on Read, so not all bad
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@disgusted-of-tw said in England vs All Blacks:
@sparky said in England vs All Blacks:
According to ESPN, Owen Farrell missed ten tackles for England.
Poor return on attempted tackles for Farrell, but where's the arm in it?
I'll get my coat
Eddie will be complaining that the refs aren't protecting poor old owie from having to make so many tackles
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Thought that was a pretty good game.
England played well, we played well at thier game too.
Garces was pretty good, pleasing to see he has learnt rules from last year, and Marshy still doesn't know the rules, or at least how they have been interpreted for a while now.
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@stargazer well that was certainly a different style of play, more England like, and was a good article by Nick Evans a week or so back explaining the things he noticed we were trying which were a bit different to our norm as well.
So our non-kicking 10 did ok to pull us through there huh.
I liked the fact we beat them like that, playing a game more in thier style and was very amusing how they chose to turn down 3 points twice...imagine the ribbing they'd be giving us if we had turned down 3 twice and lost by 1 point??
