England & Eddie
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@Chris-B said in England & Eddie:
@Disgusted-of-TW said in England & Eddie:
Yesterday I was simultaneously happy for the victorious Boks, and pissed off at the manner of England's defeat. Last night I watched "Building Jerusalem", though, and felt relatively sanguine about the loss. Winning Bill is hard, there's a thousand things that need to go right in execution and even then you need a dollop of good fortune along the way; in contrast only a few things need to go awry, or the breaks don't fall your way, and you're farked. I don't believe in fate, I think , but I do like Terry Pratchett's idea of the narrative imperative - that some stories are just so good they have to happen. History loves a good narrative, and Kolisi's was just a great story! England will rise again, and win it again - 2023 looks a good shout given the age of the current squad and the quality of the age group cohorts coming through.
Without planning on winding you up - at what point do you think not winning will become a monkey on the back for England? I'm interested in what people think in general.
For us, I think it was after 1999. 1991 was you can't win them all. 1995 we got poisoned. 1999 was WTF is wrong with these guys!
By 2003, we were getting Gregan's "Four more years" taunt - one of the greatest sledges in sport, but it has turned into the "Curse of the Bambino" for the Aussies - because they're going to do at least the same 24 year drought we did.
Thought South Africa started with a lot more composure than England on Saturday - perhaps under less pressure because they weren't favourites but maybe because their drought was shorter.
A couple of others who didn't manage to face down their demons were Ireland, who didn't look like getting past their QF and Wales, who had a chance to go to the big dance, but that Patchell (?) dropkick was a terrible option.
The choker tag was applied to us with glee from the NH as a way to say 'see, you aren't really that good when the pressure is on'. There was endless talk of peaking between RWCs.
England threw everything and re-mortgaged Twickenham to win this one. Brought the best coach, gave him a licence to lose while he molded and tested players and strategies, and scoured the registry offices for eligible players yet still came up short. The richest union in the game with the biggest pool to choose from and they can't find a way to the goal. -
Eddie...What isn't to like about Eddie? He seems to have the right attitude, is able to develop players, can coax epic performances out of teams with semi-regularity.
I'm sure England fans are disappointing at the loss - but I doubt they are left scratching their heads at puzzling selections throughout the cycle and can see the players were well prepared and went out there with a clear gameplan which just didn't come off.
Every interview I've seen with him where he isn't shit stirring I've quite enjoyed.
Who posted a series of off-the-record comments he made at a function (that were swiftly deleted and probably rightly so)? His views were pretty insightful and remarkably candid for the coach of England.
England... I mean they've made more RWC finals in the pro era than we have? Can't really stick the boot in.
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@Frank said in England & Eddie:
@rotated said in England & Eddie:
England... I mean they've made more RWC finals in the pro era than we have? Can't really stick the boot in.I'd say winning the finals is much more important.
Unless you want to give out participation awards.No doubt - but it's all a bit binary to say win the RWC or everything is a failure.
England have put together more good RWC campaigns than NZ in the pro era, and some absolute shockers as well.
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@Frank said in England & Eddie:
@rotated said in England & Eddie:
England... I mean they've made more RWC finals in the pro era than we have? Can't really stick the boot in.I'd say winning the finals is much more important.
Unless you want to give out participation awards.Like silver medals 😉
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@rotated said in England & Eddie:
England... I mean they've made more RWC finals in the pro era than we have? Can't really stick the boot in.
I guess if you look at the Big Five (with a nod especially to Wales who've upset the apple cart on several occasions) in nine World Cups, par is probably something pretty close to:
2 x World Cups
2 x Beaten Finalists
3 x Beaten Semifinalists
2 x Beaten Quarterfinalists
9 x Made it out of pool playObviously with a bit of adjustment for SA missing the first couple.
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@NTA I know you are likely being contrary just to find some excitement in the RWC after the Wobblies produced their predicted shite tournament
But seriously, if your boy won a silver medal at big event and refused to even have it put around his neck I would like to think you'd have words with him about how he handled losing.
Throw the thing in the bin or off a bridge afterwards, give it away or even just take it off a little later but refusing to accept it properly at presentation or ripping it off while still with the officials? Just poor manners really.
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@Crucial said in England & Eddie:
@NTA I know you are likely being contrary just to find some excitement in the RWC after the Wobblies produced their predicted shite tournament
I'm at peace with it. Have been since early October
But seriously, if your boy won a silver medal at big event and refused to even have it put around his neck I would like to think you'd have words with him about how he handled losing.
Yes. However, that is talking to him about it afterwards.
We're having a discussion about how whether the professional rugby players should have behaved that way in the first place.
So, in your scenario, my credentials as a parent are under serious question if we're saying the England team culture is shit.
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Eddie is staying with England
https://www.nzherald.co.nz/sport/news/article.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=12282366
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The medals thing:
Small stuff that we sweat on too much these days.
I can definitely get myself riled up about such things and found an involuntary head nodding at all the reasonable admonishments posted here.
It wasn't ideal behaviour. But not especially representative of anything other than 20 something year olds behaviour being over ridden by emotions for a time in their life spanning less than 60 seconds.
Fast forward anytime from now and you meet one and he acknowledges that it was a pretty spack thing to do, and he was a bit het up at the time. Some degree of contrition and acceptance of the yucky optics.
Well, the whole outrage fire inside just fizzles out from that point.
Cory's right. Save your outrage for non hand shaking or public denigration of the winners.
In other words,, keep your outrage powder dry 😉
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Eddie Jones has vowed to stay on as England head coach after Saturday's humiliating World Cup final defeat to South Africa
Why was it humiliating? Saw plenty of media that labelled our loss humiliating too.
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@taniwharugby said in England & Eddie:
Eddie Jones has vowed to stay on as England head coach after Saturday's humiliating World Cup final defeat to South Africa
Why was it humiliating? Saw plenty of media that labelled our loss humiliating too.
Standard media histrionics
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@rotated said in England & Eddie:
Eddie...What isn't to like about Eddie? He seems to have the right attitude, is able to develop players, can coax epic performances out of teams with semi-regularity.
I actually really like Eddie Jones. Sure, he can say some things to rile people up, but for the most part I find him both insightful and entertaining. And he is clearly a bloody good coach.
Oh - and did I mention that Eddie has now been involved in both SA's last 2 RWC victories?
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@mofitzy_ said in England & Eddie:
@junior said in England & Eddie:
@MiketheSnow said in England & Eddie:
@hydro11 said in England & Eddie:
@MiketheSnow said in England & Eddie:
@hydro11 said in England & Eddie:
Is this a troll post? No English here to troll....
Last night showed how tough it is to win a World Cup. If you look at the three tournaments South Africa have won, they haven't been very good in any of them.
- 1995 they beat Samoa, France and New Zealand.
- 2007 it was Fiji, Argentina and France.
- 2019 it was Japan, Wales and England.
Relatively speaking those are very easy runs. In the two most recent cups we won we had off performances in the knock outs. 2011, it was the final. 2015, it was the semi. We could have lost either game.
Before this game people clearly discounted the effect that England's tougher run had had. It's exceptionally tough to win a World Cup having had three tough knock out games. In 2015, we beat Australia in the final who had a much easier draw. However, Australia were much worse than us. England and South Africa are generally closely matched so the tough run was always going to be a factor.
People also discounted how South Africa were a much different team to us. We didn't try to take England on up front; South Africa were always going to. If Sinckler doesn't get injured, England could have won. Maybe if the first couple of minutes of how semi had happened differently, we could have won as well.
Eddie Jones is a great coach who has achieved great things with England over the last four years. I would still have him as coach of the year.
Not sure about this and commented on it earlier.
England's schedule was tough on paper - and I wrote before the tournament started that England wouldn't win the WC because they had Argentina, France, Wales/Australia, SA/NZ, SA/NZ on the trot - but the reality was very different.
They comfortably beat a 14-man Argentina; the France match was cancelled; and they comfortably beat an average Australia side who'd already lost to Wales.
They produced one of the performances of the decade by dismantling NZ in the SF but really that was their only serious challenge prior to the Final.
Conversely SA had to play NZ first up; then a very good Japanese side who were unbeaten with wins over Ireland and Scotland, in the QF; then Wales who were also unbeaten, in the SF.
For me, SA had the harder path - admittedly losing to NZ didn't derail their progress.
Eddie has done wonders with England but he made some fatal flaws this tournament and in the years leading up to it.
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Sinckler.
Great tournament. But if his best back up is Dan Coles then you're always going to struggle if Sinckler gets a YC or an early injury. -
Youngs
Great going forward. Shithouse going backwards. I would have yanked him at half-time. Spencer couldn't have been any worse. -
Daly
Great athlete, average full-back. Exposed badly today. Willie looked like Cullen in comparison. -
May
He was carrying an injury. Barrett caught him ffs. No way Barrett was catching Watson. -
Slade
Not match fit and made significant mistakes in the games he played in -
Ford
This was not the match to start Ford -
No nasty fluffybunny in the forwards
England have great, technical athletes in all positions but no real hard bastard in the Martin Johnson mould who can bollock them.
Lawes was stuffed twice by Kolbe ffs
How's that for starters?
Strongly disagree with this. Pool play is a bit of an irrelevancy unless you have a tough pool. The New Zealand vs South Africa game happened a long time ago and both teams were going to beat Wales. Japan had had two very good victories but were unlikely to have the physicality to beat South Africa in that game. Japan had already played their final. Wales may have been unbeaten but they were exceptionally poor in the semi final and couldn't threaten the South African line.
Not for the first time today I've questioned whether posters watched the SA v Wales SF.
We scored a try. A good one. England couldn't today, despite 20 odd stabs at it in one passage of play.
It was 16-16 going in to the last 10 minutes.
We had two opportunities to take the lead and blew both.
SA had one chance in the last 5 minutes and took it.
So if we were exceptionally poor, then SA were just poor.
SA didn't do much different tonight, so England lost to a poor team.
Not buying it.
Well, Mike, I get your point, but where does that leave England's performance against us, given that we beat RSA and then spanked Wales? Perhaps England weren't that great after all and, in fact, we were just really shit...?
They were very good on the day, but we were also really shit. Some pundits seem to think that if a team plays shit, then it's 100% because they were forced to play shit but obviously that isn't true. Likewise its possible to play well when the opponent also plays well.
Yeah, look, I never really bought the "no one would have beaten England that day" view of things. True, that they got it spot on tactically and mentally. But, there's no doubt that we were tactically stupid and got some selections way wrong.
Even so, we still had some opportunities to swing the match back into our favour, which we again cocked up through poor options (A Smith's attacking box kick, Jordie's running it and getting smashed by Underhill), poor handling (Brodie's awful pass on the break) and ill-discipline (Whitelock's palm to Farrell's face).
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@junior said in England & Eddie:
@mofitzy_ said in England & Eddie:
@junior said in England & Eddie:
@MiketheSnow said in England & Eddie:
@hydro11 said in England & Eddie:
@MiketheSnow said in England & Eddie:
@hydro11 said in England & Eddie:
Is this a troll post? No English here to troll....
Last night showed how tough it is to win a World Cup. If you look at the three tournaments South Africa have won, they haven't been very good in any of them.
- 1995 they beat Samoa, France and New Zealand.
- 2007 it was Fiji, Argentina and France.
- 2019 it was Japan, Wales and England.
Relatively speaking those are very easy runs. In the two most recent cups we won we had off performances in the knock outs. 2011, it was the final. 2015, it was the semi. We could have lost either game.
Before this game people clearly discounted the effect that England's tougher run had had. It's exceptionally tough to win a World Cup having had three tough knock out games. In 2015, we beat Australia in the final who had a much easier draw. However, Australia were much worse than us. England and South Africa are generally closely matched so the tough run was always going to be a factor.
People also discounted how South Africa were a much different team to us. We didn't try to take England on up front; South Africa were always going to. If Sinckler doesn't get injured, England could have won. Maybe if the first couple of minutes of how semi had happened differently, we could have won as well.
Eddie Jones is a great coach who has achieved great things with England over the last four years. I would still have him as coach of the year.
Not sure about this and commented on it earlier.
England's schedule was tough on paper - and I wrote before the tournament started that England wouldn't win the WC because they had Argentina, France, Wales/Australia, SA/NZ, SA/NZ on the trot - but the reality was very different.
They comfortably beat a 14-man Argentina; the France match was cancelled; and they comfortably beat an average Australia side who'd already lost to Wales.
They produced one of the performances of the decade by dismantling NZ in the SF but really that was their only serious challenge prior to the Final.
Conversely SA had to play NZ first up; then a very good Japanese side who were unbeaten with wins over Ireland and Scotland, in the QF; then Wales who were also unbeaten, in the SF.
For me, SA had the harder path - admittedly losing to NZ didn't derail their progress.
Eddie has done wonders with England but he made some fatal flaws this tournament and in the years leading up to it.
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Sinckler.
Great tournament. But if his best back up is Dan Coles then you're always going to struggle if Sinckler gets a YC or an early injury. -
Youngs
Great going forward. Shithouse going backwards. I would have yanked him at half-time. Spencer couldn't have been any worse. -
Daly
Great athlete, average full-back. Exposed badly today. Willie looked like Cullen in comparison. -
May
He was carrying an injury. Barrett caught him ffs. No way Barrett was catching Watson. -
Slade
Not match fit and made significant mistakes in the games he played in -
Ford
This was not the match to start Ford -
No nasty fluffybunny in the forwards
England have great, technical athletes in all positions but no real hard bastard in the Martin Johnson mould who can bollock them.
Lawes was stuffed twice by Kolbe ffs
How's that for starters?
Strongly disagree with this. Pool play is a bit of an irrelevancy unless you have a tough pool. The New Zealand vs South Africa game happened a long time ago and both teams were going to beat Wales. Japan had had two very good victories but were unlikely to have the physicality to beat South Africa in that game. Japan had already played their final. Wales may have been unbeaten but they were exceptionally poor in the semi final and couldn't threaten the South African line.
Not for the first time today I've questioned whether posters watched the SA v Wales SF.
We scored a try. A good one. England couldn't today, despite 20 odd stabs at it in one passage of play.
It was 16-16 going in to the last 10 minutes.
We had two opportunities to take the lead and blew both.
SA had one chance in the last 5 minutes and took it.
So if we were exceptionally poor, then SA were just poor.
SA didn't do much different tonight, so England lost to a poor team.
Not buying it.
Well, Mike, I get your point, but where does that leave England's performance against us, given that we beat RSA and then spanked Wales? Perhaps England weren't that great after all and, in fact, we were just really shit...?
They were very good on the day, but we were also really shit. Some pundits seem to think that if a team plays shit, then it's 100% because they were forced to play shit but obviously that isn't true. Likewise its possible to play well when the opponent also plays well.
Yeah, look, I never really bought the "no one would have beaten England that day" view of things. True, that they got it spot on tactically and mentally. But, there's no doubt that we were tactically stupid and got some selections way wrong.
Even so, we still had some opportunities to swing the match back into our favour, which we again cocked up through poor options (A Smith's attacking box kick, Jordie's running it and getting smashed by Underhill), poor handling (Brodie's awful pass on the break) and ill-discipline (Whitelock's palm to Farrell's face).
They dominated the collisions, however I always thought we could turn it around with a change of mindset and tactics. I was sure that Hansen would apply the hairdryer and we would come out and rumble it up the guts. But nothing changed, and that was probably the most disappointing thing of all for me
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@rotated said in England & Eddie:
@Frank said in England & Eddie:
@rotated said in England & Eddie:
England... I mean they've made more RWC finals in the pro era than we have? Can't really stick the boot in.I'd say winning the finals is much more important.
Unless you want to give out participation awards.No doubt - but it's all a bit binary to say win the RWC or everything is a failure.
England have put together more good RWC campaigns than NZ in the pro era, and some absolute shockers as well.
But this is exactly what Eddie has banked on - his whole reputation has been built upon a few epic World Cup performances from "underrated" teams. In truth, he's shown little regard for rugby outside of the RWC by taking an all-conquering team in 2016 and accepting muddling performances for the next 3 years in the hope / expectation that it would be rewarded with a RWC victory.
Sure, the Boks have been largely shit since 2015 and, so, it would be inaccurate to say that they haven't sacrificed all the rugby in between in order to win this tournament. But, their shitness has largely been due to political machinations. As soon as they got a decent coach who has able to rise above it (or wasn't constrained by it), they started and were able to play to win, understanding that you actually need to build off a winning base to win the RWC.
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@Crucial said in England & Eddie:
I do agree with your post but would also point out that those very cliched tropes do have a basis to feed off and that actions like those the other night will keep stoking the fires.
I find the whole attitude to Rugby in England quite weird.
On one hand you have the genuine fans who are the same as everywhere else, are great to have beer with and think the likes of Stephen Jones an even bigger dickhead than we do. Then you have the band-wagon/occasional watchers...
It's the later which outnumber the genuine supporters which seem to be the problem, believing every poaching/cheating/ban-the-haka/arrogant opposition coach clickbait story they can find. The media feeds the frenzy which drives the media and around we go.
But I also think Jones needs to look at player attitude a bit. He could learn a lot from the way Southgate has made England one of the more likable and success soccer teams
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@canefan said in England & Eddie:
@junior said in England & Eddie:
@mofitzy_ said in England & Eddie:
@junior said in England & Eddie:
@MiketheSnow said in England & Eddie:
@hydro11 said in England & Eddie:
@MiketheSnow said in England & Eddie:
@hydro11 said in England & Eddie:
Is this a troll post? No English here to troll....
Last night showed how tough it is to win a World Cup. If you look at the three tournaments South Africa have won, they haven't been very good in any of them.
- 1995 they beat Samoa, France and New Zealand.
- 2007 it was Fiji, Argentina and France.
- 2019 it was Japan, Wales and England.
Relatively speaking those are very easy runs. In the two most recent cups we won we had off performances in the knock outs. 2011, it was the final. 2015, it was the semi. We could have lost either game.
Before this game people clearly discounted the effect that England's tougher run had had. It's exceptionally tough to win a World Cup having had three tough knock out games. In 2015, we beat Australia in the final who had a much easier draw. However, Australia were much worse than us. England and South Africa are generally closely matched so the tough run was always going to be a factor.
People also discounted how South Africa were a much different team to us. We didn't try to take England on up front; South Africa were always going to. If Sinckler doesn't get injured, England could have won. Maybe if the first couple of minutes of how semi had happened differently, we could have won as well.
Eddie Jones is a great coach who has achieved great things with England over the last four years. I would still have him as coach of the year.
Not sure about this and commented on it earlier.
England's schedule was tough on paper - and I wrote before the tournament started that England wouldn't win the WC because they had Argentina, France, Wales/Australia, SA/NZ, SA/NZ on the trot - but the reality was very different.
They comfortably beat a 14-man Argentina; the France match was cancelled; and they comfortably beat an average Australia side who'd already lost to Wales.
They produced one of the performances of the decade by dismantling NZ in the SF but really that was their only serious challenge prior to the Final.
Conversely SA had to play NZ first up; then a very good Japanese side who were unbeaten with wins over Ireland and Scotland, in the QF; then Wales who were also unbeaten, in the SF.
For me, SA had the harder path - admittedly losing to NZ didn't derail their progress.
Eddie has done wonders with England but he made some fatal flaws this tournament and in the years leading up to it.
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Sinckler.
Great tournament. But if his best back up is Dan Coles then you're always going to struggle if Sinckler gets a YC or an early injury. -
Youngs
Great going forward. Shithouse going backwards. I would have yanked him at half-time. Spencer couldn't have been any worse. -
Daly
Great athlete, average full-back. Exposed badly today. Willie looked like Cullen in comparison. -
May
He was carrying an injury. Barrett caught him ffs. No way Barrett was catching Watson. -
Slade
Not match fit and made significant mistakes in the games he played in -
Ford
This was not the match to start Ford -
No nasty fluffybunny in the forwards
England have great, technical athletes in all positions but no real hard bastard in the Martin Johnson mould who can bollock them.
Lawes was stuffed twice by Kolbe ffs
How's that for starters?
Strongly disagree with this. Pool play is a bit of an irrelevancy unless you have a tough pool. The New Zealand vs South Africa game happened a long time ago and both teams were going to beat Wales. Japan had had two very good victories but were unlikely to have the physicality to beat South Africa in that game. Japan had already played their final. Wales may have been unbeaten but they were exceptionally poor in the semi final and couldn't threaten the South African line.
Not for the first time today I've questioned whether posters watched the SA v Wales SF.
We scored a try. A good one. England couldn't today, despite 20 odd stabs at it in one passage of play.
It was 16-16 going in to the last 10 minutes.
We had two opportunities to take the lead and blew both.
SA had one chance in the last 5 minutes and took it.
So if we were exceptionally poor, then SA were just poor.
SA didn't do much different tonight, so England lost to a poor team.
Not buying it.
Well, Mike, I get your point, but where does that leave England's performance against us, given that we beat RSA and then spanked Wales? Perhaps England weren't that great after all and, in fact, we were just really shit...?
They were very good on the day, but we were also really shit. Some pundits seem to think that if a team plays shit, then it's 100% because they were forced to play shit but obviously that isn't true. Likewise its possible to play well when the opponent also plays well.
Yeah, look, I never really bought the "no one would have beaten England that day" view of things. True, that they got it spot on tactically and mentally. But, there's no doubt that we were tactically stupid and got some selections way wrong.
Even so, we still had some opportunities to swing the match back into our favour, which we again cocked up through poor options (A Smith's attacking box kick, Jordie's running it and getting smashed by Underhill), poor handling (Brodie's awful pass on the break) and ill-discipline (Whitelock's palm to Farrell's face).
They dominated the collisions, however I always thought we could turn it around with a change of mindset and tactics. I was sure that Hansen would apply the hairdryer and we would come out and rumble it up the guts. But nothing changed, and that was probably the most disappointing thing of all for me
No shit, but a contributing factor in that were our tactics and selections. As I've said elsewhere (and so has @Bones), we ran forward pods close into the ruck once all game, which resulted in Reece getting enough space to perhaps have a chance to touch down in the corner. We then scored from the ensuing lineout.
We did that all match against the Irish and nearly brought up a half ton. We did that once all all match against the English and it proved to be fruitful (sure not as easy or as fruitful as against Ireland, but still fruitful). So, I don't really buy "England didn't allow us to play" tripe that's been trotted out a lot since.
