All Blacks 2023
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@Victor-Meldrew said in All Blacks 2023:
Locals were fine as ever - always found the Taffs great to share a beer with. Some fluffybunny in an England shirt was winding up AB supporters before getting decked.
Heard basically the same thing from a couple of friends who were separately there. Locals fine, some English dickhead immediately being a fluffybunny.
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@Victor-Meldrew yeah, i'd always found the welsh great out on the town the night after we'd beaten them before that, i always remember it being some welsh fans giving us shit "finally got what you deserve" kind of stuff, but i was definitely drunk and so it could have been anyone, either way i remember the bus leaving an hour early to get back to london and being very quiet
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The thing for me is the big stepdown between Nugget and Christie/Weber. Roigard bridges that gap better that Fakatava IMHO.
I'd give Roigard Test experience before RWC and see how he makes the step-up.
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@Victor-Meldrew i actually agree, as i said id have roigard as second behind smith assuming he can show the same or similar form in some TRC games, personally i think we can be too conservative with "experience" sometimes, some people just have loads of experience at being rubbish, its also less of a problem if we have experience around them
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Liked the way Christie stepped up to Test level when coming off the bench, but from what I've seen he's gone backwards a bit.
Weber to start in Smith's absence, but I'd like to see Roigard get some serious game-time as I think there's something a bit special about the bloke.
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@Victor-Meldrew said in All Blacks 2023:
The thing for me is the big stepdown between Nugget and everyone
problem is, this has been an issue for several years, and the lack of trust to start big games in his understudies is why we see that chasm
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Can't say I disagree. Scott is also better than the great duo often, last season and this. When BBBR and SW are on song, they're amazing. But that has not been often last few years. If they are at peak for RWC, then they should start. But if they can't keep that up?
Scott Barrett doesn't belong at blindside but his World Cup role is crucial
There are a dozen exceptional eights that would be licking their lips at the prospect of targeting an inexperienced blindside.
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I totally agree with this article. SB is not a six. The main problem is : if SB is not a six, then who will wear that jersey ? Finau is the form blindside but has no international experience, while Frizell and Jacobson are << to Ollivon, Doris and PSdT. If Blackadder stays fit, he could fill that role but a LF trio of EB, AS and SC is too smallish at the highest level. I would give Akira a last chance at the RC as he was outstanding against the Tahs. But it was only the Tahs ...
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How long have we been looking for a new Kaino or have had a settled 6 - let alone a settled 6/7/8 combination? Beggars belief.
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@Bones said in All Blacks 2023:
People bemoan the loss of Luatua, but I reckon someone that we really missed out on and was coming into his own was Hemopo. Reckon he could have been the exact player we wanted.
I like his game and he had good size to be a combo player if we needed. The limited (very limited) AB game time he got, he didn’t do anything that didn’t warrant a further look. Problem with his selection is IIRC he was only bought in as an injury cover and therefore went back down the pecking order.
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@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks 2023:
@Bones said in All Blacks 2023:
People bemoan the loss of Luatua, but I reckon someone that we really missed out on and was coming into his own was Hemopo. Reckon he could have been the exact player we wanted.
I like his game and he had good size to be a combo player if we needed. The limited (very limited) AB game time he got, he didn’t do anything that didn’t warrant a further look. Problem with his selection is IIRC he was only bought in as an injury cover and therefore went back down the pecking order.
Ran great lines and consistently made metres, rarely went backwards, safe hands, busy and a solid defender on the fringes of the breakdown. Yes please.
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Two Cents paints a good picture of how all the halfbacks are tracking.
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@Canes4life as soon as he said he's looking at five players and only looking at one guy from each team I bowed out.
Hope Mitch Drummond wins.
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@Bones yeah Drummond is an odd one to be fair but the stats show who's in form. Fakatava probably hasn't played enough rugby this year to be in the frame.
I'd take Smith, Weber as the top 2 and then Roigard because he offers something different. I think if Perenara was fit and played this year, he'd be the third due to experience and that point of difference to those smaller halfbacks.
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@Victor-Meldrew In fairness between 2016-19, Liam Squire played 24 tests and was very good.
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@friedrugby said in All Blacks 2023:
@Victor-Meldrew In fairness between 2016-19, Liam Squire played 24 tests and was very good.
Fair to people who overrate Squire. A handful of good, a couple of very good, mostly "meh" like most of the other options since Kaino.
If he was very good then so is Ioane.
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@friedrugby said in All Blacks 2023:
@Victor-Meldrew In fairness between 2016-19, Liam Squire played 24 tests and was very good.
No he wasn't. He feasted on a Wallaby team that had a huge player exodus following RWC 2015 and a Bok team in shambles under Coetzee in 2016-17 til Rassie was parachuted in to save the day.
