Sunday, November 7, 2010

The rugby South does a smash and grab at the Aviva, Twickenham, and the Millenium stadium

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Ireland 23 South Africa 25

I watched a program the other day where they proved that swearing helps you withstand pain. Well, the air was certainly blue in my lounge and may have eased the pain of this match a bit. Ireland came staggering out of the blocks for the Autumn internationals, fluffing what looked like a golden opportunity for another Southern Hemisphere notch on their belts. Let’s face it, smart play and the Springboks are not normally words that fit together in the same sentence, but you have to hand it to the Boks for judging the conditions well and laying on a 10 man rugby masterclass. The Springboks dominated the line out and the scrums for most of the match, and without any decent first phase ball, Ireland struggled. I think the knowledge of South Africa’s unbalanced and inexperienced back line had Ireland too eager to exploit these potential weaknesses. Passes were snatched at and over run, tap kicks were missed, the ball wasn’t kicked out on penalties.

Wet conditions can mean it’s better not to play with the ball, but Ireland seemed to kick at every opportunity, up and under’s which SA full back Aplon dealt with with embarrassing ease for a man who looks about 5 foot tall, and numerous grubbers. In the scrum, Buckley buckled and not a lot else I’m afraid, Court was a big improvement for him when he came on. Mick O’Driscol looked all at sea and David Wallace was pretty invisible. Reddan didn’t have his best night, Sexton looked tentative, and there seemed to be an awful lot of SA up and unders hitting the ground that you would have expected Carney to pluck out of the sky. On the positive side Heaslip was a grafter, Ferris put in some big hits, Bowe showed he is a master finisher and O’Gara injected a touch of class.

Ireland are missing O’Connell, O’Leary and Flannery big time, and if you can let me get on my hobby horse, we need a fetcher. But Ireland showed spirit at the end, scored two good trys and shouldn’t beat themselves up too much, a few tweaks and I really think the wins will start coming.

What about the Sprinboks? That makes 2 wins now in the last seven so it hasn’t been a vintage season by any means. Their pack is still totally world class, add a decent scrum half and a kicking fly half and that puts paid to most teams in the game today. They showed very little ambition, playing a full back in center was not a good attacking option, and is looks like Jean De Villiers is out injured so things are going from bad to worse. Lambie looked shaky but set up Aplon’s try and Stegman had a decent debut as fetcher. Aplon is a world class finisher, and almost unknown over here, expect to see more of him this tour. They really need to get their backline firing to carry on winning on this tour.

I’ve always rated the IRFU for the way they run the game, but 15000 empty seats and a new jersey that only lasted 40 minutes are starting to make me doubt them. Get it together lads…

England 16 New Zealand 26

There were a lot of positives for England in this match, obviously losing by 10 points in your home fortress wasn’t one of them. The last ten minutes had England making the All Blacks pretty human, where in the first 20 minutes they looked they were all on Krytonite, running in two tries and threatening to run riot. England’s scrum is looking better and better, Dan Cole obviously reads my blog as he put in a massive game to unsettle the mighty Tony Woodcock. I stand corrected, Dan. Dylan Hartley looked good when he came on, and Ashton, Foden and Youngs all had good matches. 10, 12 and 13 look flat for England, they need Barkley in there and need a lot more creativity. England are on the up again though.

The AB’s are looking a little out of sorts by their standards, they need to stop messing around at scrum half for a start. Sonny Bill Williams did whatever he was asked to do but doesn’t yet have a rugby brain on him, just awesome size and strength and those inspector gadget arms.

Wales 16 Australia 25


The wonders of TV scheduling meant I only caught the highlights of this one. I was planning to bluff it -take the words ‘brave struggle’ ‘Australian flair’ dodgy Australian scrum’ ‘lot’s of positives’ ‘two wins in a row’ ‘our injuries are hurting us’ and rearrange them as you will. I’d really like to see Hook in midfield soon.

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