Ireland forget the skills and committment, but New Zealand bring the pain

Man on the rise ( http://bit.ly/KvZ105 )

Well that was a pretty joyless start to the weekend, wasn’t it, as Ireland were demolished by the All Blacks. Ireland forgot to pack the skills or commitment, but New Zealand remembered to bring the pain.the No drop goal needed in the last minute this week. I would say that the All Blacks gave the team a sufficient kicking, so no need to add to that. Time to scratch around for a few positives, and try and offer a bit of constructive advice. A few players put their hands up and got stuck in, Healy, Touhy, Ryan. A few got shown up at test level – O’Mahoney, although I’m sure he’ll get there in the end, Earls, McFadden. I’ve been an admirer of Wallace in the past, and I think he does a great job for Ulster, but when it comes to Ireland, whatever the question is, Wallace is not the answer. Why not Cave? And the coach, what to make of Kidney. He can coach, but he can’t tackle himself, he can’t get players to catch the ball. But, he doesn’t make the players jobs any either throwing them together in seemingly random fashion, and in fairness, he did Wallace no favours, plucking him from nowhere, and throwing him  into the shark pool.

Romain Poite did us no favours –not that he affected the outcome, maybe the score with Kearney’s yellow card. You’ve got us all wrong Romain, we’re part of Europe, speak English, but we’re not English. And when you’ve reffed us in the 6N and the HC, ”Ah ya bollix!” is a term of endearment, let’s have a pint sometime.

What do we need to fix this 60-0 mess? Do we need new players?  Well, we don’t have any more players so we need to get more out the players we do have. Do we need a new captain.? O’Driscoll has been our go to man for a decade, but this wasn’t his finest hour. Maybe it is time to think of a change, I’d go for Donnacha Ryan myself. Always easier to lead from the front when you’re in the engine room. Time for a new coach? That’s the million euro question. After praising him last week, in two matches we leaked 100 points, not good enough.

Wales got agonisingly close again, they need to play with more tempo, and I’d put Phillips into flank and get a real scrum half if I was them. And give Alwn Jones some catching practice.

Finally, England scraped put a drawer against a disinterested Bok side, leaving Scotland with the only result of the summer. Get in Scotland!

Australia 20 - 19 Wales 
New Zealand 60 - 0 Ireland 
South Africa 14 - 14 England