Touch Pause, Enrage! Scrum resets, Autumn internationals and apologies in advance to redheads, the IRB and Saffas.

Photo from: http://tinyurl.com/33sdyqj

Crouch,touch, pause,enrage!


Scrum resets! We all know they make for fascinating viewing, and law changes by the IRB over the last few years have given us more viewing opportunities than ever. I can’t even remember anymore what the old system was, I think the ref used to blow his whistle and say ‘Scrum down’, and then ‘Engage’. The rationale behind ‘Crouch,Touch,pause,engage’ (or Crouch......touch.......have a quick cuppa......pause.......fix your hair, call your mates, make plans for tonight....engage’ as @LadyLassitude has it ) was to slow the engagement speed down to prevent injuries.

I seriously doubt they consulted a health and safety expert in this though. Can you imagine the H&S man ‘So you have 8 men vs 8 men each total weight +/- 900kg smashing into each other (purses lips). Well, look at all those legs sticking out for a start, that’s a definite trip hazard. We need warning cones set up all round this thing. Can I see your safety statement please (shakes head)? This is a flagrant violation of manual handling regulations. We’ll have to do a risk assessment.

No the IRB has decided has decided scrum resets are the way forward, despite the fact that most rugby highlights consist of tries and not scrum resets, despite the fact that most fans don’t fast forward their Sky plus to the scrum resets, then study them in slo-mo.

If anything, I’d say the IRB is looking to slow down engagement even more. In the future, the scrum will start with a bit of stretching to help prevent injuries. Then scrums will form 10 meters apart and advance at a crouch – by the time they get to each other they’ll be so knackered they’ll be as tame and meek as you like. ‘Stretch, crouch ,advance ,touch, pause…engage!’ You read it here first!

Friday

Wales vs Fiji 19:30

Saturday

Italy vs Australia 15:00

Scotland vs South Africa 14:30

England vs Samoa 14:30

Ireland vs New Zealand 17:30

France vs Argentina 20:45

That’s the power of blogging for you! On Sunday I complained about how all the matches are put on at the same time, and look at the changes already.

Ireland vs New Zealand

Big gulp here. In the right hand corner, wearing the black trunks, the 30 stone gorilla, the pretty well undisputed heavyweight Champions of the World, the All Blacks! In the left hand corner, wearing the green trunks and also looking pretty green at this stage, the dance like a butterfly, sting like a bee lads, the cruiserweight with a decent win ratio(up until the end of the 6 Nations), Ireland!

Well that’s how the rest of the world (including New Zealand) sees it at the moment which suits us just fine. On Saturday, 15 men are going to run out to play 15 men. OK, the All Blacks just happen to be large, strong, fast, skilled men. But they’re still just men, coming to our back yard. How are we going to beat them? We need to get set piece parity, which we can do - their front row did not looked flash against England and Scotland and their line out is not exceptional, especially with Brad Thorne out. We have to starve them of quick ball, make the breakdown a war zone, make sure players don’t get isolated. Andrew Ellis is the 3rd/4th rated NZ scrum half, let’s make it a night to forget for him. We have to trust ourselves to run at them, we have world class back line players. But it isn’t going to be easy, we have to have a perfect game. Most of all we’ve got to show heart.

You can argue about the half backs for Ireland, but to me Reddan and Sexton are a vote for the future.

I also think we should follow Dublin Zoo’s lead and let the redheads in for free to fill up the stadium. If 10000 redheads can’t frighten the All blacks, nothing will!  I think Ireland are going to pull off a famous victory, c'mon Ireland!

Here are the All Blacks doing some Irish dancing http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1eUEwOxZ-o let’s see if any of the moves make it into the haka.

Ireland Team http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,16024_6514021,00.html

All Black Team http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,3562_6513499,00.html

Fiji should give Wales the chance to get their show on the road, and Friday night rugby – I like it!

Just a short word on the South African drugs scandal, with Chilliboy Ralepelle and Bjorn Basson sent home after positive tests. Just shows the Boks can’t do much right at the moment. If they were after a good time, I’m sure there are a lot more interesting things you can stick up your nose then nose drops. If it was performance enhancement they were after, they’re doing it wrong as well, neither has produced anything like a performance. And if they were using nose drops for cold prevention they were wasting their time, no matter how compelling those TV ads are. I don’t want to be flippant, but either they were using drugs or they were just being dumb, and I’ll go with the latter as brains are not SA’s strongpoint.

How are they going to do against Scotland then? The Scottish pack is pretty formidable, to me it’s going to be a dull, grinding match which I think the Boks will do just enough to win. Scotland are still going to be a bit shell shocked from last weekend’s pasting.

Teams are here: http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,3561_6514743,00.html

England v Samoa should be a good match. England have a few changes, most of which make sense but it’ll be interesting to see how Bannahan goes in the centre. I’d still like to see Olly Barkley in there, as while the backline showed flair last weekend I still think they can do better. Looking forward to see how Hendre Fourie gets on. The whole England team is going to need to keep a lid on the excitement from last week and overcome a very tough competitive Samoan side.

England: http://www.planetrugby.com/story/0,25883,16024_6512428,00.html