Rules for this thread 1) No mentioning Dane Coles unless it is to disparage him. 2) No mentioning English Centres without the caveat that of course Manu is better. 3) No mentioning Twelvetrees or Burrell same caveat as per Dan Coles applies. 4) Positive comments on Owen Farrell welcomed. 5) Liberal mentioning of home town advantage is sanctioned 6) No blaming of referees for your team losing 7) No accusations of food poisoning by waitresses Go Forth...
Thoughts on the Samoa game are as follows: Those Samoan boys will lose every game because they enjoy contact too much. Passing is regarded as being something that wimps do. These boys love hitting it up and don't care if they get smashed. Our forwards were taking a bit of a backwards step after a while. Incredible. Andy Ellis - GAGFC. Hang up your boots. Terrible handling performance by the All Blacks - no player understood where he was supposed to be instinctively. These were 15 strangers playing with each other and not a team. But we always are weak first game of the year and will be better for the outing. Good game. Props to Samoa for the numerous hits.
Jimmy Cowan > Andy Ellis Now, who is Dan Coles? Dan Cole or Dane Coles? (Either way, not exactly 'erudite' mate!
I hope this world cup the referees aren't going to give lots of unfair cards to Twelevetrees/Burrell for tackling Kiwi great Dane Coles, because then we might have to play Owen Farrell and he's dreadful. Damn I think someone just put some sour milk in my coffee.
From BBC Aaron Smith at 10 could be an unorthodox master stroke, but I'm unconvinced by Woodcock as scrum half.
It was a phenomenal try. But why is he trying to score tries like that? Anyway it was effectively the winning of the game.enough said unless I can think of a way to besmirch him for scoring it. On to other comments: the two springbok centres are who the world has been waiting for. The 10 12 13 combination is damaging from an offensive point of view. Maybe devilliers will have a tough time coming back. i thought sa were the better team for the first 60 minutes but the bok replacements were not test standard and if they are going to be that poor then the starting xv will have to play until the 70th minute. terrific game. Great advertisement for rugby.
Funny you guys like our centres so much because if I recall correctly, there was a lot of debate about whether Kriel should be played at 13 (given he is stronger at positions such as fullback). Incredibly talented rugby player though. Wrecked face in the age group stuff.
That test match was fantastic. And SAs 10 12 13 outplayed their counterparts. I think Pollard is still, and this is unfortunate from a world cup perspective, another year away from reaching close to his potential. His tactical kicking is below average at the moment. However the way he runs a back line arguably makes him the best number 10 in the world if we only use that one dimension. He is such a threat with ball in hand that it creates room for his centres, and they honestly don't need much of an excuse to cause Havoc. Fuck knows where your 12 and 13 have come from because they are special. Your wings are a bit pedestrian especially if Habana is going to be contained. Best game I have ever seen from your full back. I am not saying he was amazing just that normally he goofs up and last night he was error free. Honestly if I was the coach I would let the entire team punch your replacements in the stomach once each. Their play was irresponsible and basically counter productive to SA winning. Who was that tight head prop who lasted two seconds on the field before injuring himself? His major contribution was knocking the ball on 2 metres out from the all black try line and losing the game for his country. Does he know care about his country? Does he not care about letting his team mates down. You fucking catch that ball son. Maybe you do get tackled before you score but you at least recycle it and keep the play alive. Unacceptable skills at international level.