Jump to content
IGNORED

Rugby thread (6 Nations, Heineken Cup etc)

Rex Grossman

By Rex Grossman
in Sport

 Share

Recommended Posts

Matt Defis

Matt Defis

Posted
Posted

Quite a strange one, both look great in attack with nice flowing moves and great pace and awareness of what's going on around them but both look absolutely shit in defence. Pretty much what i expected from France but was expecting a lot more from Scotland so far.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Rodders

Rodders

Posted
Posted

Wales played fine and capitalised on England's implosion, but it was England who lost rather than Wales who won. If England had just carried on as usual then we would have stuffed Wales. So my point is that Wales should be careful of thinking this match means anything about who they are and how well they play. Well done though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Taurus

Taurus

Posted
Posted
Wales played fine and capitalised on England's implosion, but it was England who lost rather than Wales who won.

But Wales did win, by seven points.

I thought Scotland looked pretty good at the end of the first half, which is more than can be said for the commentary, which was totally jingoistic. Did the commentators not realise that there were two teams playing? Or that some of the viewers might not be Scottish?

Link to comment
Share on other sites
SM47

SM47

Posted
Posted
So my point is that Wales should be careful of thinking this match means anything about who they are and how well they play.

Ooooh, bitter...

Beating a side like England will (hopefully) give us confidence and momentum.

Wales played their arses off in the second half. If you can't accept that, you're just going to come across like a bitter little baby, throwing your little rugby ball out of the pram.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Mars

Mars

Posted
Posted
'In your face, Layte and Wiener!' would be a more appropriate title.

Nah, I'm only kidding guys, rugby ain't football, I've got respect for English and Rugby and the English fans, it's just a bit of harmless rivalry.

Quite, whilst I enjoy seeing England beat anyone at Rugby there's no hatred of the other team involved. Some of my best rugby memories come from watching games in Wales - they certainly know how to host a game in Cardiff. Every trip I've had there has been excellent, including the World Cup games they hosted. France vs. New Zealand was just :wub:

Link to comment
Share on other sites
fasteasyfree

fasteasyfree

Posted
Posted

I'm really enjoying it, I have to be honest. It's one of those occasions where a group of friends all get together and have a good time. Booze and then curry at half time does a good combination make.

But yeah, I think we won with a hell of a lot of luck. The disintegration of England's back row is what did them in.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Rex Grossman

Rex Grossman

Posted
  • Author
Posted
As a committed (and I should be !) Welsh fan I've been asking myself whether or not we actually stepped up our game or whether England stepped their's down ...

Anywaaaay ...

I do love my international Rugby - and I've always been a Welsh fan through the good and (mostly) bad. I missed the other games this weekend - sorry, surfing but cracked a rib so maybe next time I'll skip on the excercise and lounge on the couch drinking beer. But good god - what a turnaround for the boys. The first half was a typical Welsh second half performance - but even now I'm not sure whether we actually stepped our game or not. That final try was a real fudge - a missed kick and chase, lots of fumbling and clearly the ball was coated in butter. Good god - they didn't make it easy though they did they ?

I'm sure we'll get stuffed by France - but its nice to see a bit of a shake up in the 6 nations after the World Cup. I got to a few of the games in Cardiff - Wales as always gave me a near heart attack (I think the Japan game probably aged me - lovely atmosphere though and don't get me started on the high, then low that was the Fuji game ...)

One thing I didn't enjoy though was the commentary - the constant bickering betwixt Bill Butler (I think it was him) and was it the very pro-English Brian Moore (?) ended in me turning off the volume. I now understand I missed a stressful last 3 minute when Butler announced that we'd done it for the "first time in 20 years". My dad (back in Wales) was yelling at him the whole time along the lines of "for fucks sake, they can still score twice if we give them the ball !".

Nice to see as opposed to just dropping it Wilkinson style the pack tried to do it properly - it is rugby after all, not soccer. That made me very happy :rolleyes:

Having caught the higlights since Scotland look rubbish - as do Italy but Ireland seem to have potential. Anyone else enjoying their six nations ? And how do you reckon it'll go this year ?

You're right Wales will be dicked by France, but it's in Cardiff so you never know. Having said that, the Welsh record at Stade de France is decent so not sure home advantage will make a difference.

Scotland and Italy should be wins, but the trip to Dublin will be hard.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Taurus

Taurus

Posted
Posted

I don't understand this argument that England capitulated rather than Wales did well. Wales capitulated in the first half, England capitulated in the second half. That's rugby. That's sport. For me, the difference between the two teams in general is that Wales, like France, are more likely to cause an upset because they're more capable of scoring against the run of play than England. At the risk of generalising, I think England tend to do well when their forwards do well, and their game is about controlling possession and bludgeoning the opposition. Wales don't have the pack to do that, but they've got the attitude and the backs to cause problems in a flash (even though that scrum-half runs into too many cul-des-sacs, and Henson runs in slow-motion).

In any case, I think Ireland will struggle to beat either team on the basis of last week's performance.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
g wings

g wings

Posted
Posted

Loved being at "Fortress England" on Saturday... or at least the second half!

It was a VERY ODD game. England battered at the fringes and didn't really get anywhere but Wales duly handed them the ball at every opportunity. Second half was suicidally loose for England and Wales, as usual in those situations, benefitted. What I find very odd having read all the stats is that England only had 2 driving mauls. When you have a pack as big as England's that seems like a fault in the game plan to me, especially as the rucks generally got them nowhere. Wales' blitz defence was suspect at times, but its new to the team and will take time for them to get used to.

Shankling will play a bigger part in the next game and give us more direct play, and Hook and Henson were both excellent in the second half I thought.

Wales' huge problem for the last decade or so is that we cock up the basics time and again... Restarts, line-outs... If you don't get them right you are always going to struggle, and struggle they did.

Anyway, get the basics right, use Shanklin right, get used to the blitz and we should be in fair shape for the rest of the season...

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Rex Grossman

Rex Grossman

Posted
  • Author
Posted
Loved being at "Fortress England" on Saturday... or at least the second half!

It was a VERY ODD game. England battered at the fringes and didn't really get anywhere but Wales duly handed them the ball at every opportunity. Second half was suicidally loose for England and Wales, as usual in those situations, benefitted. What I find very odd having read all the stats is that England only had 2 driving mauls. When you have a pack as big as England's that seems like a fault in the game plan to me, especially as the rucks generally got them nowhere. Wales' blitz defence was suspect at times, but its new to the team and will take time for them to get used to.

Shankling will play a bigger part in the next game and give us more direct play, and Hook and Henson were both excellent in the second half I thought.

Wales' huge problem for the last decade or so is that we cock up the basics time and again... Restarts, line-outs... If you don't get them right you are always going to struggle, and struggle they did.

Anyway, get the basics right, use Shanklin right, get used to the blitz and we should be in fair shape for the rest of the season...

I think Shanklin is the key. If he's on song he can be, like Martyn Williams in the Grand Slam year, the player of the tournament. He's key to the way Wales need to play.

Wales: Lee Byrne (Ospreys); Jamie Roberts (Blues), Tom Shanklin (Blues), Gavin Henson (Ospreys), Shane Williams (Ospreys); James Hook (Ospreys), Mike Phillips (Ospreys); Duncan Jones (Ospreys), Huw Bennett (Ospreys), Adam Jones (Ospreys), Ian Gough (Ospreys), Ian Evans (Ospreys), Jonathan Thomas (Ospreys), Martyn Williams (Blues), Ryan Jones (capt, Ospreys).

Replacements: Matthew Rees (Blues), Gethin Jenkins (Blues), Deiniol Jones (Blues), Gareth Delve (Gloucester), Dwayne Peel (Scarlets), Stephen Jones (Scarlets), Sonny Parker (Ospreys).

Still too many Ospreys!

Link to comment
Share on other sites
g wings

g wings

Posted
Posted
I think Shanklin is the key. If he's on song he can be, like Martyn Williams in the Grand Slam year, the player of the tournament. He's key to the way Wales need to play.

Wales: Lee Byrne (Ospreys); Jamie Roberts (Blues), Tom Shanklin (Blues), Gavin Henson (Ospreys), Shane Williams (Ospreys); James Hook (Ospreys), Mike Phillips (Ospreys); Duncan Jones (Ospreys), Huw Bennett (Ospreys), Adam Jones (Ospreys), Ian Gough (Ospreys), Ian Evans (Ospreys), Jonathan Thomas (Ospreys), Martyn Williams (Blues), Ryan Jones (capt, Ospreys).

Replacements: Matthew Rees (Blues), Gethin Jenkins (Blues), Deiniol Jones (Blues), Gareth Delve (Gloucester), Dwayne Peel (Scarlets), Stephen Jones (Scarlets), Sonny Parker (Ospreys).

Still too many Ospreys!

I'm not sure I would change much else to be honest, its obviously still very Ospreys heavy but I think the best players are in the 22 pretty much although I think Mark Jones can maybe feel a little unlucky to not even make the bench as can Popham, though I am looking forward to seeing Delve. He's a great intelligent player and should make a good impact if things are going well.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Rodders

Rodders

Posted
Posted
Ooooh, bitter...

Beating a side like England will (hopefully) give us confidence and momentum.

Wales played their arses off in the second half. If you can't accept that, you're just going to come across like a bitter little baby, throwing your little rugby ball out of the pram.

Ho hum. All I can do is repeat what I've said. Wales deserved to win. On top of that, they didn't play all that great overall. Happy about the second half, worried about the first. Wales can't think that playing like that will get them very far. When they play France and probably Ireland who won't implode, they'll get beaten. Wales should demand more than this.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Matt Defis

Matt Defis

Posted
Posted

I think the championship will rest on Wales vs France now, with the winner of that match coming out on top, the thought of how we're gonna play at home is making my mind boggle. Are we going to be much better or the same as we were away at England, if we play like we did against England then France will run away with it in the first half. This game against Scotland is going to be a big indicator on how well we'll do against France at home.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
Matt Defis

Matt Defis

Posted
Posted

Well we won the game, not in spectacular style but we won none the less. Wales again looked great going forward but we made to many mistakes which is where Scotland took advantage and gained 15 points. Although Wales weren't on top form Scotland never looked dangerous or like they were going to score a try and Wales seemed to be in control when defending 90% of the time. Those points never really came from Scotland working hard just Wales being poor which is something we really need to work on. Another great game from Martyn Williams who was constantly in the rucks stealing balls and generally making it a bad game for Scotland.

Link to comment
Share on other sites
McFly

McFly

Posted
Posted

Yeah, we were pretty crap, soft tries let in again and lack of any real attacking threat apart from a 3 or 4 breaks, Mike Blair played really well though. And as you say Martyn Williams is a real gamebreaker, pity Shane Williams "try" wasnt a try it was great run, whats the point in TMOs when they cant even do their jobs :)

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
 Share
Go to topic listing

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue. Use of this website is subject to our Privacy Policy, Terms of Use, and Guidelines.

  I accept