Bienvenue sur le fil de la coupe du monde de rugby!

Quarter finals starting to take shape…..I suspect:

France v South Africa
Ireland v New Zealand
England v Fiji
Wales v Argentina.

The semi finals I hope for are:
Wales v Ireland
England v France

Couple of blips…Ireland v Scotland could be close.

You get into knock outs and you never know!

 

What absolute rubbish served up from the Wallabies.

 

What is going on with RU down under? From two time winners to this? How much of a following does RU get compared to Aussie Rules and NRL?

 

This gave me a bit of insight. Second comment down below the article is very illuminating.
https://www.theguardian.com/sport/b...ld-cup-2023-wallabies-exit-fallout-loss-wales

 

good point of view here.
Peter FitzSimons played for Australia in 1989-90

https://www.smh.com.au/sport/rugby-...-i-was-wrong-about-eddie-20230925-p5e79n.html

It has lost a LOT of followers.
Rugby Australia has a lot to answer for.
Changing coaches.
Paying stupid money to 18 year olds - $5m Aus over 3years to a bloke that has played school boy union and 1 year professional league
The Folau saga

They are lucky to get 50,000 to a Bledisloe these days.
I went to a AFL semi final on Friday - 98,000

 

I can’t read that sadly without subscribing. I remember the golden age with John Eales ( always liked him because you don’t see many lock forwards who are kickers these days do you? ) Campo, Lynagh et al. It’s sad to see such a decline. Eddie Jones hasn’t done himself any favours and just seems to rub people up the wrong way every time he opens his mouth, but as the Guardian article points out, the problems are much more deep seated than EJ, and have been known about for quite some time. And the next RWC in Australia too

 

Complacency, a feeling of superiority, a lot of people in very comfortable positions not wishing to rock the boat, a game that has been ruled by defenses for 30 years thus rewarding conservative tactics, players leaving in droves, fans leaving in droves….it’s a long list, this is the short version.

It’s not just the Aussies…..England seem to be in denial (imagine in football if 3 premiership teams folded in the same year), Wales have been through the ringer this year and Australia are due their turn it seems. Super rugby down under does not fill out stadiums - the only domestic rugby I see where its really top notch is the Irish and South African teams in the URC, the French Top 14 and the New Zealand teams in Super Rugby - the English Prem used to be gold standard, it simply is not anymore.


Rugby is in a death vortex - the only light is the women's game and the likes of Ireland, Fiji, New Zealand and France whose tactics are attack, not just strangle hold defence. Whilst I appreciate the South African game - its more brutal physicality than art and skill, despite them have unbelievably skilled players like Kolbe and Lukhanyo Am, and I think the best captain the game has ever seen. Wales genetic make up don't produce the number of 6ft 5 inch athletes everyone else has - we will I suspect be forever a smash and grab team, not always World top 3 - but we at least seem to have discovered an attack game and as ever are hard to beat.

World Rugby has done a terrible job of sitting idly by, assuming the generation of players and fans coming through (aged 15 to 35) are satisfied with endless scrum resets and TMO replays - these people grew up in the internet age, they play playstations etc. Rugby, like test match cricket will die if ti remains as it is - test match cricket is only surviving because of the limited over game, which is quite brilliant if you aren't a cricket aficionado. I played front row, as a coach I specialised in scrum, breakdown and tackle game - even I get seriously bored with the resets.

Football (soccer) changed the way it was played fundamentally with the back pass rule - rugby, a game in which you cheat like hell until caught has amped up the amount of scrutiny the referee's do in a game. It's a cleaner game - I was no fan of the cheapshot dickheads that used to rule the roost - but now its all about power and gainline and fans watching apparently endless playbacks of gameplay they have already seen.

Thank god for Fiji!!! Rugby needs to outlaw the jackal (or bring back proper rucking), and make tries with 7 points on their own.

The 50:20 kicking rule is a good start - and I genuinely hope the new tackle height will reward a far better offload and passing game, rather than what we have now where progress with the ball is not rewarded enough compared to simply kicking it away and defending as defending is far easier if you are tired than attacking.

 

It was hard watch knowing how good so many of their players are, they will not be this weak for the Lions in 2 years time or the next world cup.

As for Eddy Jones - eat your words big man.




Its a pity for me, I know he's universally derided as a coach but having been to his sessions, he's a top class operator.

But boy has he talked ***** this world cup.

They let themselves be fooled - a lot of people need to get the bullet imho.

 

Aus rugby is in the doldrums at home it appears people just aren't watching as much. England is not far behind I'm afraid when the cash walks away via sponsorship the wheels will come off.
Wales play better without biggar playing and ran that game to there own tune.

 

The 2019 Grand slam was won off the back of Anscombe playing to 60 ish minutes and Biggar closing it out.

We've not had Anscombe for a long time - its fantastic he's back - he's a super talent.

 

He is the glue of the team they seam less on edge and way more confident when he is on.

 

I blame Jonny Williamson for the decline in Australian Rugby and the administrators (worldwide) for taking it professional.

 

I think the France v South Africa game will be the most brutal in Rugby History.

Ireland v New Zealand with be a tactical master class.

I still fancy us over Argentina…losing Faletau is terrible news but if everyone else is fit I think we should be able to outplay Argentina.

England were very lucky yesterday, but Fiji got scalped by Portugal so god knows which way that’ll go.

I’ll stand by my semi final predict.

 

I blame Jonny Wilkinson and "that kick"

 

I only caught the second half of Fiji v Portugal. What a great game. Fiji had a bit of a mare at times. I expect they’ll play a lot lot better than this against us…. But by the same token, I expect we’ll play better too. We can’t play any worse than we did against Samoa

My favourite games of the ones I’ve seen so far, Wales v Fiji, Ireland v SA and last night’s . Very long drawn out competition though. Not sure what the French public think, but seems to lose a bit of momentum. Still, some good Rugby to come

 

Bottom.


There for the taking spoffed it just before half time and gave them all the energy.

Fair game play Argentina.

best of luck Ireland, England, France.

 

Wales didn't play badly- Argentina certainly upped their game and the match could have gone either way to be honest ..

Sent from my SM-G960F using Tapatalk

 

Wales’ game is based on pressure….we couldn’t maintain any with the ball due to bad line outs and not being able to pass catch consistently….loosing Biggar and Liam Williams for the last 15 mins meant we lost our tactical nous.

Argentina were good for their win, but it was an error strewn game. I’m sorry to say I think they’ll get hit for 40 whoever they play in the semi.