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Rugby - Pre Binding Edition


ljkeane

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I've been laying on the couch all day, feebly moaning I have a disgusting head cold. I did spend the last five minutes roaring at the tv. A fitting end to BODs career.

Odd match, but compelling. I don't think the Irish "deserved" to win, but that's what successful teams do. Win when they need to.

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I went to the Hurricanes-Cheetahs game yesterday, I'm damned glad that was the home game I chose to go to. A 60 point arse kicking was wonderful to watch, and at least in the first half it required the 'Canes show a bit of mettle and overcome a deficit.



I think the Cheetahs might have been a bit hard done by with yellow card for deliberate knock on. But the ref took a long time looking at replays before making the call and he will know the ins and outs of making deliberate knock on rulings. The knock on prevented a certain try and I suppose a deliberate knock on in that situation is an automatic yellow card. That period saw the 'Canes score 2 tries to pull out to a handy lead and they never really looked back from there, so it was a pivotal period in the course of the game.


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Well, that was close... And chaotic and perhaps a bit controversial at the end. France are going to be pissed.

I wonder what the point of the video-ref is, if the main ref has to tell him what he's seeing.

In some ways I wonder if a video ref is even needed with bloody huge screens on the field that the actual ref can use to review how things went down. I'm more than happy for the on field ref to be the first reviewer, and the only time the video ref comes in is if the on field ref doesn't think the big screen quite provides the resolution to be certain about what happened. If the video ref is watching at the same time on hi-res screen then it'd be a short conversation and decision made without additional delay. I like the idea of the on field ref taking back all but the most difficult to see decisions.

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The oddest, though correct, video related incident of the day was when the ref yellow carded Hogg for a late tackle, saw it on the screen, called him back and red carded him. I didn't know they could do that.

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I sometimes wonder whether France save their best games for us. That theory doesn't make any sense but even in bad years for them and a good year for us, sure enough they raise their game against us.

So I'm delighted we won today. Very tough game. Lucky in some ways but when Sexton missed that very kick able penalty in the first half, I feared the worst. And when more errors crept in in the second half, it looked bad. But scoring 3 tries was always going to be a huge advantage and the players showed a huge amount of commitment to keep ahead. So whew.

Miss you BOD!

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I've enjoyed watching the highlights of the game here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dYVXZ81zCiM

Sure Scotland was no match for Wales, but that was a great game to watch. Huge talent in the Welsh side.
I've got to think Wales, Ireland, France and England will make a fair fist against the SH teams come the Autumn internationals.

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I think both Wales and France will struggle in South Africa and Australia. I can't see England winning the series in New Zealand but they should be looking to competitive, it's a bit of a shame they'll be missing players for the first test. Ireland should win fairly comfortably in Argentina as they have to rest players prior to the Rugby Championship.

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Finally got to see the return of Luke FitzGerald yesterday and he's back with a bang getting two tries. Even more remarkable was the return of Stephen Ferris what an incredible sight after 16 months. Even with the loss of BOD Almighty the Irish team is looking strong for the world cup. Two full front rows available with Donnacha Ryan returning there's strong competition in the second row. The choices in the back row is so incredible that it probably can't even be compared with New Zealand. There's an abundance of inside centers and wingers and If Henshaw continues to develop then he's the obvious new 13 although McFadden, FitzGerald, and Darren Cave will probably all have a say in that. All in all the 6 nations has gotten me really pumped about Ireland's potential in 2015


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I think both Wales and France will struggle in South Africa and Australia. I can't see England winning the series in New Zealand but they should be looking to competitive, it's a bit of a shame they'll be missing players for the first test. Ireland should win fairly comfortably in Argentina as they have to rest players prior to the Rugby Championship.

Help me out here, what am I missing? I thought the games were played in Europe? I see a listing for England starting off at home on November 8th, in London, against New Zealand.

What do you mean by series and what do you mean they will be missing players?

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What do you mean by series and what do you mean they will be missing players?

Sorry I misread what you wrote, I assumed you were talking about the summer tours because that's what comes up next.

The Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere sides play each other up north in November and then the NH sides usually tour one of the SH sides in June. England will be missing their players from the two sides playing in the Premiership final because the way the schedule has fallen means they won't be able to get out to New Zealand in time for the first test.

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I doubt it. I think they're only playing two tests anyway so there's room to move it around in the three week test window if there's any problems. Also the particular issues in the New Zealand-England test are the time difference and the associated jet lag problems, which is less of an issue in Argentina, and that the New Zealand sides have Super Rugby games the week after the last test so New Zealand aren't willing to be flexible on when the tests are played.


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  • 1 month later...

Heh, so Saracens absolutely munched Clermont in the Heineken semi today. I didn't see that coming. The penalty try was the wrong call for me but ultimately it's not made a great deal of difference.

I thought they'd struggle with Clermont's power like they have with top packs in recent years, obviously they brought in Johnson and Billy Vunipola to try and solve that but it didn't look to have worked earlier in the competition against Toulouse. They really didn't have too much trouble today and on top of that they also carved them up out wide.

In fairness, although I've not always been their biggest fan, Goode and Ashton were also excellent today and on this form may be on the plane to New Zealand.

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