The Rugby Union Thread

digitalscream · September 2023

hywelg said:

Take the Japan job Eddie....

No. We want Japan to get good.

scrumhalf · September 2023

Well done Wales, that was a good old-fashioned thumping.

hywelg · September 2023

I didn't really start to relax until it was 32-6. Great game , no yellows not that many foul play penalties. Wales won because Australia made far too many errors. Australia looked very dynamic and tougher than Wales but Wales were psychologically way stronger.

hywelg · September 2023

Eddie Jones "my coaching just hasn't been good enough"

koneguitarist · September 2023

Wow, I actually started feeling sorry for some of those young Aussies. As a Welshman who watched and supported Wales through the 80s and 90s I can sympathise with them.

exocet · September 2023

koneguitarist said:

Wow, I actually started feeling sorry for some of those young Aussies. As a Welshman who watched and supported Wales through the 80s and 90s I can sympathise with them.

Similar thoughts myself. It's a result that Rugby Union in Australia can ill afford right now. I'm realistic, Wales are not a fantastic team right now - we do have "a" match day 23 that are difficult to beat but beyond that, the cupboard is a little bare. Still, I'll happily take a quarterfinal appearance because before the campaign started, I thought that we wouldn't get out of this group.

TJT1979 · September 2023

Wales looked good to me. They’ve grown into the tournament, much like Eng.

I reckon Arg should finish 2nd in pool D, and based on what we’ve seen so far I’d put my money on Wales to beat them in the QF.

Eng beating Fiji is a lot more iffy in my opinion.

I think any of the quarter finalists from the other half will pummel all of us!

ewal · September 2023

The lopsided draw looking dafter by the day - two of SA, Ireland, France and NZ going home at quarter finals stage.

Pointless going on about it... hey-ho...

Rocker · September 2023

Wales looked good last evening, they bullied and bossed Australia all over the pitch. Wales must be concerned about the injury to Dan Biggar. Australia looked like Argentina did against England and it is going to be some time before Australia rise to the fore again. IMHO

exocet · September 2023

Rocker said:

Wales looked good last evening, they bullied and bossed Australia all over the pitch. Wales must be concerned about the injury to Dan Biggar. Australia looked like Argentina did against England and it is going to be some time before Australia rise to the fore again. IMHO

My guess is that Biggar is now out. I'm guessing but possibly a torn pectoral muscle. There was a shot of him on the pitch at end of match, he clearly couldn't lift his arm up.

tbm · September 2023

Wales are building confidence. Looked very assured. I'd fancy them against the Pumas, and then they're in another semi without having to do that much at all. The Wallabies were p*ss poor though. Really really bad. Felt awful for them. They ran Ireland close a year ago, beat Wales and were generally competitive in the Autumn. Eddie comes in and.....

Rob Kearney spent some time with the Western Force at the end of his career. He was on Virgin Media last night talking about the lack of quality coaching. You reap what you sow. 2/3 League coaches with ZERO Union experience in Jones's team. They are entirely rudderless.

exocet · September 2023

tbm said:

Wales are building confidence. Looked very assured. I'd fancy them against the Pumas, and then they're in another semi without having to do that much at all. The Wallabies were p*ss poor though. Really really bad. Felt awful for them. They ran Ireland close a year ago, beat Wales and were generally competitive in the Autumn. Eddie comes in and.....

Rob Kearney spent some time with the Western Force at the end of his career. He was on Virgin Media last night talking about the lack of quality coaching. You reap what you sow. 2/3 League coaches with ZERO Union experience in Jones's team. They are entirely rudderless.

I've always admired Australian Rugby Union, what they've achieved in RWC since its inception has been nothing short of remarkable. I fear for the game in Australia, Football is taking off in a big way, will most likely relegate RU to 5th place.

digitalscream · September 2023

tbm said:

Wales are building confidence. Looked very assured. I'd fancy them against the Pumas, and then they're in another semi without having to do that much at all. The Wallabies were p*ss poor though. Really really bad. Felt awful for them. They ran Ireland close a year ago, beat Wales and were generally competitive in the Autumn. Eddie comes in and.....

Rob Kearney spent some time with the Western Force at the end of his career. He was on Virgin Media last night talking about the lack of quality coaching. You reap what you sow. 2/3 League coaches with ZERO Union experience in Jones's team. They are entirely rudderless.

This is it - Jones tries too hard to play into the maverick reputation he's cultivated around himself, seemingly without considering the actual effectiveness of his choices. He's the very embodiment of "different != good".

Creed_Clicks · September 2023

sev112 · September 2023

ewal said:

The lopsided draw looking dafter by the day - two of SA, Ireland, France and NZ going home at quarter finals stage.

Pointless going on about it... hey-ho...

I don’t get this
the draw is such that the winner needs to beat the other big teams, all this draw does is mean they have to beat one of them in the 1/4s rather than the semi.
And if any of that “big 4” can’t beat ENG WAL FIJ ARG then they don’t really deserve to be in the final or even semi.

Pjon · September 2023

sev112 said:

ewal said:

The lopsided draw looking dafter by the day - two of SA, Ireland, France and NZ going home at quarter finals stage.

Pointless going on about it... hey-ho...

I don’t get this
the draw is such that the winner needs to beat the other big teams, all this draw does is mean they have to beat one of them in the 1/4s rather than the semi.
And if any of that “big 4” can’t beat ENG WAL FIJ ARG then they don’t really deserve to be in the final or even semi.

The complaint, obviously, is that the best 4 teams of the moment can't magic their way into the semis without encountering each other prior to that. Nobody has managed to come up with a sensible way to do this since 1987, or whether that's fair in a tournament that regularly throws up some interesting surprises.

sev112 · September 2023

It’s always been the same.
but as I say, I don’t think anyone is being affected in this comp other than Scotland getting drawn with Ireland and SAF

ewal · September 2023

sev112 said:

ewal said:

The lopsided draw looking dafter by the day - two of SA, Ireland, France and NZ going home at quarter finals stage.

Pointless going on about it... hey-ho...

I don’t get this
the draw is such that the winner needs to beat the other big teams, all this draw does is mean they have to beat one of them in the 1/4s rather than the semi.
And if any of that “big 4” can’t beat ENG WAL FIJ ARG then they don’t really deserve to be in the final or even semi.

Because it's also about how far you go in the competition and who you've had to play to get there.

England came in to the competition on poor form, but have had the opportunity to ease themselves in to it nicely against (very much relatively speaking) easier sides. While on other side of the draw, we've already two games that could've been the final.

I'm just a bitter Scot. Our best ever team in the professional era is not going to make it out the group stages, and will probably suffer as a result next time around.

The odds are always stacked the wrong way. Should be used to it by now.

camf · September 2023

^^^ Truth!

koneguitarist · September 2023

ewal said:

sev112 said:

ewal said:

The lopsided draw looking dafter by the day - two of SA, Ireland, France and NZ going home at quarter finals stage.

Pointless going on about it... hey-ho...

I don’t get this
the draw is such that the winner needs to beat the other big teams, all this draw does is mean they have to beat one of them in the 1/4s rather than the semi.
And if any of that “big 4” can’t beat ENG WAL FIJ ARG then they don’t really deserve to be in the final or even semi.

Because it's also about how far you go in the competition and who you've had to play to get there.

England came in to the competition on poor form, but have had the opportunity to ease themselves in to it nicely against (very much relatively speaking) easier sides. While on other side of the draw, we've already two games that could've been the final.

I'm just a bitter Scot. Our best ever team in the professional era is not going to make it out the group stages, and will probably suffer as a result next time around.

The odds are always stacked the wrong way. Should be used to it by now.

2015 Wales were in a pool with England and Australia, both ranked above us, guess what we just got on with it and played what we were dealt.

tbm · September 2023

koneguitarist said:

2015 Wales were in a pool with England and Australia, both ranked above us, guess what we just got on with it and played what we were dealt.

This.

It's irritating, but it is what it is. From an Ireland POV we've nobody to blame but ourselves. We topped our groups in 2011 and 2015, had eminently winnable quarter finals and just didn't deliver. Ireland might get past Scotland, play well in a quarter final and still lose. We look to have decent metal strength at the moment, are in good form, and we've beaten everybody on the last 18 months so should not fear anyone.

Gatland is some boy though. Like, a tale of two homecomings (him and Eddie). Those Welsh players were talking about striking months ago. Now their within touching distance of another semi-final. If the WRU have any sense they'll lock Gats in as a High Performance Director. Get him to mentor the next coach.

sev112 · September 2023

@koneguitarist spot on

Pjon · September 2023

ewal said:

I'm just a bitter Scot. Our best ever team in the professional era is not going to make it out the group stages, and will probably suffer as a result next time around.

The odds are always stacked the wrong way. Should be used to it by now.

I'm not having a go at you when I say this, but I'm really bored of hearing this from Scotland. Every year they get good results against one or two of the best teams, and every year they say they have the best team ever, and then they completely fail in every competition they play in. They seem to get a bit closer each time but ultimately complain about everybody being against them. It's tedious, and actually makes me support the teams who play against them which, funnily enough, plays back into the 'nobody respects us' thing.

ewal · September 2023

koneguitarist said:

ewal said:

sev112 said:

ewal said:

The lopsided draw looking dafter by the day - two of SA, Ireland, France and NZ going home at quarter finals stage.

Pointless going on about it... hey-ho...

I don’t get this
the draw is such that the winner needs to beat the other big teams, all this draw does is mean they have to beat one of them in the 1/4s rather than the semi.
And if any of that “big 4” can’t beat ENG WAL FIJ ARG then they don’t really deserve to be in the final or even semi.

Because it's also about how far you go in the competition and who you've had to play to get there.

England came in to the competition on poor form, but have had the opportunity to ease themselves in to it nicely against (very much relatively speaking) easier sides. While on other side of the draw, we've already two games that could've been the final.

I'm just a bitter Scot. Our best ever team in the professional era is not going to make it out the group stages, and will probably suffer as a result next time around.

The odds are always stacked the wrong way. Should be used to it by now.

2015 Wales were in a pool with England and Australia, both ranked above us, guess what we just got on with it and played what we were dealt.

I appreciate there will always be anomalies, but in 2015, Ireland and New Zealand were on the other side of the draw, i.e. it was not as lopsided as the draw this time. I'm not just looking at this from a Scotland perspective...

Will shut up about it now though - they should just do away with the seeding system and everyone just accept their lot. That would be fairest.

TJT1979 · September 2023

As an Eng supporter it’s clear that Scotland/Ireland got the short straw this time round.

The seeding system is designed to avoid the best teams being knocked out too early, and on the whole it works.

The issue isn’t the system…. it’s the fact that they do the draw years ahead of the event. If they’d done the draw based on rankings within the last year, we’d have very different pools.

sev112 · September 2023

It’s not even that, it’s the combination of it with 9 good teams, rather than 8. Someone is always going to be the Scotland.

TJT1979 · September 2023

Agreed.

I still don’t know why they do the draw so far ahead though. I’d have thought a year would plenty to organise whatever it is that depends on what the groups were.

fretmeister · September 2023

TJT1979 said:

Agreed.

I still don’t know why they do the draw so far ahead though. I’d have thought a year would plenty to organise whatever it is that depends on what the groups were.

They’ve changed that for next time. It’s going to be much closer to the event.

MagicPigDetective · September 2023

What’s strange is that Wales have been in the same group as Australia and Fiji in every World Cup since 2007. How does this happen? Not complaining though, we’ve done rather well out of it!

fretmeister · September 2023

Stay classy Boks….

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