Monday’s Rugby News has SBW out, Sean O’Brien in, Christian Leali’ifano back, Bill Beaumont positive about Australian rugby and George Smith on the WBs backrow.
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Sonny Bill Out
Sonny Bill Williams has been found guilty of pulverising Anthony Williams’ melon, and has been sentenced to four weeks on the naughty step.
This is four weeks, and not games, which means Bill Williams will miss out the Lions decider, and then the meaningless Blues game the first week back to Super Rugby, and the two non-existing Blues finals game after that.
It took the disciplinary panel THREE hours to figure out that shouldering a bloke right on the noggin was a bad thing.
“Just finished my hearing, ended up getting four weeks. Obviously really disappointed, but happy with being able to get in there and say my piece,” Williams said, according to rugby.com.au.
“But I’m very disappointed that I was sent from the field last night and that I let my brothers down.”
Meanwhile Steve Hansen doesn’t sound too happy, telling him SBW to go Guilty.
“There’s a (judicial) process, we trust the process. Sonny’s paid a big price. The team’s paid a big price for him making a mistake,” Hansen said.
“He’s disappointed. Not for himself, he accepts he’s made a mistake, but he’s disappointed because he’s let the team down.”
Meanwhile, Sean O’Brien has had his charge dismissed. After replaying it over and over again, you could sorta of see O’Brien whack Waisake Naholo in the head with a swinging arm, an arm that was swinging almost as if it was in a normal tackling motion.
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Leali’ifano is Back!
Christian Leali’ifano made his comeback to competitive rugby on the weekend, playing for the Tuggeranong 4th grade.
Leali’ifano ran out with his brother Lix’s team, which is sorta sweet, beating the Royals in a close game, 80-0. Lix came out of retirement for this game, the first time in 10 years that the brothers had played together. Also in attendance was mum, Mafa.
“Christian was really positive when he got the initial diagnosis and one of the things he spoke about was playing with the boys again,” said former Tuggeranong Viking and pal Beau Mokotupu (via the Canberra Times).
“As the brothership we are, we all agreed that when he was ready we’d all get back out there and make it happen.
“Christian has always been upbeat and that rubbed off on everyone. Christian said he wanted to play, we believed him and there was never a doubt in our mind we’d be out there together.
“Sport was put aside. The feeling to run out with him again was something special. It was bigger than sport. It was the end of one part of the journey … it was just like back in the day.”
Meanwhile Stephen Larkham said this:
“He wanted to play with his brother, that was one of his goals that he set going through the treatment,” Larkham said.
“In terms of his preparation to play at that next level, this was his best avenue.
“We haven’t made a decision [on his involvement in the Super Rugby season], it’s a matter of sitting down with Christian and finding out what he wants to do first.
“But he did play exceptionally well [in a friendly in Singapore] so it was good to see him back out there playing rugby again. We’ll make a decision [on Sunday].”
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Bill Beaumont Bigs Up ARU
World Rugby chairman Bill Beaumont popped into the ARU on his way to New Zealand late last week, and has told the SMH that he reckons everything will be a-ok in Australian rugby soon again.
“All countries go through difficult times and obviously it’s a challenging time for the union and it’s hard to imagine that two years ago you were in the final of a Rugby World Cup,” Beaumont said.
“They’ve got challenges and World Rugby acknowledge the challenges that Australia face but have got every confidence in the union that they will ride the storm and come out strong.
“It’s up to each individual country to determine what the format of their game is within that country.”
World Rugby lobbied SANZAAR hard to include a team from Argentina in Super, and despite being able to say shit like “Australian rugby will be ok”, Bill Beaumont reckons more Super expansion – into the Pacific – is the key.
“Put it this way, it could well be a Pacific Island team playing in Super Rugby that might be a solution,” Beaumont said. “If you look at the contribution in rugby terms that those islands have made, it’s absolutely enormous isn’t it.
“Certainly if there is any way they can play on the island and still play top club rugby then I suppose it’s a win-win for everybody. We will work with the individual unions and the shareholders on Super Rugby to find solutions.”
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Smith Bigs Up WBs Backrow
Backrow guru George Smith has run his eye over the Wallabies’ backrow performance during the June series, and reckons it’s a-ok.
While the Scottish game wasn’t good, Smith reckons the backrow learnt from their lessons.
“I thought they flooded the breakdown really well, the Scots,” Smith told rugby.com.au. “A lot of the ball when the Aussies were attacking – the placement of the ball wasn’t great.
“When they did place the ball to the inside, it allowed or invited the Scots to get the jump on the players. That makes it far harder to clean or present the ball in an attacking raid.
“There were a number of issues in that area but I think they learned from that and played well in the next game.”
Smith also has something to say about the calls for the Wallabies to include a fetcher.
“You see a player like Ardie Savea, who plays similar to Michael Hooper,” Smith said.
“He links with the backs extremely well, he’s fast around the field, he is able to play within the backline and play very well – it’s not about changing that.
“Hooper has been one of the standouts.”
With another Brumbies vs Reds game on the horizon, Smith is looking to reassert himself as the Australian Backrow Kingpin.
“[Chris Alcock] played all over me in that game. You want to play over your opposite number and I will be looking to do that – there’s no doubt there.
“But at the same time I need to be contributing to the team and playing within the systems that we have.
“Me playing well within the team in most cases, means we wend up playing a big game.”
Settle down, George.
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