Author: Moses

Click here for our coverage of the trial match between the NSW Waratahs and the Queensland Reds. Thanks to our roving reporters Noddy and matty_k for covering the match.

The Super 14 trial match and between the NSW Waratahs and the Queensland Reds sees the Round 1 opponents going head to head in the far northern NSW town of Lismore. As is the custom with these trial matches, the format is open to the interpretation of the respective coaches, but should loosely resemble a rugby game. Ewen McKenzie has selected two teams to play a half each, with four replacements set to cover both periods. Softly spoken 21-year-old loosehead prop Ben Daley will lead the Reds by example as a reward for training hard. Meanwhile, Chris Hickey has named…

We’ve just made the move across to our own virtual private server after outgrowing our shared hosting arrangement, please post any teething problems in this thread.

Here are some highlights from The Back Page last night where they showed the last two occasions at which the Barbarians have overcome the All Blacks, 1973 and 2009.

Join us from 4am Sydney time for live commentary of the final match of our NH tour.

I’ve written this post straight after the game while the pain is still raw and untempered, and I’m trying to work out if that’s the worst I’ve seen the Wallabies play. I suspect it is. We’ll post a more balanced review later. That we still had a chance to win with the last kick is perhaps a measure of how “outclassed” these Scots were, completely lacking the ability to break our line with their only territory coming from the plethora of Wallaby mistakes.

Join us from 4am AEDST as we live blog the Wallabies vs Scotland. Short of hitting the pub all night, it’s the only way to watch the game with company.

The Vic Super 15 team is looking for a name. Well, they’re not, yet, but in the words of John O’Niell: “I’d prefer something other than the Rebels. I think we need a fresh start, and I think they ought to put it out to the [public and] run a competition.” Let’s be honest here, recent form in naming of Australian rugby teams has been piss-poor, with an alarming trend towards Americanised corporate wankery.

I sincerely hope that we will see Stirling Mortlock in Green and Gold again, but the chances are getting very slim with a calf injury injury ruling him out of the NH tour and a likely Japanese signing around the corner. Stirlo is and will always be my favourite rugby player. He truly won me over during the 2003 world cup semi-final with a certain intercept try which condemned the kiwi’s 4 more years. I recall it was 7am at the time and I was in a Walkabout pub in London drinking Lager/Cider/Raspberry pints when my mate declared “my first…

Despite a great showing in match 7, Robbie’s young developmental squad no longer have even a mathematical chance (my favourite kind of chance) to win the Tri-Nations. I’ve looked at all possible outcomes from this weekends match and produced the table below to show the path to glory as the Boks and Blecks to battle it out for the silverware. The following scenarious will wrap up the tournament for the Boks this weekend:

Here’s a short clip showing highlights of Rocky Elsom’s time with Leinster. [youtube]_yPv0JkMcIU[/youtube] This shows why Rocky is the complete package and is in the form of his life. His pace, palm off, strength in the tackle, step, mongrel, big game temperament and ability to make anyone his bitch are truly world class.

Ok, that hurts.. to lose the Bledisloe for another year is not a pleasant feeling. This post is purely my reactions from been at the game, we’ll have some proper analysis later in the week. Cowan was extremely lucky not to get a yellow right before half time, apparently Kaplin had his hand in the pocket but McCaw talked him out of sending him.

With Noddy posting the real Kefu try, I thought it could be a good time to show a short movie that my wife and I made last year. It’s a recreation of Kefu’s effort and was our entry into a competition last year. We were hoping to win tickets to the Hong Kong Bledisloe, alas a few kids in a park beat us and we didn’t even scrape into 3rd. I blame Lote Tuqiri, he was the judge afterall! [youtube]ul2j6kcQch8[/youtube]

There’s been a lot of opinion from both sides of the Indian about Matt Giteau’s hit on Fourie Du Preez and why it was not cited. A GAGR poll found 100% agreeance that Giteau should face the judiciary, however 50% also believed he should then have been let off as it’s his first offence. The match citing officer, David Gray of New Zealand, found no reason to refer the incident to the judiciary. He’s also offered no explanation to date for this finding, which leaves me to conclude that David Gray condones of this play by Giteau.

Just imagine you wake up after the Perth Tri Nations with a massive hangover, and lying in bed you recall the events that transpired the night before…. A big smile comes over your face, after all your boys put on a solid 12 point win and that leggy blonde gave you her number.

I haven’t had a chance to re-watch the footage yet, but here are some initial thoughts from Newlands last night. The performance of our young bench players was very encouraging. JOC was exceptional from the outset, TPN played brilliantly and together with Ben Alexander and Benn Robinson formed a scrum so dominant the sprinboks were in fact scared of it, opting for a lineout to secure their on their ball. Only some well chosen words from Smit in Allain’s ear together with the biggest bore in from a LHP I’ve ever seen gave the Boks a temporary reprieve here. Genia…

Boks vs Wallabies at Newlands (08/09/2009) Close 12:40 Moses: Evening All,Welcome to the green and gold coverage of the Wallabies taking on the Boks from Newlands. 12:41 Moses: Horwill’s had a stomach bug, apparently is OK to start the game. Waugh was there to back up replace Kev 12:42 Moses: “We’ll put a lot of pressure on their line out, we’ll get up there.It’s going to be physical. We’ll see a fair bit of kicking and get up by 2” – Phil Waugh 12:42 Moses: Well said Waughy 12:44 Moses: “We just had to kick” – supercoach devilliers 12:51…

Each week the members of our forum cast their 3-2-1 votes to contribute to the prestigious Green and Gold Rugby Wallaby of the Year. So far this year Noddy has collated over 200 votes, and we expect this to bulid through the Tri-Nations. The weekly Man of the Match for each test to date can be viewed on this page, which will be updated throughout the season. As well as the voting, there’s plenty of discussion on the forums of who’s voting for whom and why from our informed and knowledgeable forum contributors. If you’re at work or browsing on…

I’ve often thought that certain players within the springbok squad are scum, however labelling the entire team as such is a bit rich, even for me. Yet that’s exactly what their national broadcaster SuperSport have done this week. Towards the end of the first half against the Lions on Saturday they put together a montage of the set pieces with the caption “Springbok scum power”, as shown in this screen capture below (undoctored!). A simple typo? Below – don’t try to reduce gap between two top items – scoring of both teams – and cards and crowd size – it…