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I don't understand why knocking the ball out is a yellow card but running it out deliberately like Maitland earlier is OK?

Did you see his other attempts at catches this game? About expected I'd say.

I agree that they might have had a chance if they tried to push past the people standing in their way instead of trying to draw attention to the obstruction but it still wouldn't been hard to get there with a couple large players in the way. Then there's the risk that the obstruction goes unnoticed.

They've been pretty consistently against Australia, and the ref has consistently looked confused calling them!

Was about to go to bed, the ref is making the game hard to watch. Then they had to go and score that and keep me watching... Still dirty on the obstruction try, blockers really get my goat.

almost muffed by holding on to the ball as usual with an unmarked folau a metre to his right! It was good to watch but it didn't give me confidence in TK or cement his place in the team in my eyes, but maybe a daytime viewing will convince me otherwise.

I was actually unimpressed, and his try was nothing Kerevi wouldnt have finished.

Agree about the penalties - the offside blocking/running off the ball at most kickoffs (or the blocking on Hodge pointed out at the start of the match on a Scotland break) has more of an impact than an obstruction like that. They are just ignored though.

I would but I'm worried that if I push as hard as I can Nigel Owens might come out.

I think he was about effective last night as he was back then

Some decent footage of his rugby gameplay at Biarritz here (skip to 1:50): Looks promising though I was surprised to see that it was uploaded 4 years ago! It's hard to judge what he would be like now from those few clips.

I think another one from tonights game was Tomane - he did enough to remind us that he has held the gold jersey before! Something to think about when picking wingers.

Judging by comments here and in the news threads I seem to be the only one who thinks Douglas is doing very well and contributing a lot. Does anyone care to enlighten me?

I think what holds those guys back is foot speed and agility. Being a fan of both codes and having seen a lot of all of those mentioned players I'd have to guess that Burgess is quite a bit quicker than that lot. Also I imagine their thinking is that being from league he is probably a little...

No one has the same offloading capabilities as SBW, but Burgess' offload is definitely passable and will be at least on par with other rugby centres. His foot speed and footwork are also JUST OK for a centre position in my opinion. He's going to be a lot bigger and stronger than any other centre...

Some decent footage here:

I'd probably add Akuila Uate, Jharal Yow Yeh, Daly Cherry-Evans and maybe even Fifita and Bird off the bench, pending a speed/fitness test. NZ would be Vatuvei, Inu, Hoffman, Johnson, Luke, Tuivasa-Sheck, Locke and I'd consider SBW, Kenny-Dowall, Winterstein, Whare and Tupou.

I imagine trying to stop him would be a little like trying to read your posts. I think there are a lot of players who would do very well in sevens. Probably even better than our current sevens team, given the right coach. I am even expecting a few who might be coming off contract to duck over...

Isn't that pretty much a Hooper-like level of involvement in the sport? There are so few chances to stand out for the majority of positions - the fact they only kicked the ball ONCE to the guy who has never played before supports that. Good that he is moving bodies though, that's what he's there...

It seems like he did quite well. They seemed particularly impressed that he "threw off blockers" whatever that means. Wonder if anyone can get a hold of some footage. http://mmqb.si.com/2013/12/09/daniel-adongo-indianapolis-colts-robert-klemko/