Australia v South Africa - Perth - 6 September 2014

[Viking]

He pulled out of the Vikings game today

god dammnit!!!

 

[disco]

Horwill was good when he cam on tonight hopefully he can get back to his best.

For all the shit Higgers cops on here I think he had another good game tonight & really made a difference when he came on.

 

[Lorenzo]

We tend to lose our way through matches and I have to blame the leadership for that, does Hooper have it?

Personally I think the captain tacking a tap kick (on a penalty) 25 metres out from our own line when we have been wasting petrol boshing it up in our own half all night is unforgivable. It's just terrible judgment.

 

[Brumby Jack]

Things to work on for next week:

Lineout - was a bit shaky at times and when you're up against Matfield you need to on your game.
Kicking - our general kicking out of hand was terrible - watching Folau and Horne put in some poor distance kicks was infuriating. Folau played AFL FFS!

The good things:
Foley getting the backline going
Kuridrani was huge at 13 and his tackle busts were impressive
Better use of the bench instead of the junk time they normally get

 

[KOB1987]

So the question is should Speight be rushed into the starting side. Moving AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) to 13 and K to the bench?

no

 

[qwerty51]

He definitely has flaws but no one else can captain. He's the only forward who's spot is fixed and plays 80.

 

[Viking]

Horwill was good when he cam on tonight hopefully he can get back to his best.

For all the shit Higgers cops on here I think he had another good game tonight & really made a difference when he came on.

I really hope both Higgers and Horwill get a start next week. Higgers was superb. What on Earth is happening with Palu? His superb super season has not translated to the Test arena. It's time for Higginbothan to step in.

 

[Viking]

He definitely has flaws but no one else can captain. He's the only forward who's spot is fixed and plays 80.

Slipper?

 

[Pjmil]

Folau played AFL FFS!

That's his problem. He's using the drop punt which is great for accuracy but shit for distance especially when done from a static position.

 

[ChargerWA]

Palu is our Nonu. A superb Super season or a superb Test season. You only get one.

 

[Wilson]

Thought Kuridrani was superb and Palu was woeful. Horwill and Higgers should both start next week, Palu to the bench, Simmons possibly dropped for Skelton(still not sure about him in the scrums but Simo needs the kick up the arse), Higgers or Horwill to call the Lineout. Probably stick to the 6-2 split. If speight is 100% then he pushes Horne to the bench, but any questions over his fitness and he should stay in the NRC another week. If TPN is fit then bring him back either to start or on the bench. Otherwise no changes, assuming everyone pulls up ok. Slipper looked hurt when he went off, thoguht Cowan held up well in the scrums but wouldn't be too comfortable starting him against the argies.

 

[qwerty51]

Slipper?

Doesn't play 80

 

[Lorenzo]

Folau was quite obviously tought to kick in his 20s and he's just not very good at it. It would only get worse if he tried a torp or whatever. It makes him a liability at 15.

He might be better off on the wing with AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) at 15.

 

[KOB1987]

I find it interesting that we all have opinions about who should play where, who's more effective at passing turds, etc but no-one questions the overall game plan..the real reason we got 9 points behind in the second half in a game we should have run away with was that we were outplayed by a team that, for at least that 20 minutes, had their shit together..

 

[Sandpit Fan]

Horwill. What were you thinking? Bokke don't kick it 10, but don't slow play, take the scrum with our feed and wind the clock down but grab it and hope we can hang on for 60 seconds. Lucky we did.

WTF seems apt... That was a smart piece of play. You didn't notice that our scrum was not real good? Better than 50% chance of conceding a penalty and Steyn can kick them from there. Kev took the right option no question.

 

[KOB1987]

Folau was quite obviously tought to kick in his 20s and he's just not very good at it. It would only get worse if he tried a torp or whatever. It makes him a liability at 15.

He might be better off on the wing with AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) at 15.

WTF??

 

[Viking]

I find it interesting that we all have opinions about who should play where, who's more effective at passing turds, etc but no-one questions the overall game plan..the real reason we got 9 points behind in the second half in a game we should have run away with was that we were outplayed by a team that, for at least that 20 minutes, had their shit together..

Interesting post. In regards to the game plan, at times we had a hard time getting out of our half, our kicking game and tactics really let us down. I thought we passed it off to forward runners one or two many times before clearing it and once we cleared it the kick was either straight to the Boks back 3 or out with poor distance.

 

[Lorenzo]

WTF??

Did you disagree re Folau's kicking? Do you think fullbacks need to have top-tier kicking chops?

AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) was considered Australia's premier fullback in 2008. He's not going to play 13 anytime soon.

 

[Shiggins]

Crowd figures?

 

[FrankLind]

Personally I think the captain tacking a tap kick (on a penalty) 25 metres out from our own line when we have been wasting petrol boshing it up in our own half all night is unforgivable. It's just terrible judgment.

The expectation that can be a first rate captain in his first year is too much.
he is so young and inexperienced. But he will grow into the role and make a great vice-captain when Moore returns.