Bledisloe #2 - AUS v NZL, Eden Park, Auckland, August 15th

[Highlander35]

USA shouldn't be an issue. Think you play Fiji at Millennium, which gives them a dry track to wreck havoc on.

But you should still be fine.

 

[Train Without a Station]

And Uruguay as well isn't it?

All 3 would be 5 to 1 outsiders at least. In a 2 horse race there's always a chance sure. But it's extremely unlikely.

There's a lot of unwarranted negativity such as the old "we won't make it out of our pool with x problems in our team" despite these being the same problems which have not prevented us defeating Wales 10 games in a row, and we'd need to lose to them to not get out of our pool.

 

[Braveheart81]

If anyone really thinks we could lose to Fiji at the RWC or to the USA before that you should really put some money on it.

USA will be paying well over $10 and Fiji will probably pay $8 or so.

These are games where we'll be close to unbackable favourites and we won't be fronting up with half a week's preparation and a side full of second choice players.

Of course we need to show adequate respect to these sides but they're not exactly star-studded world beaters.

 

[Gagger]

And this wasn't a dig?



Even managed a dig at Genia who wasn't even playing. Good work.

Why are they digs?

I made a point about the style of play Genia and Cooper have played since 2011.

The problem with the Cooper debate is that people personalise it.

My commentary isn't about Cooper as a person - it's about how he played last weekend and the years leading up to it.

These aren't digs at the players and they're not digs at you TWAS. Your life could be a lot happier when you accept that!

 

[zer0]

In seriousness, I can't be the only one who thinks a non-playing member getting physical with the opposition players during a match is a pretty big violation.

It was certainly silly. I believe he'll be facing internal disciplining, but doesn't seem as though SANZAR will get involved.

 

[Train Without a Station]

but doesn't seem as though SANZAR will get involved.

At first I thought it was odd. A water runner getting involved in an on-field "brawl". But then I considered Messam appears to be only trying to prevent Savea from partaking, and there's been no murmurs from our camp suggesting otherwise, so perhaps common sense has prevailed. .

 

[Hugh Jarse]

Probably get a fair hearing, and have a proper and common sense "solution" applied if it is handled outside the SANZAR lottery.

 

[zer0]

At first I thought it was odd. A water runner getting involved in an on-field "brawl". But then I considered Messam appears to be only trying to prevent Savea from partaking, and there's been no murmurs from our camp suggesting otherwise, so perhaps common sense has prevailed. .

If that's the case I don't think he needed go that far. Just had to throw a hamburger in the opposite direction and the Bus milk tanker would've wobbled off after it.

 

[teach]

Sanzar has fined the All Blacks for Messam breaching sideline protocols.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/...ar-after-waterboy-liam-messams-onfield-antics

 

[Dismal Pillock]

$2,000, probably have a whip-around

http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/co...eded-with-daily-news.13356/page-2#post-778528

 

[Scoey]

Yeah probably fair enough. $2k is nothing really but it can't go without some sort of slap on the wrist.

 

[ACR]

If that's the case I don't think he needed go that far. Just had to throw a hamburger in the opposite direction and the Bus milk tanker would've wobbled off after it.

Wow, a bit of a lean streak and maybe lack of match fitness and all of a sudden Savea is "milk tanker". I pity the fool. Wanna swap wingers? Hmmm? lol

Can't wait to see how this turns out..

 

[zer0]

Wow, a bit of a lean streak and maybe lack of match fitness and all of a sudden Savea is "milk tanker". I pity the fool. Wanna swap wingers? Hmmm? lol

Swap wingers with who? Auckland? Yeah, if I was a selector I'd have played Piutau instead of Savea.

 

[Hugh Jarse]

$2,000, probably have a whip-around

http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/co...eded-with-daily-news.13356/page-2#post-778528

Hamilton to Auckland is similar to the distance from Melbourne to Geelong.

A chartered Helicopter for that distance over here is $5k. If it only cost $2k for Messam to get from his couch in Hamilton to Eden Park $2k then he got a good return on his investment. Helicopter trips can cost some folk their very cushy job on this side of the Tasman.

 

[Pfitzy]

Could it be me you refer to good sir?

Jeez - I'm not usually called "sir" unless its followed with "you'll have to leave the premises"

Are you just a tad upset at me for lowering the idolising-of-Cheika quotient?

Not at all - where you're coming from is the bitter little "BEALE GOT LINK FIRED AND EVERYONE FROM NSW IS SATAN!" angle. Which is like masturbating with a cheese grater - somewhat amusing, but mostly painful.

Just as FYI: I don't give a flying fuck about 'going deep into the Finals at the RWC.' And nor do most everyday Aus rugby fans, the Wallabies in the RWC SF stage then right bundled out will be forgotten within a week of it happening. Most won't even remember who they played.

Like every other red-blooded Aussie sports fan, I want them to win the fucking thing! And to do that, it's 70%+ likely they'll have to beat the ABs in a GF, or along the way.

Firstly: France are going to beat the ABs in the Quarters, so calm your farm.

Secondly: I also want us to win. But if, as a NSW supporter, I say here and now "we're going to win this thing and you'll all look a right pack of shunts for criticising Cheika!", in the event we don't win it, you'll be back here with your little maroon book of grudges, laying into all and sundry south of the border for "our" coach fucking up something that Link was going to ace, despite all evidence to the contrary.

The truly sad part is I feel sorry for you, because regardless of where we get at RWC, come February you have to consider Richard Fucking Graham screwing up yet another season in Brisbane, frowning myopically at a clipboard in between mouthfuls of Jim Carmichael.

Fuck. That.

 

[Viking]

Oh look another Tahs V Reds d*ck measuring contest.... this is new and exciting.

Now back to talking about actual rugby please.

Anyone worried about our high ball skills? On second viewing I think the AB's can easily target anyone who isn't Falou. They targeting Cooper at the back and if Foley or To'omua started they would have success targeting them too. AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper) is solid enough but the old move the flyhalf to fullback trick is being used against us.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Yep. Exactly why we shouldn't be shuffling our playmakers back when somebody else replaces them in the front line.

 

[Grant NZ]

NZRU fined for Messam's getting involved in handbags. Not for his actual conduct, but because waterways aren't allowed in the playing area during play and he came on before play had been blown up apparently.

 

[pissedoffihavetoregister]

I didn't mind us losing on Saturday night. We got to try a few new combinations and NZ put on their best team. Hopefully, we play them in the WC, there is no way we would have beat them 3 times in a row. But 2 times in a year is possible. I was great practice for Cooper to play in a cauldron that's more tense/unfriendly than the WC will be. Falou's kicking is getting better. Our defence in the second half really hurt us, but we can work on that. We had a few chances to pull them back with overlaps on the wing but we fluffed them. Even Kurtley made a couple of good tackles. I am not sure if that big pack is better than our pooper pack. Having the second-row height so different makes the number 8 much less effective (have a look at Reid in the first bled).

 

[Braveheart81]

Watching through the game a second time (and in a sober state), it was quite telling how many of our problems arose directly from unforced errors.

Certainly we were beaten across the park for well over half the match. The first twenty minutes though we probably had the ascendency and it wasn't until the Coles try that NZ got on top and we started making bad errors. I think the thing to look at though is that even if our team had dominated possession and territory, we would have probably lost on the back of the errors that we made. This is test match rugby and errors get punished far more often.

Most of our lineout losses came from our own errors. The worst of which was Horwill dropping the ball cold uncontested 5m out from the All Blacks line. The game was certainly lost by this point, but the turnover resulted in a big All Blacks break and we lost all the pressure we had built up. Other lineouts were lost through an overthrow and twice we got the ball locked up in the maul after making a clean catch. All the talk surrounding the balance of the pack to have enough lineout jumpers and the right lineout technicians shouldn't be trotted out ad nauseum without properly reviewing why our lineout isn't functioning well.

Our general play kicking was woeful. Two of the All Blacks tries happened within a phase of two of us making a bad kick down field. The RWC is going to feature a lot of contestable kicking against us. We need to do the same when we kick. I can't remember a single one of our kicks downfield that we were able to contest in the air. Every one of them went about 10-15m too far.

A couple of the All Blacks tries were scored on the back of defensive misreads where we should have had them covered.

It's easy to take the view that we were simply outplayed and that's why we lost but I think that's an easy way out.

We need to improve the accuracy of our play and limit the errors that we make. Otherwise we'll be getting to the end of matches where we have been the significantly better team and wonder why we lost.

We need to have the confidence that outside of the All Blacks, we have the cattle to be able to beat every team on a consistent basis. We don't need to do anything spectacular, we just need players to do their jobs, make smart decisions and limit our errors.