tragic
John Solomon (38)
In all honesty, you are pretty much right. The problem for me is the yellow cards are a sign of a wider problem. So whilst the yellow cards are mostly from poor technique, they fit the perception of grub behaviour. Things like Hooper throwing sand in the face during a scrum, Phipps throwing a boot into the crowd, the off the ball shoulders and late tackles, general niggle and whining to the ref during the game and the coach whining about the ref after the game. It just seems as the team on the field is following the coaches behaviour off the field. So whilst the yellow cards maybe technique related, they fit the perception of grubby and niggley behaviour, and perception is reality.
Still not convinced. Phipps was just being a twat. Hooper didn't throw sand - alternate camera angles proved it. The "shoulder charges" were all marginal and from players like Izzy and DHP who are not dirty players - the timing was slightly off and the use of arms borderline but that is all technique related.
I agree there is stupid niggle creeping into the Wallabies game and I don't like it either.
But I think the yellow cards are a separate and unrelated issue.
- mainly discipline and technique. And whilst that does come back to coaching, it is not necessarily the behaviour of the coach himself.