The Official English Rugby Thread

[JM2K6]

Ends with a fucking appalling lineout. Just give wasps the bonus point now.

Any analysis of this at half time better not hide from the fact that Quins have picked a 10 who can't kick, can't pass, and can only run fast, while making a big lummox of a 12 our primary playmaker, while the hooker has a meltdown at the lineout.

We're a shambles, no shape at all and no real idea how we want to win this game.

Edit: apparently Edwards has missed six tackles too. Just amazing stuff. Without sudden improvement I can see the academy kid Benson getting a fair bit of premiership cup time...

[JM2K6]

Whoever blatantly left their hand on the ball in a lost ruck to give Quins this oppportunity is a moron.

An hour to play forty minutes of rugby. Sheesh.

The commentators were wanking on about how it's not as one sided as the score suggests. I don't know what game they're watching.

Is that including the injury break?

Yes, but it's not just that - been a lot of stoppages for various things.

[Raggs]

Ends with a fucking appalling lineout. Just give wasps the bonus point now.

Any analysis of this at half time better not hide from the fact that Quins have picked a 10 who can't kick, can't pass, and can only run fast, while making a big lummox of a 12 our primary playmaker, while the hooker has a meltdown at the lineout.

We're a shambles, no shape at all and no real idea how we want to win this game.

Edit: apparently Edwards has missed six tackles too. Just amazing stuff. Without sudden improvement I can see the academy kid Benson getting a fair bit of premiership cup time...

It was Nearchou, I think he had lost his balance and was trying to support himself up on it, not realising it was the ball, or just not fancying faceplanting. Frustrating pen regardless.

[JM2K6]

Wasps were asleep there, never had the numbers.

Esterhuizen taking conversions, lol

[sockwithaticket]

And that's why I won't feel comfortable until there's an 8 point lead with 79 minutes on the clock.

[Raggs]

And that's why I won't feel comfortable until there's an 8 point lead with 79 minutes on the clock.

Yep, 16 points is nowhere near enough to be safe for a whole half. It's just enough to fall asleep with though.

[JM2K6]

Austin praising Edwards for... Running fast then passing to no one

[JM2K6]

Baffling by Quins. Missed touch again, because we don't have a front line kicker, then care takes the lineout to himself like it's 2007

[sockwithaticket]

The missed opportunities are starting to stack up for us.

[sockwithaticket]

A couple more and Nearchou will be off, just overwhelmed in the scrum.

[JM2K6]

Quins starting to challenge closer to the ruck with some success.

[Raggs]

A couple more and Nearchou will be off, just overwhelmed in the scrum.

Probably more than 2, but yeah, I hope Barnes has a bit of sympathy.

EDIT- That'll make it uncontested actually? But Wasps to 13?

[JM2K6]

Edwards plays ten like he learned it from watching YouTube

[sockwithaticket]

A couple more and Nearchou will be off, just overwhelmed in the scrum.

Probably more than 2, but yeah, I hope Barnes has a bit of sympathy.

EDIT- That'll make it uncontested actually? But Wasps to 13?

Shit, it would as well. Guess everyone's just got to try really hard not to drop the ball and give Quins a scrum.

[JM2K6]

Edwards gets the ball with two backs outside him running good lines, one of them Esterhuizen, and he is just too slow to pass and we did up isolated

[sockwithaticket]

Just inviting pressure with this penalty count.

[Kawazaki]

Surprised Green can't play flyhalf tbh.

[JM2K6]

Yeah, that's a classic catchup try for Quins. Andre takes out two and gives the offload.

[JM2K6]

Surprised Green can't play flyhalf tbh.

He can, apparently.

[Raggs]

Frustrating that it just goes to another scrum if they don't use it. A dominant team can surely just keep resetting till they get the result they want.

[JM2K6]

Also frustrating that one team can't scrum, mind.

[JM2K6]

Oh that is a killer penalty from wasps. Wow.

[JM2K6]

And it costs them. Excellent by Steele, who's been looking for that opportunity a few times

[sockwithaticket]

Going to need a big moment to rescue this. The squandered opportunities are looking really costly.

[JM2K6]

Forward pass I think. Nice finish though.

Edit: yeah. Forward. Shame.

[JM2K6]

Nearchou off with a very convincing limp. Uncontested scrums.

[sockwithaticket]

We must be claiming it's a head knock is JTA has come back on?

Hougaard's looking much improved on his previous showings, but delivery is still too slow and wild.

[JM2K6]

Great turnover. Gosh, Toomaga-Allen is doing well to carry like this with a few minutes to go.

[JM2K6]

That is the worst bonus point win we'll ever have. I wish I could have enjoyed that more.

Wasps just didn't come out at half time. I guess the scrum beastings took a lot out of them.

edit: They gave Edwards MOTM, because of course they did. We'll forget all the bad shit, the missed tackles, the hesitation, the fact that he can't kick at all... we'll also forget Collier's demolition job, or Green's ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTY FOUR METRES, or Northmore's superb tight carrying.

[sockwithaticket]

Steele coming on was big for Quins, also sorting out the lineout. That plus Nearchou getting pummelled in the scrum and us not nailing our chances from the first half.

Game of two halves cliche, there was only one team in it that second period.

Serious question, can we opt out of the Prem cup? Without signing more loan players I don't know if we've got enough to go through it.

[Hal Jordan]

I knew not watching the second half would have the desired effect.

[Kawazaki]

Not sure what to make of this article on Eddie Jones. He appears to be more worried about what the repercussions are if Marcus Smith is a glittering success rather than selecting and developing a team around him that allows him to become one. As usual, it's just another bizarre tangent that will likely have the Jones fans cooing that he's some kind of 4D genius.

Eddie Jones has warned Marcus Smith about the “flood of distractions” that could come his way as the next potential superstar of English rugby, pointing to the commercial activity undertaken by Emma Raducanu as an example to be avoided.

Smith, 22, scored one try and brilliantly laid on another for Jamie Blamire in an eye-catching second-half cameo during England’s 69-3 victory over Tonga on Saturday. The performance cemented his status as a favourite of the Twickenham crowd in only his third international appearance.

Jones believes that, as the face of a rejuvenated England team, doors will open for Smith in the way that Raducanu suddenly received invitations to events such as a James Bond premiere and the Met Gala, the biggest night of the fashion year, as well as signing lucrative commercial deals with Tiffany & Co and Christian Dior, since winning the US Open in September.

“The big thing for young players is distractions,” Jones said. “Distractions can be the exposure they get in the media, the praise and criticism they get, groups of agents who see this guy as the next big thing.

“There’s a reason why the girl who won the US Open hasn’t done so well afterwards. What have you seen her on? The front page of Vogue, the front page of Harper’s Bazaar, whatever it is, wearing Christian Dior clothes. All those distractions are out there. It mightn’t be to that degree with Marcus, but it could be.”

Since winning the US Open, Raducanu was beaten in the first round of the Indian Wells Open tournament, then reached the quarter-finals of the Transylvania Open. She competes in the Upper Austria Linz event this week.

Jones must decide whether to promote Smith to the starting line-up against Australia on Saturday, although Owen Farrell, who had initially been named at fly half against Tonga, will be available again after the Covid test that ruled him out was discovered to be a false positive.

As a wider audience gains an appreciation of Smith’s playmaking gifts, Jones is keen that the fly half remains focused. “The guidance we can give him when he’s with us, the guidance he gets at Quins [his club Harlequins] and the guidance he can get from his parents, who fortunately are very good people, will be important to how he keeps his feet on the ground and keeps progressing as a rugby player,” Jones said.

“He is grounded, but they all start off grounded. No one starts with their feet off the ground or they don’t get in the team, or they don’t win a US Open. But there’s this flood of distractions that comes in that makes you ungrounded.”

Asked in Linz yesterday about how she has balanced her increased off-court commitments with her tennis in recent weeks, Raducanu, who turns 19 this week, said: “I’ve been quite busy since the US Open, but I felt like that was going to come with it.

“I made it very, very clear to every single person in my team that I was not going to cancel one training session or practice session for any off-court commitments. That was a non-negotiable for me. I wanted to make sure that was my priority, and it is. Everyone’s clear about that. It’s just managing my time with the commitments around that.”

[JM2K6]

Seems fairly obvious that it's Eddie doing his usual thing of being really bitter about quality young players actually performing and getting a lot of praise - he hates it when someone he hasn't already based his tactics on is being boosted in the media, no matter how good they are. One would suggest the biggest thing for young players is coaches who understand and develop them, and trust them. But no, it's DISTRACTIONS and THE MEDIA, says the guy who delights in kicking up a media storm and who does about 5 other jobs.

The comments about Raducanu are fucking idiotic, but that's par for the course for the poison dwarf.

[petej]

It was weird comment on Smith who has been around for a few years so is hardly comparable to raducanu's very quick rise. There is a struggle to fit Farrell in to the team somewhere.

[JM2K6]

On a vaguely related note, John Barclay had some more things to say about Cockerill and Jones here: https://archive.md/6StWd

As an Edinburgh player, I would pull into Murrayfield each morning, park up, and dread the day that lay ahead. I wasn’t alone. Cockerill, 50, has no gears — his default, and only, approach is to rant and rave every day. He is obsessive. He hopes the players have the mental capacity and resilience to return stronger.

That style had a place, but to me it is a relic. Players are more reflective now; there are enough metrics to quantify their own performance and plenty of coaching opportunities to realise the necessary change.

How you are treated off the pitch will inevitably be reflected in how you play on it. If the environment is so suffocating and autocratic that players don’t feel empowered to make decisions, you end up thinking: “What will he want me to do?” rather than, “What should we do?” Sometimes it’s the same thing, but often it’s not. If you have purposefully eroded people’s ability to make decisions, you can’t expect them to think on their feet in the heat of battle.

To me this is best demonstrated by England last year. There is no doubt that Jones, 61, is a great coach — he has made huge improvements with England — but there’s a reason why most teams are now going with a more collaborative approach: you need only look as far as Harlequins’ revival for proof.

I would dread coming to training under Johnson. It was the worst possible environment in terms of getting the best out of people; very similar to what Dylan Hartley describes in his book when discussing life under Jones.

[petej]

Pretty obvious long before his departure at tigers that cockerill's approach has a limited shelf life.

[Torquemada 1420]

Though this was interesting by BCM in the Torygraph
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union ... h-england/

Henry Slade’s man-of-the-match performance saw him in his best form for some time, but with this came a problem for Eddie Jones and also for fans of Marcus Smith.

We know that Manu Tuilagi is always going to play in a Jones team if fit, and so is Owen Farrell, because he is his captain. There are only three slots at 10, 12 and 13 and if Slade continues in this sort of form, it makes it more difficult for Jones to start Smith at outside-half. I fear that Smith from the bench is likely to be the norm after this game...

Question is whether BCM is right and Farrell is still Jones' automatic choice. For those of us who want to watch rugby, we hope not. For those of us who want to see Eng lose, we hope BCM is correct. I feel curiously torn.

[Paddington Bear]

I can imagine Cockerill's approach winning a one off game against SA. Can't see it being viable in the longer term.

[sockwithaticket]

Though this was interesting by BCM in the Torygraph
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/rugby-union ... h-england/

Henry Slade’s man-of-the-match performance saw him in his best form for some time, but with this came a problem for Eddie Jones and also for fans of Marcus Smith.

We know that Manu Tuilagi is always going to play in a Jones team if fit, and so is Owen Farrell, because he is his captain. There are only three slots at 10, 12 and 13 and if Slade continues in this sort of form, it makes it more difficult for Jones to start Smith at outside-half. I fear that Smith from the bench is likely to be the norm after this game...

Question is whether BCM is right and Farrell is still Jones' automatic choice. For those of us who want to watch rugby, we hope not. For those of us who want to see Eng lose, we hope BCM is correct. I feel curiously torn.

Still mystified as to how Slade got MotM for that game, He was the same as he usually is for England - inconsistent. Fuck, even Youngs would've been a better pick.

Seen nothing to suggest that Jones has less of a boner for Farrell now. They'd have taken the positive covid test on the chin and left him to isolate for a couple of weeks if he wasn;t desperately wanted in the side.

If I had my way the midfield for the next couple of games would be Smith Atkinson Tuilagi or Smith Tuilagi Marchant,

[Raggs]

Why Atkinson? Every move died with him in the Tonga game, and that was Tonga after 60 minutes. At 31, he's not getting faster, and he's just not worth investing 10 caps to see if he can even start to come good in my mind.