England in Australia

[SaintK]

Van portfleet has to be number 1, him and Randall, a great pairing.

Quirke and Mitchell are better than Randall, but you do seem to have a thing for him.

Yep, much better all round players

[FalseBayFC]

Lawes has been absolutely fucking immense.

Yes he's the player of the series for me. He has such a huge engine for his size. Comparable to PSDT.

[petej]

Van portfleet has to be number 1, him and Randall, a great pairing.

Quirke and Mitchell are better than Randall, but you do seem to have a thing for him.

I absolutely do, he has speed of service second to none

No shortage of English 9's

[Hal Jordan]

Indeed, and we have Youngs to come back!

[ASMO]

Indeed, and we have Youngs to come back!

Fuck off troll, thats close to a banning

[Kawazaki]

"It's all about the performance maaate"


5/10 Eddie.

[dkm57]

Nice win Englishers but no-where near as accomplished as Ireland.

[SaintK]

Nice win Englishers but no-where near as accomplished as Ireland.

Who said they were?

[dkm57]

Nice win Englishers but no-where near as accomplished as Ireland.

Who said they were?

Just an observation, for me tackling was the main difference. Thought the English pack were outstanding and I do like the van Poortvliet- Smith axis.

[Torquemada 1420]

Freddy Steward, absolutely man of the series, dont care he has no pace,everything else he is world class.

Nahhh. Lawes for me too. And a FB who, arguably, got caught in defence for 2 Aus tries is not MOTS.

[Lobby]

Freddy Steward, absolutely man of the series, dont care he has no pace,everything else he is world class.

Nahhh. Lawes for me too. And a FB who, arguably, got caught in defence for 2 Aus tries is not MOTS.

I'm surprised there is even an argument. Lawes has been immense in this series.

[SaintK]

Nice win Englishers but no-where near as accomplished as Ireland.

Who said they were?

Just an observation, for me tackling was the main difference. Thought the English pack were outstanding and I do like the van Poortvliet- Smith axis.

Fair play.
Far too many missed tackles

[JM2K6]

Nice win Englishers but no-where near as accomplished as Ireland.

Who said they were?

Just an observation, for me tackling was the main difference. Thought the English pack were outstanding and I do like the van Poortvliet- Smith axis.

Tbf I'm pretty sure most people posting on this thread think you're being kind to England with that comparison. We are not good at all.

[ASMO]

Who said they were?

Just an observation, for me tackling was the main difference. Thought the English pack were outstanding and I do like the van Poortvliet- Smith axis.

Tbf I'm pretty sure most people posting on this thread think you're being kind to England with that comparison. We are not good at all.

Beating Australia is not really considered much of an achievement these days, hell even Wales beat them regularly, losing to them however.......and JM2K6 is right, after all the confetti has settled, England are not that good.

[ASMO]

People bagging Smith should consider this. What Smith needs most is a 12 and 13 that offer a threat, England had none (Marchant maybe a bit until he was dropped/injured) and Porter was shockingly bad. Opposing teams know this, know that if they target and stop Smith, there is nothing outside him to worry about. How many breaks did the England centers make? Smith feels like he has to do all of the attacking himself. The problem is not him, its the dross outside him look how different he is at Quins with a good 12 and 13 to work with.

[Paddington Bear]

Signs of life. Australia are a decent side and winning a series down there is nothing to be sniffed at.
Where we’re looking right now is as a side no one will particularly want to play in a knock out match IMHO, principally off the strength of the pack.
If discipline improves and Smith clicks we’ll be in business, but right now we’re a way off France and Ireland. Think we’ll turn the ABs over in the autumn.

[Raggs]

People bagging Smith should consider this. What Smith needs most is a 12 and 13 that offer a threat, England had none (Marchant maybe a bit until he was dropped/injured) and Porter was shockingly bad. Opposing teams know this, know that if they target and stop Smith, there is nothing outside him to worry about. How many breaks did the England centers make? Smith feels like he has to do all of the attacking himself. The problem is not him, its the dross outside him look how different he is at Quins with a good 12 and 13 to work with.

Porter wasn't the one causing Smith to miss so many tackles. He also didn't force Smith to put in a lot of poor kicks last week. It's OK that Smith has had a couple of rough games, he's adapting. A lot of his passing has been good this series, he seems to be learning to not spend too long on the ball himself unless a gap is very obvious, since at this level it's not going to just open up for him like it can in the prem. He needs to adapt to the players around him, and he seems to be doing that.

[Kawazaki]

People bagging Smith should consider this. What Smith needs most is a 12 and 13 that offer a threat, England had none (Marchant maybe a bit until he was dropped/injured) and Porter was shockingly bad. Opposing teams know this, know that if they target and stop Smith, there is nothing outside him to worry about. How many breaks did the England centers make? Smith feels like he has to do all of the attacking himself. The problem is not him, its the dross outside him look how different he is at Quins with a good 12 and 13 to work with.

Just look at the try Ireland scored through the midfield against NZ. It didn't require a line bust using heft and muscle. It was a product of pressure and very good coaching.

Those exact same Irish players are not, man-for-man, better players than the English players, however, if you took those Irish players and placed them into the England coaching environment, they'd never score that try. I doubt they'd even make it stick in unopposed training.

[sockwithaticket]

Signs of life. Australia are a decent side and winning a series down there is nothing to be sniffed at.
Where we’re looking right now is as a side no one will particularly want to play in a knock out match IMHO, principally off the strength of the pack.
If discipline improves and Smith clicks we’ll be in business, but right now we’re a way off France and Ireland. Think we’ll turn the ABs over in the autumn.

Yet to be convinced that's true. They're not utter dogshit under Rennie as they became under Cheika, but I haven't seen much evidence that they're any good.

[tc27]

[SaintK]

People bagging Smith should consider this. What Smith needs most is a 12 and 13 that offer a threat, England had none (Marchant maybe a bit until he was dropped/injured) and Porter was shockingly bad. Opposing teams know this, know that if they target and stop Smith, there is nothing outside him to worry about. How many breaks did the England centers make? Smith feels like he has to do all of the attacking himself. The problem is not him, its the dross outside him look how different he is at Quins with a good 12 and 13 to work with.

Porter wasn't the one causing Smith to miss so many tackles. He also didn't force Smith to put in a lot of poor kicks last week. It's OK that Smith has had a couple of rough games, he's adapting. A lot of his passing has been good this series, he seems to be learning to not spend too long on the ball himself unless a gap is very obvious, since at this level it's not going to just open up for him like it can in the prem. He needs to adapt to the players around him, and he seems to be doing that.

Poerter was very poor
There was a 5 minute period when he missed 2 head on tackles and fell off a third!
One of the youngsters who probably shouldn't have toured and who will need to massively up his game to win more caps.

[Paddington Bear]

Signs of life. Australia are a decent side and winning a series down there is nothing to be sniffed at.
Where we’re looking right now is as a side no one will particularly want to play in a knock out match IMHO, principally off the strength of the pack.
If discipline improves and Smith clicks we’ll be in business, but right now we’re a way off France and Ireland. Think we’ll turn the ABs over in the autumn.

Yet to be convinced that's true. They're not utter dogshit under Rennie as they became under Cheika, but I haven't seen much evidence that they're any good.

I thought they were impressively physical, decent up front and offered plenty in attack.
Not saying they are world beaters but those were three proper test matches.

[sockwithaticket]

Signs of life. Australia are a decent side and winning a series down there is nothing to be sniffed at.
Where we’re looking right now is as a side no one will particularly want to play in a knock out match IMHO, principally off the strength of the pack.
If discipline improves and Smith clicks we’ll be in business, but right now we’re a way off France and Ireland. Think we’ll turn the ABs over in the autumn.

Yet to be convinced that's true. They're not utter dogshit under Rennie as they became under Cheika, but I haven't seen much evidence that they're any good.

I thought they were impressively physical, decent up front and offered plenty in attack.
Not saying they are world beaters but those were three proper test matches.

The games were definitely close and competitive, we're not too far apart from each other in terms of quality. I just think that indicates we're fairly middling in tier 1 terms. At the moment it's looking incredibly fortuitous that our likely world cup quarter final opponents will either be Wales or Australia. The other side of the draw would see us knocked out at that stage.

[Paddington Bear]

Yet to be convinced that's true. They're not utter dogshit under Rennie as they became under Cheika, but I haven't seen much evidence that they're any good.

I thought they were impressively physical, decent up front and offered plenty in attack.
Not saying they are world beaters but those were three proper test matches.

The games were definitely close and competitive, we're not too far apart from each other in terms of quality. I just think that indicates we're fairly middling in tier 1 terms. At the moment it's looking incredibly fortuitous that our likely world cup quarter final opponents will either be Wales or Australia. The other side of the draw would see us knocked out at that stage.

Certainly agree with that

[JM2K6]

People bagging Smith should consider this. What Smith needs most is a 12 and 13 that offer a threat, England had none (Marchant maybe a bit until he was dropped/injured) and Porter was shockingly bad. Opposing teams know this, know that if they target and stop Smith, there is nothing outside him to worry about. How many breaks did the England centers make? Smith feels like he has to do all of the attacking himself. The problem is not him, its the dross outside him look how different he is at Quins with a good 12 and 13 to work with.

Porter wasn't the one causing Smith to miss so many tackles. He also didn't force Smith to put in a lot of poor kicks last week. It's OK that Smith has had a couple of rough games, he's adapting. A lot of his passing has been good this series, he seems to be learning to not spend too long on the ball himself unless a gap is very obvious, since at this level it's not going to just open up for him like it can in the prem. He needs to adapt to the players around him, and he seems to be doing that.

Smith was missing tackles because big fast blokes were running into him and he had no support. I remember the days when a 7 would be expected to help out.

He is the smallest/lightest tier 1 fly half so this will continue to happen.

[JM2K6]

People bagging Smith should consider this. What Smith needs most is a 12 and 13 that offer a threat, England had none (Marchant maybe a bit until he was dropped/injured) and Porter was shockingly bad. Opposing teams know this, know that if they target and stop Smith, there is nothing outside him to worry about. How many breaks did the England centers make? Smith feels like he has to do all of the attacking himself. The problem is not him, its the dross outside him look how different he is at Quins with a good 12 and 13 to work with.

Porter wasn't the one causing Smith to miss so many tackles. He also didn't force Smith to put in a lot of poor kicks last week. It's OK that Smith has had a couple of rough games, he's adapting. A lot of his passing has been good this series, he seems to be learning to not spend too long on the ball himself unless a gap is very obvious, since at this level it's not going to just open up for him like it can in the prem. He needs to adapt to the players around him, and he seems to be doing that.

Poerter was very poor
There was a 5 minute period when he missed 2 head on tackles and fell off a third!
One of the youngsters who probably shouldn't have toured and who will need to massively up his game to win more caps.

He's 25, same as Marchant and four years older than Freeman I wouldn't say he's a youngster. It was a typical Eddie arse-pull of a selection.

[Slick]

Signs of life. Australia are a decent side and winning a series down there is nothing to be sniffed at.
Where we’re looking right now is as a side no one will particularly want to play in a knock out match IMHO, principally off the strength of the pack.
If discipline improves and Smith clicks we’ll be in business, but right now we’re a way off France and Ireland. Think we’ll turn the ABs over in the autumn.

Yet to be convinced that's true. They're not utter dogshit under Rennie as they became under Cheika, but I haven't seen much evidence that they're any good.

I thought they were impressively physical, decent up front and offered plenty in attack.
Not saying they are world beaters but those were three proper test matches.

Not sure they really offered much in attack. They maybe have the possibility of developing that but their backs looked like they had never met before

[Niegs]

What was going on with Steward and Wright after the latter's try? Should be having a think about how he botched that rather than getting aggressive...

[petej]

Porter wasn't the one causing Smith to miss so many tackles. He also didn't force Smith to put in a lot of poor kicks last week. It's OK that Smith has had a couple of rough games, he's adapting. A lot of his passing has been good this series, he seems to be learning to not spend too long on the ball himself unless a gap is very obvious, since at this level it's not going to just open up for him like it can in the prem. He needs to adapt to the players around him, and he seems to be doing that.

Poerter was very poor
There was a 5 minute period when he missed 2 head on tackles and fell off a third!
One of the youngsters who probably shouldn't have toured and who will need to massively up his game to win more caps.

He's 25, same as Marchant and four years older than Freeman I wouldn't say he's a youngster. It was a typical Eddie arse-pull of a selection.

Ive assumed the conversation in Eddie's head went like this "Ah shit the centre I wanted is injured, bit late now I'll just pick the utility back who replaces him in the prem final"

[Kawazaki]

Eddie Jones is a terrible selector. Period.

[petej]

What was going on with Steward and Wright after the latter's try? Should be having a think about how he botched that rather than getting aggressive...

Concerned nowell isn't getting to make the tackle? I assume it is Porter who misses the critical tackle in midfield.

[Hal Jordan]

Porter is 25? Shit, I thought he was about 21!

He was not good, if Marchant was fit there is no excuse why he wasn't starting.

[pjm1]

Christ the awards are bit painful, giving player of the series to a player who's potentially earned it, but lost the series (and this game) doesn't really put a shine on it.

Agreed. Should have gone to Launchbury.

[SaintK]

The Plank in tears!!!
https://fb.watch/eld6x_ekkS/

[JM2K6]

What was going on with Steward and Wright after the latter's try? Should be having a think about how he botched that rather than getting aggressive...

Concerned nowell isn't getting to make the tackle? I assume it is Porter who misses the critical tackle in midfield.

England need to go to the Mike Brown school of fucking levelling your man if you've been drawn and they've passed. At least twice it cost us at the weekend - players still able to take a return pass.

[Raggs]

What was going on with Steward and Wright after the latter's try? Should be having a think about how he botched that rather than getting aggressive...

Concerned nowell isn't getting to make the tackle? I assume it is Porter who misses the critical tackle in midfield.

England need to go to the Mike Brown school of fucking levelling your man if you've been drawn and they've passed. At least twice it cost us at the weekend - players still able to take a return pass.

Yep, frustrated me a lot too. If play has gone past you, you're never going to be more useful than the opposition in front of you, take him out and it's a far better trade for the defence.