Springbokke vs Ireland series

[fishfoodie]

Oh for the love of Dog; why are we still starting Murray in 2024 !!!!!!

FFS, while he's had a bit of an improvement in form over the last few months, he was yesterdays man years ago !!!!

[OomStruisbaai]

He will enjoy playing against our weakest link Faf. He spend so much time organising try to milk penalties forgetting his primary job of quick service. Partly to blame for Pollards form.

[Uncle fester]

Oh for the love of Dog; why are we still starting Murray in 2024 !!!!!!

FFS, while he's had a bit of an improvement in form over the last few months, he was yesterdays man years ago !!!!

You might have noticed but the two lads better than him are now injured?

[Sards]

He will enjoy playing against our weakest link Faf. He spend so much time organising try to milk penalties forgetting his primary job of quick service. Partly to blame for Pollards form.

Damn right. Get Jantjies in there immediately.

[LoveOfTheGame]

He will enjoy playing against our weakest link Faf. He spend so much time organising try to milk penalties forgetting his primary job of quick service. Partly to blame for Pollards form.

Don't know if you are trolling oom, but how can you blame Faf for Pollard's poor form last week? The attack was not the issue, his kicking off the tee was.

[Blake]

He will enjoy playing against our weakest link Faf. He spend so much time organising try to milk penalties forgetting his primary job of quick service. Partly to blame for Pollards form.

While Faf is undoubtedly a menace in defence, I'm really looking forward to the Grant Williams / Morne vd Berg era of Springbok scrumhalves.

[_Os_]

15. Jamie Osborne (Naas/Leinster)(1)
14. Calvin Nash (Young Munster/Munster)(7)
13. Garry Ringrose (UCD/Leinster)(59)
12. Robbie Henshaw (Buccaneers/Leinster)(73)
11. James Lowe (Leinster)(32)
10. Jack Crowley (Cork Constitution/Munster)(15)
9. Conor Murray (Garryowen/Munster) (117)

21. Caolin Blade (Galwegians/Connacht)(2)
22. Ciaran Frawley (UCD/Leinster)(5)
23. Stuart McCloskey (Bangor/Ulster)(17).

I'm going to say it. Looks less threatening. Some genuine proven class in there, but all the top test teams can always manage that in at least a few backline positions (other than England). Combinations at halfback and centre, but the back three and combinations using the bench players are green. Without Gibson-Park/Casey/Sexton/Aki/Earls/Hansen/Keenan, it's still solid on defence and Irish backlines always have some kicking, but doesn't look as special on attack. Only three players short of what they started against France and England in the 6N (Gibson-Park/Aki/Keenan), but Lowe is carrying a lot on attack, his errors in the 1st test came from trying to do too much.

More worried about fast unstructured counter attacks from turnovers than multi phase Leinster stuff.

[assfly]

I just hope we can stop them from jackaling our ball as much as they did last week. Which may be hard given our expansive game plan.

[Blake]

More worried about fast unstructured counter attacks from turnovers than multi phase Leinster stuff.

That is my worry as well.

Ireland obviously didn't prepare for the Boks to play it as wide as we did in the 1st test. They stacked the midfield to contain our traditional midfield runners which left a lot of space out wide. They adjusted a bit in the second half, but again, were not drilled enough during the week to shut it down completely.

If they hit us with some well organised linespeed in the second test, our intricate passes out the back might backfire. When our players get nailed behind the gainline with an aggressive rush and turned over we'll be no different to the other teams that the Boks do that to. Yes, if the players are sharp, we can adjust and revert back to bombs and midfield carries to counter the rush (and I hope we get used to adjusting between the 2 tactics on the fly) but they don't adjust, and Ireland start to get some good defensive reads, I wouldn't put it past them to pick off some easy tries from turnovers.

The disallowed Lowe try was a great example of how quickly a lost ruck can turn into a score against you.

[Blake]

I just hope we can stop them from jackaling our ball as much as they did last week. Which may be hard given our expansive game plan.

That seems to be the trade-off, doesn't it? If you play it wide, you lack bodies to protect the ball carriers if they get cut down mid-field. So the cleanout from the first supporting player has to be super accurate...which it wasn't at times. We are so used to blasting the jacklers off the ball with 2 or 3 supporting players, that it was only really the former Sevens players (Arendse, Kolbe, Kwagga) that did it really well one-on-one. The locks and props and Bongi struggled a bit with it, going in too hard are driving too far past the ball. But it's as tough as it gets against Ireland because they have such an amazing and clinical ground game, and they'll get better at it I'm sure.

In the first test Ireland seemed to over-commit to the breakdown though (expecting the Boks to blast in like they did in the past), which left us with tons of space out wide. Maybe for the second test they'll sacrifice some of the pressure on the Bok ruck and get more of their forwards out wide to plug some gaps in defence.

It's a nice little chess-match between Rassie and Farrel at the moment, with Rassie giving Farrel double the workload to prepare for. The more comfortable the Bok players can get switching between the 2 styles mid-game, the tougher they are going to get to prepare for and to beat. It's great signs for the future if we can add another weapon to our arsenal.

[Insane_Homer]

I just hope we can stop them from jackaling our ball as much as they did last week. Which may be hard given our expansive game plan.

That's explained quite well here (as Blake states above), it's a trade-off at the breakdown in the new style of attacking play.

[assfly]

Cheers IH, I've been waiting on that video.

[bok_viking]

I just hope we can stop them from jackaling our ball as much as they did last week. Which may be hard given our expansive game plan.

That's explained quite well here (as Blake states above), it's a trade-off at the breakdown in the new style of attacking play.

Yeah I think it will take a few games for our forwards especially to get used to the new structure of play in my opinion, but I believe that by next season they will be more effective at the breakdown again to retain the ball. But yes as it stands now it allowed the Irish backrow a lot of freedom to poach balls at rucks and as a result led to a lot of red zone attacks breaking down that could have led to tries with a bit more accuracy at the breakdown. It took the boks about 10 games or so to get used to the new defensive structure pre 2019 so I will not be surprised if it takes a similar time to get used to Brown's new attacking structures. But it looked really promising last weekend apart from the turnovers in the end zone. I am sure that will be mostly sorted in the next year or so.

[Uncle fester]

15. Jamie Osborne (Naas/Leinster)(1)
14. Calvin Nash (Young Munster/Munster)(7)
13. Garry Ringrose (UCD/Leinster)(59)
12. Robbie Henshaw (Buccaneers/Leinster)(73)
11. James Lowe (Leinster)(32)
10. Jack Crowley (Cork Constitution/Munster)(15)
9. Conor Murray (Garryowen/Munster) (117)

21. Caolin Blade (Galwegians/Connacht)(2)
22. Ciaran Frawley (UCD/Leinster)(5)
23. Stuart McCloskey (Bangor/Ulster)(17).

I'm going to say it. Looks less threatening. Some genuine proven class in there, but all the top test teams can always manage that in at least a few backline positions (other than England). Combinations at halfback and centre, but the back three and combinations using the bench players are green. Without Gibson-Park/Casey/Sexton/Aki/Earls/Hansen/Keenan, it's still solid on defence and Irish backlines always have some kicking, but doesn't look as special on attack. Only three players short of what they started against France and England in the 6N (Gibson-Park/Aki/Keenan), but Lowe is carrying a lot on attack, his errors in the 1st test came from trying to do too much.

More worried about fast unstructured counter attacks from turnovers than multi phase Leinster stuff.

Hansen and Keenan are big losses and we don't have the strength in depth to cover players like that. Means the attacking game loses a lot of pep as you point out above. Team is pretty resilient though so I'm hopeful they will keep it close.

Can't see us winning it unless we manage to pull ye into an arm wrestle.

[OomStruisbaai]

Ireland the big favorites

[Sandstorm]

He will enjoy playing against our weakest link Faf. He spend so much time organising try to milk penalties forgetting his primary job of quick service. Partly to blame for Pollards form.

While Faf is undoubtedly a menace in defence, I'm really looking forward to the Grant Williams / Morne vd Berg era of Springbok scrumhalves.

The non-tackling Bok scrumhalf era? No thanks.

[Blake]

The non-tackling Bok scrumhalf era? No thanks.

Maybe I missed it then, but neither Williams nor Van Den Berg seemed shy of defence in the matches I’ve seen them
in…

[OomStruisbaai]

He will enjoy playing against our weakest link Faf. He spend so much time organising try to milk penalties forgetting his primary job of quick service. Partly to blame for Pollards form.

Don't know if you are trolling oom, but how can you blame Faf for Pollard's poor form last week? The attack was not the issue, his kicking off the tee was.

No trolling Boet. We try to play the wide game. Every second your 9 waisted is 2 steps of space less in the wide channel. Quick service is needed except when you do the stupid box kick. If you play phase , quick service, you going nowhere against rush defense.

[Yeeb]

Having to watch S.A. again this week
Last weeks game was pretty boring , kids lasted about ten minutes before they went off to play with their friends , Mrs Y wasn’t paying attention either despite wearing a bok jersey. I just sat and got drunk and watched the worlds best team get beaten by a bok team not even needing to get out of second gear.
France arg was much more entertaining , still wasn’t great though.

In laws going to Durban game today, hopefully it will be better to watch , suspect another bok win at a canter

[Yeeb]

26’c in Durban today says my weather app, hope those irishers don’t sunburn too bad

[_Os_]

For anyone that wants to watch Nam v Porras.

[GrahamWa]

For anyone that wants to watch Nam v Porras.

Cheers, enjoyed that.

[petej]

Ireland the big favorites

Back to back world cup winners at home are definitely favourites.

[_Os_]

Portugal won 37 -22.

Portugal only really dominated the scrum. Namibia dominated the lineout and maul, Portugal seem scared to kick it out by the end. Rest was quite even, game turned quite a bit for Portugal when Nam put their bench on, but Portugal were more accurate in the backline looked faster with a bit more sevens skills. Nam were in control at times especially when they built tempo and momentum with their carrying and recycling, Portugal were playing with their back three up when their defence was set which created a lot of space in behind down the middle Nam kicked into a few times, Portugal defence was also weak outwide especially from turnover which Nam exploited a lot.

Boks should put a large score on Portugal.

[Blackmac]

Can never understand why an Irishman wants to dress as a leprechaun to support Ireland, much the same way that I can't understand my fellow Scots who wear "see you Jimmy" hats.

[Sandstorm]

With these stoppages we’ll still be here at 8pm!

[Sandstorm]

Great try Ireland

[Sards]

What happened to Willie. Lost signal for awhile

[Sandstorm]

What happened to Willie. Lost signal for awhile

Failed his HIA

[Sandstorm]

Mostert gooorrrnnn too

[Uncle fester]

What happened to Willie. Lost signal for awhile

Failed his HIA

Did he also have a failed HIA in the bulls v Leinster game?

[Sandstorm]

Paddies moving the ball like they do on their best days. Boks need to stop kicking the ball back to them, starve them of possession

Of course Faf and Pollard won’t do that……

[Sandstorm]

Be nice to see a Bok wearing a number lower than 9 actually rucking!!!

[Insane_Homer]

Lol, both arriving Irish players into the tackle from the wrong side. Completely ignored

[Insane_Homer]

That was harsh, looked like a good rip

[Insane_Homer]

Boks need to wake up in the second half. Very poor half of rugby, far too many unforced errors

[Sards]

Hmmmmm. Sascha a bit nervy. Struggling on the high ball

[Sards]

Don't know how we can turn this around. Ireland will have a stronger bomb squad with all our injuries

[Chilli2]

We are going to lose this test.

[OomStruisbaai]

Ireland played well. Dominant display so far.