England have been excellent so far today…It may well be rudamentry rugby they are playing but it is working today…Their defence has been excellent, but as I type Beale is after scoring a lovely try…
This is a proper test match
Hard to see Ireland win a match in the Six Nations championship under the current coaching regime. 50-50 chance against Italy but will be beaten by the rest.
This is horrible, horrible stuff.
Feel sorry for the backs who are forcing things a bit but they’ve had no ball and no quick ball.
There seems to be a bigger crowd at it then the last day or have they just sat all the fans across from the camera?
They are genuine World Cup contenders and I fear for our lads in the group match against them next September. Not looking forward to it.
Only flicking in and out, any chance Samoa could win this
Every chance, Ireland are woeful.
[quote=“sid waddell, post: 528649”]
They are genuine World Cup contenders and [/quote]
If they actually had a decent creative centre they would be a serious outfit, getting better with every game at the moment
Would you not watch Ireland before the England game? Try for ROG here, probably the best player today for us.
The difference in mindset is the key difference. England always believe they are capable of beating anybody. They usually are too, even with a shit team, as the last World Cup proved.
Absoluetely dying with a hangover and the first 20 minutes of the ireland match were making it worse, flicked on the England one, it is a very good game, end to end stuff…
Ireland have to score again here and should. The fresh players have made a difference.
Good win for the Pumas in Italy today, or is that still going on?, purely a warm up exercise for the Irish in two weeks though when it should be an easy victory for us.
England giving the Aussies a taste of what’s to come in the Ashes.
Oh jesus christ. The All Blacks will make a mockery of this Ireland team.
A miserable performance.
Not sure many emerged with credit but some thoughts on individual players:
Fitzgerald - some nice steps and he’s obviously quick and dangerous but had to deal with one high kick all day and he didn’t get near it.
Bowe - mixed effort. No ball. Tried some things but nothing really came off.
O’Driscoll - same as Bowe.
Wallace - few forced passes near the gainline when the backs persisted with the called move despite the ball being shite. Defence didn’t look great.
Trimble - this is getting difficult. Nothing to do and did nothing.
O’Gara - shite really. Slow in kicking didn’t command the game and play territory.
Stringer - passing was good early on but needed to kick the arse of the pack in front of him.
Heaslip - too quiet. Ferris was far more lively.
O’Brien - a few good carries actually but didn’t clean out any rucks and stole nothing.
Leamy - too quiet.
Toner - perfect at lineouts. Poor on restarts. Did nothing in the loose as expected
O’Callaghan - found wanting again. No clearing out at rucks. Nothing in set pieces
Hayes - Court got penalised a couple of times but the scrum problem was clearly Hayes and it transformed when he went off. Mudered
Cronin - Probably not great in the scrum. Throwing was grand. A few decent carries.
Court - Harshly penalised a couple of times. Reasonable involvement in the loose with a few powerful carries.
That England Australia game was fucking excellent.
Whereas the Ireland match was depressing. I gave up on it after 20 mins.
Great finish to the Welsh match, Wales could have won it, they were 3 on 1 at one stage and kicked a grubber kick instead of passing outside. :blink:
Dire stuff once more. Changes were made too slow again but at least they made some difference when they were made. We scrummaged much better when Best came in and Court was moved. Toner had a very good debut and was our best player. ryan Constable and myself think it was a deliberate ploy to get him up early at restarts rocko and leave it for man in behind so think you are being harsh on him on that score. Would completely disagree with tre on ROG. Thought his decision making was very poor. He ran it when he shouldn’t have and didn’t get backline going. Did the odd good thing but Sexton and Wallace next week please.
Wait until the third best team in the world get a hold of them. It’s going to be carnage.