It'll be interesting to see how the All Blacks deal with this compared to the recidivist Jesse Ryder. I reckon it'll be a long time before Cruden is properly trusted again. Really poor show.
They gave chance after chance to Zac Guildford despite him running down the street naked on holiday and trying to badger a woman into having sex with him. If the NZRFU let that go with a slap on the wrist then don't expect much to come out of this.
Daft mistake by Cruden and he coudl really live to regret it if Barrett plays well against SA. It does send a message to the rest of the squad about staying in line and maintaining standards. Lacks the class of dwarf tossing or jumping off ferries!!
New line for the sim though: 'And that conversion attempt has gone the way of Aaron Cruden's travel itinerary'.
Or post the Bath game Oh and that flowing back move has embarrassed them more than Leicesters attempts to tackle the Bath backs
One of the most evil benches in history today: Bismark du Plessis, Schalk Burger and Bakkies Botha. Surprised the UN hasn't intervened, tbh.
Fuck me, Phipps's passing is all kinds of shite today. Used to be a prerequisite for a scrum-half, the ability to pass. Couple of good carries from Slipper so far though.
Jesus, what happened there? Wobblies 10-8 up with 12 mins left and lose 28-10. Lambie made the difference for my quid.
Bit disappointed that most of the points came with pollard off the field. Hougard looked like a different man on the highlights and actually passed the ball rather than aimless kicks.
Yeah bad news for Crotty though who will probably look overseas shortly What I reckon the 14 man AB backline for the world cup will be Halfback: Smith, Perenara, +1 Flyhalf: Carter, Barrett, Cruden Midfield: Nonu, Smith, SBW, Fekitoa Outside Backs: Dagg, Smith, Savea, Jane Don't really like Cruden at all; reckon as a general he is pretty ordinary (too many inside balls into traffic when the sling wide was the better option and also running at non existent space getting crunched) so hopefully DC hits the ground running and gets up to speed asap because outside of his kicking game Cruden could be a liability for mine if he starts in a crunch game.
Yeah it seems like they still have Cruden infront of Barrett (unless Barrett can play amazing v SA and then Cruden is shit on the end of year tour) so would really like to see DC start and play 50-60 minutes and then Barrett come on.
It was a shame Barrett's performance wasn't faultless on the weekend... would of helped his claim... he kicked well though - good to see him get the monkey off the back early on that count! He might get some mileage if AC get's into trouble again. I'm a fan of Charles Piutau but I think Dagg has done enough recently to be back in favour ever since the Napier test. And some slick stuff yesterday too.
Hougaard's decision making when using the ball was good, although I still think he cleared the ball out of the rucks too slowly. Although Lambie kicked bad, I think his distribution was spot on and he looked good when running with the ball. Schalk Burger made a MASSIVE difference when coming on since he was actually present at ruck time securing our ball. Mohoje wasn't bad, but didn't too enough to retain the starting spot imo. Bismarck was strong of the bench too.
Fuck knows why he was there. There are so many good, young locks in our system atm that I just can't find any good reason to still include him, or Victor Matfield, in the team. When is this cunt Heyneke Mayer planning to start building for next years WC, surely he is out of his mind if he thinks that Victor or Bakkies would still be good choices for the team by then. Etzebeth is an obvious, then there is De Jager who was left out now for Bakkies, then Pieter Steph Du Toit (unfortunately injured), Stephan Lewies, Etienne Oosthuizen, Anton Bresler, Flip vd merwe (although I personally think he shouldn't come near a Springbok side), Steven Sykes, etc etc etc. So fuck knows what he is thinking tbh. The same with Jean De Villiers vs Francois Steyn, although there is politics involved there. I still reckon it can be easily sorted though and Francois is a much better option going forward. Also Morne Steyn vs Lambie / Pollard / Goosen / Boshoff and Fourie Du Preez vs Reinach / Hougaard etc etc. Edit: Bakkies is 36/7 I think!?