Terrible game from us. We needed to calm down. Woodcock and Franks made the scrum 10 times better when they came on. Naholo was a mixed bad and seemed to limp around a bit - not sure if related or just a stinger but NMS is the better fit IMO. A game like that would have benefited from having Nonu, calms play down by straightening so often and gives the game a bit more structure. Something that lacked tonight. That being said no team has looked that good tbh so I think it'll be a different story come play offs.
Yeah that was another frustrating game to be at, like the Namibia one. They slowed everything right down. Every scrum and lineout seemed to take forever. And the ABs were very scratchy with too many errors. Good atmosphere and impressive stadium though. Massive crowd of over 70000 for a NZ v Georgia game in Wales is quite unbelievable really. I do think the ABs are holding themselves back a lot. Keeping their powder dry and minimizing injury risk. Just have to get through the Tonga game unscathed now.
Not sure there the team they were. But that said you can guarantee they won't just roll over. They'll play with passion. We just need to draw on all previous bad encounters and score early and often.
France are as scary as ever IMO. Thought they have looked good so far and seems to be up for this WC. Will be interesting to see how they go against Ireland, I don't think they will be too concerned about winning tbh because the bastards probably want to meet the All Blacks in Cardiff.
Teams generally go with the attitude that to win the WC you have to beat the All Blacks at some point. France have done it a couple times now and they have done it at Cardiff so I couldn't think of a better place for them to face us and just keep reminding Richie/Dan of 07 if it's a close game.
I wasn't saying you have to beat the All Blacks to win, just something teams would want to do IMO. Rugby, and sport, is all about challenging yourself against the best.
I don't think any team would really give a toss if they didn't play the All Blacks while winning a World Cup tbh. I think they would all be hoping someone else knocks us out.
Agree with this. Plus the prospect of either France or Ireland in the quarters should be pretty worrying for the AB's since they haven't been tested yet.
Talk about knee-jerk reactions to not scoring 150 points against teams like Georgia and Namibia lol. I don't know why you would say France have looked the best. They have struggled to run up big scores against 2nd tier teams of similar standard. Australia are the form team.
I think most would want to avoid NZ, Australia and RSA. One of those is winning barring some major injuries.
Its because france is the abs bogey team and always play shite during pool play and then step it up against the all blacks Its a case of not wanting history to repeat itself