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Autumn Internationals - week 2 thread
Just to start - STEVE WALSH = WANKER. Should have stayed out of sight; never be allowed to ref internationals again
Saw Wales v SA and Scot v NZ, plus highlights of Eng v Aus
Wales v SA. Once again, Wales fail to realise that playing brilliantly for 40 minutes does not mean you can switch off for 15 minutes after half time. How many fucking times has this happened now in the last 5 years? V Ireland 2009, V NZ 2008 & 2009, V SA summer 2010, V France 2009. Its beyond a joke now. We were the better team, with more territory and possession for 65 minutes of the match, and still lost. Clinical stuff from SA though, ramped up the pace for a 15 minutes burst, then defended superbly. Game management and leadership in those last 10 minutes again went AWOL? How many players with over 50 caps on the field? None of them saying "take a drop goal, take 3 and then back at them". No, just one dimensional forwards on and drive. So easy to defend, so predictable. SA could have defended that until christmas. Positives for Wales: North looked good, although he needs to develop his game to actually try running around players, Powell did well, and its time for Rees to replace Phillips. Its also now time to get rid of Ryan Jones: the man is a carthorse. He literally offers nothing
Scot v NZ. Terribly one sided affair. NZ barely got out of 3rd gear, just awesome stuff. Sonny Bill Williams is wonderful, its like watching basketball. Genuinely lovely chap in the post match interview as well, very magnanimous. Scotland were appalling, offered less than zero. They will be crap during the 6 nations unless they get some key players back from injury.
From what I saw of England v Aus, England played very well. Beat the aussies at their own game, which is nice to see an england team do (especially a team featuring Tindall). Ashton's try, though great, was not the best ever seen at twickenham (as some people seem to be suggesting). That honour still belongs to this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuF-wYCyV7E
The english press need to chill a bit as well. England will need to become consistent again. I honestly don't think they can beat France or Wales in cardiff/Ireland in Dublin unless they can try and recreate this flair against SA