Why all this talk about the scrum when it's the least of our problems?

forlorndonkey

I don't know why you're all so concerned about the scrum, it's irrelevant. With crooked feeds no one is ever turned over in the scrum and our scrum being crap anyway we can just elect to take line outs.

That's what we've done up to now, and it's what we owe all our success to in the last few years. Virtually all of Tommy Bows (and the Ireland teams) tries came off the back of lineout set pieces. The problem is that with Flannery injured and Kidney refusing to pick Cullen for some reason, our line out is completely banjaxed. If we play Toner we win our own line outs but we're a man down in the loose and unlike with POC or Cullen we don't steal any of our opponents line outs.

There's no replacement for Flannery as Cronin is just not good enough for this level but I think between him and Best he should get the nod as his throwing has been less bad. He is fat and has bad handling skills, both of which could be fixed with a bit of work over a few months but he still wouldn't be the equal of Flannery. For now we'll have to make due with him.

On top of all that the BOD/Darcy combination is after going stale. BOD had lots of the ball against Samoa and has blatantly lost too much pace to be a 13 anymore, he needs to be moved to 12 whether he likes it or not. Darcy has been a great player but hasn't distnguished himself for years and doesn't deserve to play for Ireland on current form, obviously if he picks it back up again fair enough but for now he needs to be dropped.

Nothing against Fitzgerald either but he hasn't got up to speed yet after his injury and shouldn't be playing till he's back at his best in a month or two. He over ran the ball twice against South Africa.

Bowe needs to be in at 13, he played brilliantly there for the lions and basically plays the wing as a centre anyway. He doesn't have the pace to exploit any overlaps and has scored virtually all of his tries off lineouts or from kick aheads. Nothing wrong with that at all but he'd score all those tries as a 13 and we need someone with the requisite pace on the wing in his place, lke Fitzgerald or Trimble.

Trimble/Earls should be tried in BOD's place in my opinion. BOD looks to be fading fast so he should be switched with Earls/Trimble intermittently just in case he's completely gone/injured in the World Cup and we're left with a midfield pairing who have never played together before.

Geordan Murphy should obviously be playing full back. Like Darcy, Kearney hasn't distinguished himself in that position in over a year and simply doesn't deserve his place.

That's my immediate take on the situation.

Podge_irl

There is more to a scrum then simply scragging possession. It's about getting useable ball - Ireland simply can't attack off scrum ball at the moment. On top of that Ireland gave away at least 3 penalties in the scrum against Samoa, I dread to think what kind of possession they'll give away against NZ. Having poor scrummagers also causes the pack to expend a lot of energy in just getting the ball at scrum time, which affects their performance elsewhere.

Also, ultimately, watching your scrum being marched back ten metres at will is bloody emasculating and kills morale in a team.

Saying we only lose one or two scrums against the head in a match is akin to saying we secure all but one or two lineouts if they were all throw to 2 and were ragged. It's useless ball.

Podge_irl

Mind you, there is a massive problem in the backline as well, but that is clearly more systematic and I suspect Gaffney is largely at fault. Games are still won in the forwards though, and especially with a team as reliant on first phase ball as Ireland are. We have scrums and line-outs to work off, neither are working right now and the former is a bloody embarrassment.

forlorndonkey

Podge_irl wrote: »

There is more to a scrum then simply scragging possession. It's about getting useable ball - Ireland simply can't attack off scrum ball at the moment. On top of that Ireland gave away at least 3 penalties in the scrum against Samoa, I dread to think what kind of possession they'll give away against NZ. Having poor scrummagers also causes the pack to expend a lot of energy in just getting the ball at scrum time, which affects their performance elsewhere.

Also, ultimately, watching your scrum being marched back ten metres at will is bloody emasculating and kills morale in a team.

Saying we only lose one or two scrums against the head in a match is akin to saying we secure all but one or two lineouts if they were all throw to 2 and were ragged. It's useless ball.

But we don't have to elect to scrummage at all. Ever. The very odd time circumstances force us to take one, well, we'll retain possession and go into a ruck and restart play on our terms from there. Who cares?

At the end of the day the reason Ireland have turned crap has nothing to do with crap scrummaging. We won the Grand Slam and went on our greatest unbeaten streak in history with a crap scrum. It's our lineout that's crucial. Along with injuries, ****e players getting their game and important players not being selected.

I think we all need to collectively take our heads out of our backsides and confront the fact that even if we had the best scrum in the World (as Italy arguably does) it wouldn't help us in the slightest with any of the real problems that have befallen this team.

irishbucsfan

forlorndonkey wrote: »

But we don't have to elect to scrums at all. Ever. The very odd time circumstances force us to take one, well, we'll retain possession and go into a ruck and restart play on our terms from there. Who cares?

At the end of the day the reason Ireland have turned ****e has nothing to do with ****e scrummaging. We won the Grand Slam and went on our greatest unbeaten streak in history with a ****e scrum. It's our lineout that's crucial. Along with injuries, ****e players getting their game and important players not being selected.

Talking a bit of rubbish there. We can't avoid scrummaging.

If you'd made this thread after the SA game it would've been almost a good point (we didn't concede penalties at scrum time, and only two free kicks for early engagement... I think). But against Samoa we were conceding far too many penalties, which leads to conceding either points or field position. That's why we care about the scrum.

forlorndonkey

irishbucsfan wrote: »

Talking a bit of rubbish there. We can't avoid scrummaging.

If you'd made this thread after the SA game it would've been almost a good point (we didn't concede penalties at scrum time, and only two free kicks for early engagement... I think). But against Samoa we were conceding far too many penalties, which leads to conceding either points or field position. That's why we care about the scrum.

Of course we can ( I meant our scrums not our opponents by the way). We can just elect not to scrummage when we're given penalties and so what if we're not turning our opponents over on their scrums? That almost never happens anyway and has never been an important feature of our game, we're well used to it and can defend well in that situation. The solution is not to give penalites away in our 22.

It was the lineout that all our success has been based on and when that is fixed, important players return from injury and the backline is shuffled all will be well again.

It's undoubtedly a red herring when our scrum has been this crap for this long to be acting like the lack of a scrum is this teams problem.

irishbucsfan

forlorndonkey wrote: »

Of course we can. We can just elect not to scrummage when we're given penalties and so what if we're not turning our opponents over on their scrums? That almost never happens anyway and has never been an important feature of our game, we're well used to it and can defend well in that situation. The solution is not to give penalites away in our 22.

:pac:

What about any knock-ons, accidental offsides, crooked throws etc. that take place in the game? What about if we force the opposition back over their dead ball line?

What about when every other team in the world realise that scrummaging is our weakness? We'll spend entire games playing out of our own half due to the penalties we concede at scrum time, and that will lead to more scrummaging, which will lead to more penalties, which will lead to points for the opposition. Which will inevitably lead to losing games.

Everyone has to be able to at least challenge in the scrums.

If we scrummage against any top-10 team like we did against Samoa we'll be embarrassed.

What happens when someone knocks it on? When there's a forward pass? When the ball isn't coming out of a ruck / maul?

Do you know the rules of rugby? Cause you're way off here

forlorndonkey

Deleted User wrote: »

What happens when someone knocks it on? When there's a forward pass? When the ball isn't coming out of a ruck / maul?

Do you know the rules of rugby? Cause you're way off here

What happens is the same thing that happened 12 months ago when we were still in our most successful streak in history and had a scrum that was just as crap. We'll retain possession on our own scrum and we won't be running fancy moves off it but that doesn't matter because that isn't why we we're good anyway. Ireland's success has been all based off the lineout. That's where we're World Class. Fretting about the scrum which has always been crap when the crucial engine that wins us all our games has broken down is ridiculous.

This is an Ireland team with lots of massive problems, the scrum is not the one we should be focusing on. It's just a red herring.

Danger_dave1

forlorndonkey wrote: »

Of course we can ( I meant our scrums not our opponents by the way). We can just elect not to scrummage when we're given penalties

What happens when we knock it on and give away a penatly at the scrum on their feed.

What happens when they knock it on and we give away a penalty on our own scrum

what happens when we lose ball in a maul , give away a penalty on a resulting scrum?

If you dont have a scrum , you give up field possession , you give points to opposing kicker, you will eventually have a player sin binned for continuous infringements.

With a scrum going backwards on opponents scrum your backline is continually backing up giving the attackers even more space, vice versa for your own scrum even if you win it, your backing up giving your backline even less room to work with.

Also you tommy bowes try in the grand slam was off a scrum . You cant call the scrum irrelevant.

Danger_dave1

forlorndonkey wrote: »

This is an Ireland team with lots of massive problems, the scrum is not the one we should be focusing on. It's just a red herring.

Thats ridiculous , john hayes 2 years ago was a better scrummager. if were giving away penalties to samoa in the scrum one of the weaker nations in relation to set piece's then were going to give away much much more to other nations with better scrum's

forlorndonkey

Lookit, all I'm saying is we always had a crap scrum and we got along just fine. Our scrum is the only thing that has not declined at all in the last 18 months. As such it is the area with the least potential for improvement and the least relevence in our decline.

forlorndonkey

forlorndonkey wrote: »

What happens is the same thing that happened 12 months ago when we were still in our most successful streak in history and had a scrum that was just as crap.

The game is a different beast, look at the way teams operate, the way the interpretations have affected games. If we're constantly looking back, we're going to spend a lot of years being run over.

forlorndonkey wrote: »

We'll retain possession on our own scrum and we won't be running fancy moves off it but that doesn't matter because that isn't why we we're good anyway. Ireland's success has been all based off the lineout. That's where we're World Class. Fretting about the scrum which has always been crap when the crucial engine that wins us all our games has broken down is ridiculous.

That's incredibly optimistic, because as we saw at the weekend, the Samoan's had no problem scrummaging, and if the scrum doesn't set, the ref is going to start blowing us at every one, our ball or theirs, then we start playing 10 minutes of every game with only 14... Which you simply cannot afford to do.

forlorndonkey wrote: »

This is an Ireland team with lots of massive problems, the scrum is not the one we should be focusing on. It's just a red herring.

Ireland have always (maybe incorrectly, and I'd be happy to discuss this) played a structured game, its how it was taught to 7year olds, and its hard to iron that intuition out once they get to professional levels. To play a structured game, you need to have the key elements, a top lineout, a solid scrum, and a great kicker. We had 2/3 for the last few years and every so often our scrum scraped through and we got results.

The game is changing (for the good imo) to reward teams that are getting away from this structured gameplan, but the problem is that even if you are throwing the ball around the whole game, and taking risks, is that you still have to do the basics, the bread and butter, right.

Scrums and lineouts are the bread and butter of rugby.

jolley123

This really is a strange thread. How on earth are you trying to convince people that scrums are unimportant, more importantly how did you convince yourself?? If we don't have a scrum, then how do we capitalise off other teams mistakes. The other team knocks it on, gives a forward pass, touches it down over their own 22, throws a crooked ball in at the line out, kicks the ball dead - all of those situations lead to a scrum, and if Ireland can't win their own scrums then we are taking out a huge facet of the game.

In regards to your other comments, you have a point. Darcy is off form and BOD is too. However i don't think Earls is an amiable replacement seeing as his defensive skills seem to be seriously inadequate at international level. True, Bowe is a good 13, but he is an even better 14. In the long term I see Ulster producing our 12 and Leinster producing the 13, but i don't think things are going to change in time for the world cup. We will just have to face another wc where we don't pose a threat at all.

forlorndonkey

forlorndonkey wrote: »

Lookit, all I'm saying is we always had a crap scrum and we got along just fine. Our scrum is the only thing that has not declined at all in the last 18 months. As such it is the area with the least potential for improvement and the least relevence in our decline.

woah. Really?

Look at our front row options.

We have, at TH
Buckley Hayes Court Ross (seems to be Kidneys preferred order). Of these, Buckley is reknowned as a weak scrummager, and JH is not the man he used to be.

At hooker
Best Cronin Varley (Flannery injured). The hooker doesn't really have a huge role in scrummaging, but adding some explosive strength is useful, Best has tonnes of experience, but counts for little if he's not doing much of the grunt work.

At LH
Healy Court (A.N Other?)
Healy will be able to scrum against the best, some day, but he's not there yet, he's young, and will develop, and experience will come, but for now, he's a genius in the loose and a liability in the tight. Court is a decent scrummager at LH, but I think he does far better at TH.

I actually think that a front row which always contains one of Ross/Court will do fine for us. Achieving parity will be ok in my books!

forlorndonkey

Deleted User wrote: »

The game is a different beast, look at the way teams operate, the way the interpretations have affected games. If we're constantly looking back, we're going to spend a lot of years being run over.



That's incredibly optimistic, because as we saw at the weekend, the Samoan's had no problem scrummaging, and if the scrum doesn't set, the ref is going to start blowing us at every one, our ball or theirs, then we start playing 10 minutes of every game with only 14... Which you simply cannot afford to do.



Ireland have always (maybe incorrectly, and I'd be happy to discuss this) played a structured game, its how it was taught to 7year olds, and its hard to iron that intuition out once they get to professional levels. To play a structured game, you need to have the key elements, a top lineout, a solid scrum, and a great kicker. We had 2/3 for the last few years and every so often our scrum scraped through and we got results.

The game is changing (for the good imo) to reward teams that are getting away from this structured gameplan, but the problem is that even if you are throwing the ball around the whole game, and taking risks, is that you still have to do the basics, the bread and butter, right.

Scrums and lineouts are the bread and butter of rugby.

I don't think the rule changes will stop using our line outs as effectively as before to be honest, or will massively effect the way Ireland play rugby or how effective that game plan is.

And with all the controversy around the scrum as it was in that game with the long pauses etc I think it would be slightly unfair to judge them on that particular match. If you did you'd be led to the conclusion that they'd gotten even worse which I'm not sure is the case. I think as long as it remains only as poor as it has been for the past year or two we'll be alright. It's the lineout and the backline that have turned to crap and are the areas of real concern and importance.

An amazing scrum isn't the bread and butter of our rugby.

Danger_dave1

my god this guy is a troll

forlorndonkey

Danger_dave1 wrote: »

my god this guy is a troll

Yeah just from reading this forum I've noticed that particular insult gets thrown around a lot. It doesn't reflect well on you when your response to someone holding a different opinion to yours is just to call them names.

8-10

forlorndonkey wrote: »

We'll retain possession on our own scrum and we won't be running fancy moves off it

Did you see the Samoa game? What happened in the first half when we were nearly over the try-line and got a scrum under the posts?

25 mins Samoa on the charge again, but they spill it on a pick and drive and Wallace plays some football kicking the ball on the ground towat the Samoa line. The blue shirts get back to snuff out the breakaway chance. Scrum to Ireland on the Samoa line.

26 mins Scrum again as the first one collapses.

27 mins The Irish pack is driven back five yards and the ball has not been put in. Scrum sets again.

28 mins Again the scrum goes down and the peno is against Ireland for Hayes going in and under. Lavea boots the peno to the halfway line.

Terrific position and we ended up back at halfway after being awarded a scrum a couple of metres out. You're saying it's easy for us to just retain possession at the scrum and set up a ruck??? Only if we can set it properly. Same thing after Cian Healy was held up late on (73mins) and there was a scrum 5 to Ireland. Ireland scrummaged better, got reset a couple of times, but still gave away a penalty. 5 metres from the tryline.

Could have been an extra 14 points if we had retained possession from our 2 scrums within 5 metres on Sat, which you suggest is what we can just do like that.

jolley123

8-10 wrote: »

Did you see the Samoa game? What happened in the first half when we were nearly over the try-line and got a scrum under the posts?

25 mins Samoa on the charge again, but they spill it on a pick and drive and Wallace plays some football kicking the ball on the ground towat the Samoa line. The blue shirts get back to snuff out the breakaway chance. Scrum to Ireland on the Samoa line.

26 mins Scrum again as the first one collapses.

27 mins The Irish pack is driven back five yards and the ball has not been put in. Scrum sets again.

28 mins Again the scrum goes down and the peno is against Ireland for Hayes going in and under. Lavea boots the peno to the halfway line.

Terrific position and we ended up back at halfway after being awarded a scrum a couple of metres out. You're saying it's easy for us to just retain possession at the scrum and set up a ruck??? Only if we can set it properly. Same thing after Cian Healy was held up late on (73mins) and there was a scrum 5 to Ireland. Ireland scrummaged better, got reset a couple of times, but still gave away a penalty. 5 metres from the tryline.

Could have been an extra 14 points if we had retained possession from our 2 scrums within 5 metres on Sat, which you suggest is what we can just do like that.

I agree with the point you're making, but that first example isn't really Ireland's fault. The ref made a horrible call. The Samoan prop lost his bind clear as day and the ref penalised Hayes. It just goes to show how clueless everyone is about what goes on at scrum time when an experienced prop like Hayes doesn't even react to a garbage call. He just walked away, expressionless. Not even the props know what they're doing wrong.

The scrum is becoming ridiculous all over the rugby world, not just Ireland. It defies logic that an attacking team, 5 metres from the opposition try line, would illegally srcummage. What advantage is that to them??? Plus this pause is doing more to hurt the problem rather than help it. If anything the call should have been shortened.

corny

8-10 wrote: »

Did you see the Samoa game? What happened in the first half when we were nearly over the try-line and got a scrum under the posts?

25 mins Samoa on the charge again, but they spill it on a pick and drive and Wallace plays some football kicking the ball on the ground towat the Samoa line. The blue shirts get back to snuff out the breakaway chance. Scrum to Ireland on the Samoa line.

26 mins Scrum again as the first one collapses.

27 mins The Irish pack is driven back five yards and the ball has not been put in. Scrum sets again.

28 mins Again the scrum goes down and the peno is against Ireland for Hayes going in and under. Lavea boots the peno to the halfway line.

You compare that to what the French or the English would have done and you have you're point made OP. Against either of those sides the only recourse for the Samoans would be to concede a penalty try. Its ludicrous to suggest the scrum doesn't matter.

I agree our problems are near innumerable at the minute but because other problems might take precedence in your view OP that doesn't mean the scrum doesn't matter.

On the backline i think someones already mentioned this but i think all of our problems are coach driven. Gaffney is a set piece coach who has no clue how to organise continuity in attack. Even Martin Johnson has moved on ffs.

Trojan

A lot of the talk about the scrum isn't just about the Irish selection issues. The game as a whole has a big problem with the scrum, as evidenced by Tim Robbins comments on how the IRB want it policed, and by how many scrums we saw complete in all Tests last weekend.

This is a massive issue that cannot be underestimated - the scrum is a vital part of what makes Rugby Union Rugby Union. If the scrum is disenfranchised we are a huge step closer to merging back up with League.

twinytwo

forlorndonkey wrote: »

I don't know why you're all so concerned about the scrum, it's irrelevant. With crooked feeds no one is ever turned over in the scrum and our scrum being crap anyway we can just elect to take line outs.

That's what we've done up to now, and it's what we owe all our success to in the last few years. Virtually all of Tommy Bows (and the Ireland teams) tries came off the back of lineout set pieces. The problem is that with Flannery injured and Kidney refusing to pick Cullen for some reason, our line out is completely banjaxed. If we play Toner we win our own line outs but we're a man down in the loose and unlike with POC or Cullen we don't steal any of our opponents line outs.

There's no replacement for Flannery as Cronin is just not good enough for this level but I think between him and Best he should get the nod as his throwing has been less bad. He is fat and has bad handling skills, both of which could be fixed with a bit of work over a few months but he still wouldn't be the equal of Flannery. For now we'll have to make due with him.

On top of all that the BOD/Darcy combination is after going stale. BOD had lots of the ball against Samoa and has blatantly lost too much pace to be a 13 anymore, he needs to be moved to 12 whether he likes it or not. Darcy has been a great player but hasn't distnguished himself for years and doesn't deserve to play for Ireland on current form, obviously if he picks it back up again fair enough but for now he needs to be dropped.

Nothing against Fitzgerald either but he hasn't got up to speed yet after his injury and shouldn't be playing till he's back at his best in a month or two. He over ran the ball twice against South Africa.

Bowe needs to be in at 13, he played brilliantly there for the lions and basically plays the wing as a centre anyway. He doesn't have the pace to exploit any overlaps and has scored virtually all of his tries off lineouts or from kick aheads. Nothing wrong with that at all but he'd score all those tries as a 13 and we need someone with the requisite pace on the wing in his place, lke Fitzgerald or Trimble.

Trimble/Earls should be tried in BOD's place in my opinion. BOD looks to be fading fast so he should be switched with Earls/Trimble intermittently just in case he's completely gone/injured in the World Cup and we're left with a midfield pairing who have never played together before.

Geordan Murphy should obviously be playing full back. Like Darcy, Kearney hasn't distinguished himself in that position in over a year and simply doesn't deserve his place.

That's my immediate take on the situation.

Actually the scrum is killing us... eveytime knock on.. scrum or give away a stupid peno teams will elect to scrum against us because they know we are fcuked.. As for drico playing 12 maybe it would be a good idea but if kindey dosent have the balls to tell hayes to retire do you actually think he has the balls to tell drico they are moving him to 12?

sleepyman

Podge_irl wrote: »

Mind you, there is a massive problem in the backline as well, but that is clearly more systematic and I suspect Gaffney is largely at fault. Games are still won in the forwards though, and especially with a team as reliant on first phase ball as Ireland are. We have scrums and line-outs to work off, neither are working right now and the former is a bloody embarrassment.

I just don't see what Gaffney brings to the table-it's been mentioned here before.Seems a nice chap but the Munster backline wasn't impressive when he managed Munster, i think the Leinster backs were at the best when knox was there.

Stev_o

Id agree with the OP.

The way the game is going i don't see the scrum being the be all and end all of winning matches. It helps a great deal to have it as a offensive weapon but all you have to do is look at England Wales who killed NZ and Australias scrum respectively to see that if you don't have the the attacking ability to convert on that possesion it won't account for anything.

Aus and Nz have a high risk game plan to play at a very high pace and blow teams out of it in the first half of the game. Scrums are avoided if needs be by playing any advantage and running with the balls. The only way they can be punished if there game was slowed right down to a crawl where every single contest for the ball is crucial and getting penalised from a scrum will make the difference.

Personally i feel that the backline play is far more worrying to us then anything that's being done to the scrum against us. A inability to score points is a greater concern that being able to reset the ball.

forlorndonkey

8-10 wrote: »

Did you see the Samoa game? What happened in the first half when we were nearly over the try-line and got a scrum under the posts?

25 mins Samoa on the charge again, but they spill it on a pick and drive and Wallace plays some football kicking the ball on the ground towat the Samoa line. The blue shirts get back to snuff out the breakaway chance. Scrum to Ireland on the Samoa line.

26 mins Scrum again as the first one collapses.

27 mins The Irish pack is driven back five yards and the ball has not been put in. Scrum sets again.

28 mins Again the scrum goes down and the peno is against Ireland for Hayes going in and under. Lavea boots the peno to the halfway line.

Terrific position and we ended up back at halfway after being awarded a scrum a couple of metres out. You're saying it's easy for us to just retain possession at the scrum and set up a ruck??? Only if we can set it properly. Same thing after Cian Healy was held up late on (73mins) and there was a scrum 5 to Ireland. Ireland scrummaged better, got reset a couple of times, but still gave away a penalty. 5 metres from the tryline.

Could have been an extra 14 points if we had retained possession from our 2 scrums within 5 metres on Sat, which you suggest is what we can just do like that.

Yes but the Samoan game was refereed by a novice referee who called the scrum very eccentrically so it doesn't really tell us anything. I don't think our scrum s any worse than it has ever been to be honest, and I don't think it will be anything like the liability it was in that game.

its_phil

The scrum is a major problem,what happens on Saturday when we get penalised for a penalty in our own half? Dan Carter is going to step up and knock it over,no doubt. The scrum is a huge liability it is going to keep leaking points. The back line has not helped the scrum, with a large amount of knock on's.

When we won the grand slam we weren't making as many mistakes and weren't forced to use the scrum as much. We need to change our gameplan in a way that ensures we won't be forced to use the scrum. Back to the old kicking to touch is the way to go imo as soon as POC and Leo Cullen are in.

irishbucsfan

forlorndonkey wrote: »

Yes but the Samoan game was refereed by a novice referee who called the scrum very eccentrically so it doesn't really tell us anything. I don't think our scrum s any worse than it has ever been to be honest, and I don't think it will be anything like the liability it was in that game.

Regardless of how the scrum was called, we were demolished in the first half. It was the worst scrummaging performance we've had in my memory.

I'd love to see if you can find evidence that we were ever this bad before, because we weren't.


I will agree with you that it will improve this week. Hayes will be out of the starting team (please god) and so too will Cronin. That will allow us to hold our ground at least, maybe resulting in only one or two penalties, instead of the 5 or 6 we had last week.

If you'd made this thread after the SA game you'd have been more right, because despite all the complaining people (myself included before I watched it back) did about Buckley, we didn't concede one penalty at scrum time with him on the pitch. He got a very tough time in the press, despite what was actually a decent performance.

Luckycharm

One of the strangest threads I have ever read, our scrum has never been as bad as it has been recently. Pushed around by Samoa, pushed around by OZ in the summer who had been pulverised by Eng.
Also with the new rules it is much harder to kick to touch then before given you have to be within your 22. Plus another tactic some teams with weak lineouts use is simply not to kick the ball into touch and trust their defence- Georgia did that against us in the last RWC and it worked very well.