Six Nations 2022 - England v Ireland, 12/03/22, KO 4.45pm - RTÉ2, RTÉ Player, ITV1, ITV Hub

captbarnacles

What can a team do in this situation when ref has decided its one team infringing in the scrum?

Say we get to WC quarter final and similar happens. Taking the high road and trying to scrum within the rules will still mean another lost QF.

So what do we do??

Former Former Former

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118780863#Comment_118780863

Think it would be a bit naive to say that they were cheating and we just want to play within the rules. Healy and Furlong have been around long enough to know that in the scrums, it's every man for himself.

They just cheated better than us.

leakyboots

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118779112#Comment_118779112

It's been interesting to flick through this thread in its entirety. You're the second poster to post that stat, I'm not sure anyone has replied? Some posts on about him being a "passenger, an empty jersey, finished at this level" etc., he literally made the most tackles in a game many were saying as it unfolded that we were going to lose/deserve to lose. Complaining he hasn't made metres with ball in hand as if that was what he always does.

Many on this place used defend Heaslip to the hilt for doing the exact same thing - not making metres ball in hand, for making tackles and hitting rucks, 'tis gas.

POM wasn't great yesterday, mind, not many were out of the fatties let's be honest. And I think there's merit in the whole debate around is the combination of him and VdF good against a team like England, but the quoted words above are nonsense.

Conway (in particular bar that poor clearance when the pressure was on) and Aki had good games, Lowe was solid going forward bar a few mistakes, Keenan was very good also. Subs at the end did their job well. Oh and Sheehan, wow, brilliant with ball in hand.

I'm not sure we're going to learn a whole lot out of this Six Nations. We're still a bit bare a LH, Carberry is still a bit of an unknown, I'm not convinced by JGP and feel like one of Doak or Casey are worth a shot, we've another option in Hansen I guess and I'm glad Lowry got a run out. I'm not sure Doris is the answer in the backrow, I'd love to get a look at Timoney or Coombes or even JOD to be honest.

Poor performance but jeez red card or not you take a scoreline like that away from Twickers any day of the week, let's see how they go in the next one.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118780712#Comment_118780712

I might have bitten off more than I'm interested in chewing here, and I appreciate you feel quite strongly about this - so by any chance could you also link the post you found offending and I promise I'll provide a reasonably comprehensive reply at that point - I'm part way through the first post you linked and seems fine but I've no context.

Podge_irl

Many on this place used defend Heaslip to the hilt for doing the exact same thing - not making metres ball in hand, for making tackles and hitting rucks, 'tis gas.

Heaslip made a lot of carries trying to turn scrappy ball into front foot ball however and was also a massive threat at the breakdown. I don't think anyone ever brought up his tackling stats.

_NAGDEFY

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118777707#Comment_118777707

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118780959#Comment_118780959

The Stephen H 'seeing as you're such an expert' quote riled me. That type of tone is juvenile.

You're ok Venjur no need to reply. I appreciate the sincere way you have replied. Will chat next Saturday and hopefully have a cherished Triple Crown. Thanks again. When you're genuinely trying to make points it's hard to take being labelled a troll and put on the ignore button. We all want Ireland to max out on all we have, and definitely break the QF glass ceiling in 2023.

Great, great win for the 20s.

lawrencesummers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118780309#Comment_118780309

Itoje was the best player on the pitch.

By a long long long long way.

awec

Posters need to remember that this is a discussion forum, and people are going to have different views. We're going to have to start dishing out cards if people can't be civil to one another.

A special note also for our regular posters, and this is something we say every year. Six Nations time always brings in new posters, just because someone doesn't have hundreds of posts in the rugby forum does not make their point of view invalid.

If you believe someone to be trolling, don't respond and report the post.

From now on, anyone who feels the need to publicly announce that they're putting someone on the ignore list is getting carded.

awec

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118780945#Comment_118780945

Yes spot on.

If roles were reversed nobody on here would be saying we cheated or how we were lucky on the ref, we'd all be praising the smarts of the Irish front row for smashing England in the scrum.

We got done over yesterday in the scrum and it will be a lesson for us.

Dubinusa

Agree with the Itoje comments. Spectacular player.

_NAGDEFY

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118781170#Comment_118781170

He's such an athlete, and an animal in the best sense of the word, plenty of cynicism and mongrel, all you want in a forward.

tritriagain

Wish we had someone with his aggression and willingness to do the dirty work in our second row. On the scrummaging, England were illegal but we had 2 lions props and a lions captain, they should have been able to adapt. What happens in WC if this occurs again. Of all sports, rugby is the one where you often have to play the referees interpretation of the laws as well as play the opposition. Moaning about unfortunately will do nothing to stop it happening again.

tritriagain

Achilles Knee

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118781464#Comment_118781464

New Zealand moaned about Wayne Barnes v France 2007. But they soon copped on it was mostly self inflicted. They hadn't even planned how to play for field position to engineer a decent late drop goal chance. Many of the same players won WCs in 2011 and 2015.

techdiver

Isn't is great that these questions are being asked now though? In 2018 we had a perfect year and went into 2019 all full of confidence and got found out and then had another disaster of a World Cup.

I think we are in a better place now than we were on 2018. We are winning (an outstanding France aside which we could easily have won) yet still have improvements to make.

molloyjh

Haven’t read the posts here, but just finished rewatching the game. On the scrums, we gave up 6 scrum penalties. 4 in the first half and 2 in the second. We won 1. Twice our LH collapsed (Healy and Killer both) and we were correctly pinged. Once we were pinged for an early engage which seemed correct too. 3 times we were pinged for wheeling when it was abundantly clear that England were the ones stepping sideways. It absolutely was not that England cheated well. They didn’t. They were really blatant. Raynal just didn’t ping them. That wasn’t smarts on Englands side, it was just poor officiating. I don’t think they identified it as something to target with Raynal either as they drove straight in the first scrum and coughed up a penalty on the TH side.

Interestingly though, all 3 of those penalties came in the first half. On the first scrum in the second half he warned England ahead of the reset that they were stepping to the side and they were to stop. And they didn’t do it again. We still gave up 2 penalties on the LH side, but that happens. Whether someone had a word with Raynal or what I don’t know. It’s impossible to know what would have happened in the scrum had he pinged England for wheeling the first time they did it, you’d assume they wouldn’t try it again, but of the 6 penalties we were pinged for, only 3 were correct.

Ultimately we dominated that for 65 mins or so. Some of those forced passes and offloads were probably the difference between us scoring 35 and us scoring 50. But there’s no way England were going to be able to live with us for the full 80 playing with the tempo we played at. They were done in that final quarter.

Our bench made a big impact which was great to see. Too often the opposite has been the case. Sheehan was great in the loose, particularly in the first half. Beirne was decent and had some big moments, VDF played very well, JGP and Sexton were good and Keenan was superb. Conway had a couple of errors, but those 50:22s were outstanding. Off the bench Henderson went okay in general, but my God those 3 penalties were dumb. Herring was very impressive, Murray shut a few people up with a really strong showing and Henshaw did exactly what we needed him to, took it hard and fast to a tiring England defence.

There was a lot of really good stuff in there from Ireland. Tidy up some of those forced passes and we could have been looking at a big score. England lived off scraps, but in reality that was never going to be enough given the damage we were doing with ball in hand. 555m to their 214m. 26 defenders beaten to their 7. 8 clean breaks to their 1. 66 gain line carries to their 28 (and that’s with their defence being very powerful). 78.6% of our rucks < 3 seconds. Fit as they are, having to face that for 78 mins with a man down was always going to tell. We should have scored more, but I think even if it didn’t always feel like it we were really always going to win it.

Dubinusa

That puts a different perspective on it. I didn't catch the lh infringements. I do remember the early shunt and the smirk on Jamie George's beak!

Seeing Furlong getting mullered, either legally or illegally is something we don't see often. Although England did not threaten the line, it must be said that over ball handling was poor! I reckon it is due to trying too hard.

ersatz

The bench made a huge impact. Serious position for us to be in when Robbie henshaw is coming on as a sub, I thought Herring was good too, though Sheehan had been great in the loose. There was a lot of smart play by Ireland with the back three making good decisions throughout the game. Room for improvement in the pack and the leadership stuff. After making a mountain of playing 13 Italians I’d have thought onfield adjustments to going a man up would be squared away but I’m not sure Ireland adjusted as quickly as I’d like. Some of that middle 40 was headless. England’s backs were poor and made very little of some of the advantages their forwards delivered but you’d expect most top teams to do better with that set piece dominance.

I’ve been saying for a while that people overestimate our front row, probably because the pundits are quick to tell us they’re the best in the world. They’re all fantastic players in the loose but here, as against France, there were major scrummaging issues. Porter was absent but he has a lot to learn too. it’s a good point made by someone earlier, when good teams take the piss in the scrum other good teams adjust and do what it takes to counteract it. We didn’t do that.

interesting that in a game like that Farrell only brought in Carbery after full time.

we are in a great position though, we know how to score, great Defense, loads of talent and plenty to work on. Happy days.

TRC10

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118781748#Comment_118781748

interesting that in a game like that Farrell only brought in Carbery after full time.

That says more about Carbery than it does about Farrell

Interested Observer

https://twitter.com/BHHooker/status/1502991804211343362

Tell me who is wheeling this scrum. Sinckler is at about 45 degrees to straight and the entire England pack are crabbing. They got a penalty for it and just kept doing it. We didn't have an answer for this throughout the game but you're not going to convince me this is not just straight up bad refereeing.

pickarooney

Healy is completely crooked there. If Reynal was standing on that side it's probably what he would have seen.

I honestly don't get how it's physically possible for a ref to see both sides of the scrum at once and why the TMO isn't directly involved each time.

Maybe 3 of the penalties against Ireland were bordeline or downright wrong but that's still 3 scrums lost against 7 forwards and Jack Nowell, with no TH lock. It's a bit of embarrassment whatever way you look at it

Ardillaun

Conway had an excellent game overall but I do see an occasional problem with his tackling where he goes in mainly with the shoulder and just bounces off the ball carrier.

Obviously, the big worry now is our scrum. Things better go smoothly against Scotland.

OldRio

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118781586#Comment_118781586

This 100%, thank you.

Pete_Cavan

I think the timing of those first half scrum penalties for England was a huge boost to them. It gave them a huge lift and belief that they could actually win despite being a man down. Had the ref interpreted it as not driving straight by the English pack (which is what it was imo), their thoughts might have switched somewhat to France next week. The red and the scrum penalties also really brought the home crowd into the game and the English team were feeding off them.

It's also worth remembering that England ended up with 3 points from a ridiculous forward pass to Simmonds on the wing which kept them within touching distance at half time.

Overall though, it was better for Ireland that England got these calls and stayed competitive throughout. Winning in Twickenham without a set piece platform should stand to the team. Getting the win while not raising expectations too much and having clear things to work on is a good way to come out of there. England will take heart from how they stayed in the game but I don't see them gaining much in terms of developing their team or style of play, I think they have limitations which don't seem to get addressed. France should win comfortably next weekend and it will have been a wasted 6N for England.

Former Former Former

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118781586#Comment_118781586

 it absolutely was not that England cheated well. They didn’t. They were really blatant. Raynal just didn’t ping them. 

Surely getting away with it is the definition of cheating well?

And it wasn't even just the six penalties, we never looked comfortable and we certainly never had any chance of using the scrum as a platform of our own.

Whether England were cheating or not doesn't even matter, the ref was sympathetic to their technique and they took full advantage. If we couldn't react and adapt, then that's on us. A better team than England would have taken much better advantage of their dominance (illegal or otherwise).

stephen_n

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118782007#Comment_118782007

Whether England were cheating or not doesn't even matter, the ref was sympathetic to their technique and they took full advantage. If we couldn't react and adapt, then that's on us. A better team than England would have taken much better advantage of their dominance (illegal or otherwise).

People keeping saying this but can’t give any examples of how you react to it. We drew the refs attention to it. He even warned them about it, eventually. Furlong tried to close the gap, to prevent Genge getting around him and got pinged for that. It’s great to say we should be able to adapt but it’s just empty words, without being able to say how you can adapt to that kind of cheating. I’m going to assume that Healy, Furlong and Fogarty would have a lot more ideas than any fans would though.

molloyjh

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118782007#Comment_118782007

I suppose it depends what you mean by cheating well. For me that means being subtle enough about it to get away with it. Cheating well means hiding it well, at least for me. Officials making glaring errors is not something that the offending teams do well. It’s something the officials do badly. There’s a big difference there for me.

As for how we handled it, we were pinged for it 3 times and it didn’t happen in the second half. At the first scrum in the second half Raynal called England on it and it stopped. Someone, probably in our camp, seemingly brought his attention to it effectively. We can’t always see and know what happens there and who is to credit for the change in interpretation.

I'm putting awec on ignore.

oh who am I kidding

lawrencesummers

If the ref isnt penalising it then it isnt a penalty.

pickarooney

It's fairly worrying that if the next scrum we're up against does the same thing, we just have to resign ourselves to not being able to do anything and getting minced in the scrum again.