Surely if it’s just from the point of view of the winning or losing of a game then he’s as likely to win you a game as lose it.
for me, id like to get the luck of the draw when it will come to referee selection for the games, especially any potential games against france. a 'hometown' ref in such a game could basically be game over, as it was in the last rwc. as poor as ireland were against japan, they would have still won if there had been a fair(ish) ref
You say avoid poor refs. You get whats appointed. there is only 12 officials(refs - there is more there but who'll only be ARs/TMOs) and if we manage to get an official at a game that reduces number again who can do our games especially South African game as they'll likely have a ref or 2 selected
We will sustain injuries and most likely at least 1 tournament ending one over the course of the warm ups/tournament itself. Nature of the sport.
I think England and France have a harder time bringing their greater resources to bear on international games between World Cups than we do. The domestic leagues are a bigger distraction.
We should be going into the tournament believing we will win it.
Luck plays a part too. Avoiding particularly poor refs would be ideal. Not sustaining injuries would be good luck.
What specifically do you want in terms of luck from officials. I wouldnt be thinking about winning a world cup even with how well we've done recently. getting through 1 round of knockouts would be great. gives us 2 more games guaranteed. that first. wouldnt be talking about winning a world cup at all.
A lot of luck would be nice! Good referees in particular. I think we can win the world cup. But, I believe our route could be a little too much. We will see.
If Argentina and Japan have proven anything, it's that they can be a bit of a banana skin at World Cups. We should know this better than anyone.
Even still, I fully expect England to win that group and beat Wales/Australia in the quarters. But I can't see them getting past a likely Semi final v France.
It's funny that England have been fairly dreadful for the last couple of years, yet we fully expect them to make the semis. We're probably as strong as we've ever been, yet very few see us making the semis. I know it's partly because of the draw, but even if we had England's draw, I'd struggle to see us beating Wales or Aus in a quarter final.
Yeah, but by far the softest group to emerge from, so they shouldn't need to over-exert themselves to get to the QFs. They're in a group with the current world #9 & #10 who they'll be confident they'll account for without much trouble.
Even in the WC they have a very easy run to the final
They have Wales or Australia in the quarter final and Us, France, SA or NZ in the Semi. I wouldn't call that easy.
South Africa's run to the final last time was as 'easy' as it gets.
I see a France v NZ final.
If we can win our group and then turn over NZ in the quarters, it's Wales, Australia or Argentina in the semi.
Hogg dropping the ball over the line was the first game of the Farrell era and the first game after the 2019 WC. THe entire team was lacking in confidence plus the game changed in the first few mins when Doris was taken off with a knock so game plan out the window.
It was a win at the end of the day.
England last cycle had an excellent 2016 and 2017 season, didn't they win both 6 nations and only came unstuck in Ireland to miss out on the record for most games unbeaten?
Then 2018 came and the wheels came off very quickly, then the SA tour and totally fell off. Mitchell was hired in then and it all changed right up to the WC. They ran NZ close that Nov in a down pour before Ireland beat NZ.
Even with all the talk of England 2019 they won nothing. Wales won the Grand Slam and England lost in the final.
England are not a dark horse in any competition. They have too much money and too many people to be a dark horse. Even in the WC they have a very easy run to the final
It's not Tuilagi, it's any powerful centre who can get them over the gain line. It doesn't have to be a player of the calibre of Tuilagi. They've had success with Luther Burrell and Ben Te'o in the past. There's a dearth of powerful EQP centres in the premiership and that's a huge problem for them, as can be seen by Jones trying to get Guy Porter to fill that role.
Farrell at 12 with Slade or Marchant at 13 is seriously lacking in power. Jones has tried to compensate for that by playing a high tempo, expansive game with varying levels of success. And as you said, it doesn't come naturally to England.
Ollie Lawrence is a guy who could be that player for them. I think he was injured last season but he's young and has a great blend of power, pace and footballing ability. He's like a cross between Tuilagi and Jonathan Joseph. If he comes back and hits the ground running I think they could be in business. Dan Kelly is another one potentially.
It's ironic that two years ago Nick Tompkins went to play for Wales because he couldn't get a look in with England, but he's a player that England would love to have now.
What England do or don’t do, will entirely depend on Tualagi’s fitness. Jones doesn’t have any great grand plan to reinvent the wheel. He has blooded some young players to have cohesion but England only know one way to play.
We struggled versus Scotland. Hogg dropping the ball by the try line and blowing a 2 on 1. Wales can be up or down. I think Wales will be happy with their tour to S.A
England are the team that I think can get it all together for the world cup. They were gash a couple of years out from the last world cup and turned it around. France are a great side atm.
I doubt there's a grand slam on this coming 6nations for anyone. We do have a great chance and should be in the mix. England will be my dark horse.
Can see us tripping up in Cardiff, haven't won there in the 6 nations in a while. We've the better team but they are always up for us at home
id be delighted to have our RWC opponents thinking we've peaked a year early.
i expect a tough game against aussie and SA in nov. One win from those two with a bit of squad building / tactical experimenting would be a successful nov window imo.
6N 2023, anything can happen. We've england and france at home which will be winnable but very tough games, and i fully expect to win the 3 away games without too much bother.
the big question is over sextons form, can he continue for another 14 months at this level?
Lots of images etc going around about Ireland peaking :-)
To be honest I don't care at the moment. Maybe at WC I will but for now happy days
https://www.planetrugby.com/andy-farrell-ireland-head-coach-regarded-very-highly-by-england-as-chief-executive-bill-sweeney-discusses-eddie-jones-successor/
Inevitable I suppose!
..
It's a 50/50 call to be honest. Both top class wingers with different strengths. if it were me I'd probably go with Adams too.
They didn’t. That was a big narrative going into the games and while they struggled a bit they never got dominated in the way that some expected. Leicester was the toughest day out of the three, but overall we managed well enough.
Why pick Adams at 14 over Rees-Zammit?
Leinster scrum v Leicester, Toulouse and La Rochelle held up so not sure what the pause is about?
I think you need to watch those games again because it really didn't. Our scrum got demolished in each of those games.
it depends on the gameplan i suppose. taking a hypothetical game against SA tomorrow, if the plan would be to try and take them on physically then i dont think beirne plays tbh, as you said hes not the biggest so it probably would be henderson (lets say hes available) and ryan in the second row, most of our backrows are bigger too so you'd have some combination of coombes/ doris/ conan at 6/8 probably. for me, this would be a terrible idea as whoever we play still won't be as physical as any SA team.
if however, the plan was to try to outsmart and 'out-skill' them, then beirne starts with ryan. neither are going to bowl bigger guys over but theyre both skillful enough to be able to hold their own
I wonder whether the increased length of the head injury stand down period will mean that the IRB will increase the RWC squad size from 33.
Didn’t say they did
Still Leinster with a huge part of the Ireland forwards came against huge packs and could handle them.
NZ don’t offer the same threat at scrum or maul time, and we know that a scrum or maul can go from OK to terrible very quickly against a big team. The sort of thing I’m worried about is Bourgarit’s try from a lineout maul. South Africa can do that all day.
Our scrum is ok, not great but ok and hopefully getting better. Kelleher is stronger in the scrum to Sheehan yet we still stood up v NZ…
Against EnglAnd we blitzed them in first scrum then it was spin time.
We have a season now against the SA teams and a match v SA, England and France to try things out…..we also have Europe which I expect Leinster will be up against big packs and the other teams….
The lineout was the problem in URC semi and not the scrum for Leinster.
I thought he was excellent in the third Test.
How many players look better playing for Ireland than they do playing for their province? Ryan, Porter, Doris, Treadwell, Scannell, Murray, Carbery. They look like better players even though the opposition is much tougher than anything the Provinces come up against. It's a sign of the quality Farrell's coaching.
We’ll have to match them to some extent or they’ll just roll over us at maul and scrum time. In this regard, the last few matches played by Leinster and Ulster should give us pause. One thing NZ managed over the years was to be good enough in the scrum to match the likes of SA, England and France while being much more mobile everywhere else. Against these power teams should Beirne be in the back row, for example? He’s not massive for a second row.
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