Interesting that both teams will be missing their respective Captains / Number 10s
We beat Wales twice in the warm up games and Wales were three points from the 2019 final. The warm up games are largely meaningless, and the narrative around the England loss in 2019 is completely blown out of proportion. Ireland were goosed long before that. We should beat England on Saturday, but this notion of demanding a hammering and nothing less than that being acceptable is silly. We'll give very little away but look for cohesion.
We are a number of weeks before the big game. Going out looking for a huge score and risking injuries is pointless.
Go out, play our game, hope for no injuries and see if you win at end of day.
The difference between a 20 point win and a 40 point win is often just happenstance and whether heads drop or things start compounding about going awry. A 20 point win is still a hammering on the international stage.
Why?
France put 50 on them in the 6N. NZ put 50 on Argentina (a better side than England) a few weeks ago. They put 50 on us in the lead up to the last World Cup. How is it realistic for them to do it to us, but unrealistic for us to do it to them?
If we're going to win a World Cup we should be annihilating this England side. They're awful.
I think you have peaked too early. I would recommend you do some mid week expectation training sessions, build up your positivity muscles, and aim for peak stomach churning, nail biting enthusiasm for the knockout rounds.
The result of the game will be completely meaningless.
Once we get out of it with no serious injuries or red cards, and fine tune some things, that's all that matters
So just equalling our biggest ever win. And anything less and we won’t be serious World Cup contenders?
Not for me, Clive.
We’ll be far from our best but we should still win.
I expect more of what we saw against Italy, trying new combinations and putting lads outside their comfort zones.
Don’t think we’ll see many pods or moves outside some basic stuff but I think we’ll take them on in the forwards and try out muscle them.
These matches are unexciting and sour affairs , anyone thinking we’ll see full flowing rugby will be sadly disappointed.
Just want to come through without injuries.
About a 30 point margin. If we play at our best I think that's very achievable
No they won’t be disappointed, they will absolutely revel in it. They hate Ireland, in fact I’m pretty sure they hate rugby. So if we do beat England but not by more than 15 points, they will have the inbuilt excuse they are developing to moan about it.
But I thought the narrative was we peaked in NZL, or was that France in the 6N?
I think you'll be a little disappointed. We will probably see a relatively strong Irish team but we won't start showing a whole load of variation in attack this early. It will be the same pods used consistently I think. I doubt you are going to see us slice them open at will.
I was really happy with how we looked physically against Italy so I'm just hoping for a continuation of that. It's all about minutes into the legs at this point and getting a decent hit out.
At least a trillion point win. No less.
What would you consider a serious score?
If we don't play well on Saturday the worry will be that we have peaked too early
It’s not the World Cup yet. We are building decent performances, let’s not peak to early either.
On form we should hammer them but then they were brutal during the 6N and saved their only decent performance for us. They might rise to the occasion, and bad as they were at the weekend gatland has wales starting to play like a team who are hard to beat.
Assume we will be going with quite a strong XV next weekend?
We are serious World Cup contenders regardless of the outcome of Saturday’s game.
NZ, France or SA would absolutely annihilate that England team. The world cup is in a few weeks and we need to start hitting some form. If we stutter past them like we did against Italy I'll be worried.
if you don’t fully commit to tackles you will come off worse same with taking it into contact however as these are really just pre season matches I’d say a lot of players cruise around the pitch without maybe pushing themselves too much, covering chases and things like that are probably places where some players may not push as hard as they really could. That said if you are not positive you are travelling you will want to empty the tank to book a seat.
yes
We do?
We owe them a hammering. Hoping there's some simmering anger from 2019
We are serious World Cup contenders regardless of the outcome of Saturday’s game. Based on the Irish and English games so far we would be clear favorites and I think we will win. Hopefully it’s a more entertaining match than the English games so far, awful stuff.
If we're serious world cup contenders, we'll rack up a serious score against England on Saturday.
Not a stupid question at all.
I've always had the opinion that Rugby doesn't really lend itself to not giving it 100%. I think the players have to tackle as hard and run as hard as any other test match other wise they'd just get injured or blown away by the opposition.
Maybe the difference is they don't have ride as high a mental wave before these games as they would for a 6Ns match or World Cup game.
The other thing, and the Italy game proved this, but the slightest hint of an injury and players will be taken off which wouldn't necessarily be the case in games of real significance.
Although one of the players quoted that Farrell had said he didn't want any heroes or words to that affect. For that reason alone I can see Earls getting into the squad ahead of stockdale
Players who are already selected might hold back to avoid injury. Although that’s a usually a good way of getting injured. Players vying to make the squad will go all out and often over reach, making mistakes. These games are often a mix of both.
Hope this isn't too stupid a question but in these warm-up games are players expected to go all out to stop their opposite number or is it okay to be "a bit passive" in view of what's to come next month?
