Bad news for Scotland if this is the case
Barre has been excellent today.
Pinpoint accuracy from Dupont unlocking them.
Just on this I thought Dickson made a very good call in the first half, saying the ruck had shifted forward when a French player went for the ball. The ruck was cleared past were he was stood so he would need to retreat back to that point before moving forward again.
That should be how it's ruled rather than being able to step straight in.
Above was in response to this btw
Italian defence is very passive
Italians defending very badly.
Way too easy
IreIreland have to win the last two games now. French points difference of the charts now
Looked like another forward pass there.
Too easy for the French. One of Italy's worst defensive performances in a while.
That's shambolic defending.
Yeah, it's very hard to know what to take from this. France are just being allowed play under zero pressure. Italian heads are gone.
Slam Or nothing the way it should be!
The one concern I'd have is that whilst Ireland will be on a different planet defensively, if we continue to kick possession away like we have been doing we will invite wave after wave of attack. I think we'll need to hold possession and work more phases before kicking. That French midfield is vulnerable defensively so Bundi (and Lowe coming off his wing or from set plays) running at them will make ground.
Swinging arm in that last tackle should be looked at
Our kicking is not random though. It is generally very well placed and puts the opposition immediately under pressure. We made huge yards in kick battles yesterday.
The Italian defence was a lot more aggressive in the first 10 minutes and had France in trouble. They've gone completely passive since and are allowing France to do whatever they want.
I think we win comfortably. The French defense is terrible. And I'm convinced they are the champions at touch rugby but in the face of aggressive defence where you have to play the percentage passes and offloads lead to interceptions, they won't be the same team. The one thing I find impressive is their scrum and lineout, that will be the challenge, the rest is just flat track bullies.
There will be nothing "comfortable " about it but we will beat them!
Well if we fail to secure possession from our own lineout , like in our previous losses, it'll be very uncomfortable. I don't know what we need to do to fix that, it still is lurking in the background.
I don't think it will be comfortable but I'd largely agree. I wouldn't trust them at all in the face of an aggressive rush defence, they'll start flinging the ball all over the shop (and, to be fair, it will almost definitely work once or twice). They are leaving a lot of holes in defence also.
I do worry about the scrum. Need to move Antonio around the field as much as possible in the opening 30 minutes and he'll be gone though.
I understand the intent of the kicking, but the stats don't lie. We have flipped recently to a team that plays with less possession. Yesterday Wales had 57% possession and 51% territory. Against Scotland they had 57% possession. You don't want to be surrendering too much ball to France.
I know for yesterday there was the mitigation of playing with 14 for 20 minutes. But the point still stands.
I thought for a turnover now you had to have hands on the ball and be attempting to pick it up?
Not just bent over bear hugging the tackled player on the ground..
I don't really expect this to change though. I do think we had the perfect gameplan 2 years ago to combat France (and somewhat similarly Leinster had the perfect gameplan to neuter Toulouse), and I'm far from convinced it has been a positive move, but ultimately we have changed how we play and we aren't going to adjust that for one game.
If our kicking remains to the high standard it has been at I'm less worried.
What about the Karl Dickson combover...
Keep that denial going Karl!!
I agree that it's most likely not going to change which in my opinion will play into Frances hands. The more you kick it away the more chance for loose kicks and you don't want to kick loose to France and invite them to counter.
I just think if we probe them more with ball in hand we'll find gaps as I don't think they are a great defensively.
Porter has struggled vs Antonio in the past....
We're also not burying loads of energy and effort on extended multiphase either. If there's nothing happening after a few phases, we're looking to kick for territory and applying pressure. It's keeping us fresher as the game goes on, imo.
At least we have the mocker gods on our side , with our difficult game against Wales and France's Harlem Globetrotters win. Two weeks of French and British media blowing smoke up France and Irish media exposing our engrained inferiority complex, will set us up perfectly for a battling against all odds performance!
The offence is not releasing the ball in the tackle. So the onus is on the tackled player to let it go as soon as possible after the tackle. The opposing player getting hands on should be enough, but holding the player preventing the release should also trigger a penalty.
Porter has struggled when refs let Antoni away with flopping on his face when he's struggling
Very poor from Italy today, not good for the game , such scorelines, if the sport is to grow outside the usual 5 or 6
