Rugby Union

[malcolmw]

The pundits were very divided tonight on whether it was a poor/undisciplined Argentina display or a top English performance, my answer to that is it was a superb English performance that forced an undisciplined Argentina performance, I honestly reckon once Ford's 2nd drop goal went over they were stunned and thought f**k we actually have to play here, but England never gave them an inch, never once let up and they didn't know how to combat that, it was a backs against the wall performance but from the front, a master class in defending, as for not scoring a try, it wasn't from the lack of trying but it was more of a we don't need to can you?

Interesting. I'll be watching it later. Good for England.
I know SA fans say the Argies are only dangerous at home?!
But I put them - overall - just above Italy. They have grown since being included in the Rugby Championship.

[Madron]

The pundits were very divided tonight on whether it was a poor/undisciplined Argentina display or a top English performance, my answer to that is it was a superb English performance that forced an undisciplined Argentina performance, I honestly reckon once Ford's 2nd drop goal went over they were stunned and thought f**k we actually have to play here, but England never gave them an inch, never once let up and they didn't know how to combat that, it was a backs against the wall performance but from the front, a master class in defending, as for not scoring a try, it wasn't from the lack of trying but it was more of a we don't need to can you?

I didn't stay up to hear what the pundits thought ,but ,for me, it was Argentinas ineptitude that was the key factor. They were awful.
Calling Englands performance 'superb' is very generous. Defensively they were very good, helped greatly by Argentinas inability to form any sort of attacking moves.
Like I said before the game, I didn't expect to see too much in the way of running rugby and so it proved. I don't remember England threatening their line even once.
Argentina made more runs and more metres, Our back line weren't in the game offensively, May 2 runs for 14m, Daly 2 for 5m, Tuilagi 3 for 7m. Hardly earth shattering stats.
As i said ,defensively very good (and lucky) but as for calling their performance superb ?,far from it, from me.

[Madron]

Interesting. I'll be watching it later. Good for England.
I know SA fans say the Argies are only dangerous at home?!
But I put them - overall - just above Italy. They have grown since being included in the Rugby Championship.

In the last 12 months The Pumas have beaten NZ and Australia both away And England at Twickers.
Italy are light years (literally) away from achieving that feat.

[Kennyb41]

Wasn't able to watch it live - have it recorded. Sounds like a solid performance from England.
But Pumas very undisciplined, so any concerns England didn't score a try? Can't rely on getting that number of kickable opportunities all the time.

SA Scotland game tomorrow should be good. Scotland can be giant slayers.

For me England definitely had a gameplan and i've never seen them so focused in a long time, now you'll have to make your own mind up whether Argentina were shite or whether England just totally flummoxed and forced them into errors (which were everywhere)

Sir Clive when asked were England that good or were Argentina that bad said 'a bit of both', i'm more 'England were very good, and made them look bad

The sending off just didn't seem to affect them 1 iota, you just didn't even notice it, they were that focused, every single one of them seemed to know their role and they looked like a 'team'

I'll never know what the sending off did to them, whether it galvanised them or not, but imo they just didn't look any different and there was no huge shake up or panic stations it was as if they weren't arsed and just cracked on.

It's hard to talk about try situations coz they were a man down - Argentina were bad - But did England rattle them with a gameplan and make them look bad ? I think so myself.

Anyway, the effort was 100% and Itoje was dead on his feet at the end along with the rest, it's definitely given me renewed hope we can do the Aussie lucky twats, i just hope i'm not jumping the gun.

It obviously would be interesting to know what would've happened had we 15 on the grass for the duration or whether we'd have played differently, but i don't think so, he came with a plan, they stuck to it and they pulled it off in good fashion.

I now am hoping he's playing his cards to his chest, and has been all along in the build up.

I hope to fck i'm not getting carried away with the one result.

I was 99% sticking £100 on England to win prior to the sending off, i thought i'd watch them start, then decide, i thought 'fck that' after the sending off....DOH!

[Kennyb41]

Interesting. I'll be watching it later. Good for England.
I know SA fans say the Argies are only dangerous at home?!
But I put them - overall - just above Italy. They have grown since being included in the Rugby Championship.

Yeah definitely watch it, you're in for a treat (would be better if you didn't know the score)

No no, they're currently a lot better than Italy and probably the best they've ever been, they're not the minnows they used to be and are miles ahead of Italy atm.

It'll be interesting to get your take on it.

Forget being English or any bias, but our sending off i thought was wrong and so did all the tv studio, they both should've been yellow, and i'm soooooo glad they still won after thinking it had ruined it as a contest.

[Tighthead]

Argentina were so off the ball, they looked undercooked. They had no zip or vigour. England played to a gameplan and it worked. England were not outstanding.

[Kennyb41]

I didn't stay up to hear what the pundits thought ,but ,for me, it was Argentinas ineptitude that was the key factor. They were awful.
Calling Englands performance 'superb' is very generous. Defensively they were very good, helped greatly by Argentinas inability to form any sort of attacking moves.
Like I said before the game, I didn't expect to see too much in the way of running rugby and so it proved. I don't remember England threatening their line even once.
Argentina made more runs and more metres, Our back line weren't in the game offensively, May 2 runs for 14m, Daly 2 for 5m, Tuilagi 3 for 7m. Hardly earth shattering stats.
As i said ,defensively very good (and lucky) but as for calling their performance superb ?,far from it, from me.

It 100% contributed and they were awful, but was that because of Englands speed, i hope i'm not giving England too much credit here, but it's the way i saw it, i haven't seen them as a team and plan like that in yonks, and i hope i'm not getting carried away, but i detected a complete change in everything that's been going wrong recently.

I also agree with that, the stats don't lie, was it coz we were a man down and so had to change any plans ? I don't think so myself, they seemed so focused and Daly and May never saw any ball.

I'd like to know if Borthwick had gone to plan B coz of the ending off, i don't think he did.

[Kennyb41]

Argentina were so off the ball, they looked undercooked. They had no zip or vigour. England played to a gameplan and it worked. England were not outstanding.

Seems like i'm getting carried away then, it might be because i'd totally written us off coz of the lead up games and thought we'd lost the plot.

We weren't outstanding no, but it's got me sitting up and wanting to see more, especially if he's got owt else up his sleeve.

[Tighthead]

Seems like i'm getting carried away then, it might be because i'd totally written us off coz of the lead up games and thought we'd lost the plot.

We weren't outstanding no, but it's got me sitting up and wanting to see more, especially if he's got owt else up his sleeve.

We still kicked away ball when we should have kept it closer. We had no go forward ball as we had Manu stuck to the scrum half the time. I had Argentina to beat us as we were awful for the last year.

[Barlow Boy]

I do , I'm Irish so it's kinda in the blood if that makes any sense, ya love Union but mainly international , I'm from Munster but I actually hate them because it's the biggest bandwagon there is outside of Manu, every fucker here supports them and never followed any kind of rugby in their life before, Munster is made up of loads of club sides that never got that kind of support .

For what it's worth I cheer on all the home Nations in the world cup unless it's against Ireland obviously, especially tonight I was an England fan from the start .

But as much as I love Union i'm a massive fan (and prefer) of Rugby League and been a fan of the Rhino's for god knows how long

As mentioned, I’m more League than Union, although I did enjoy that last night. That said, I’m a Cas fan so nothing to cheer in the RL season, at the moment, that is for sure.

Who is your Union club side ?

[Madron]

It 100% contributed and they were awful, but was that because of Englands speed, i hope i'm not giving England too much credit here, but it's the way i saw it, i haven't seen them as a team and plan like that in yonks, and i hope i'm not getting carried away, but i detected a complete change in everything that's been going wrong recently.

I also agree with that, the stats don't lie, was it coz we were a man down and so had to change any plans ? I don't think so myself, they seemed so focused and Daly and May never saw any ball.

I'd like to know if Borthwick had gone to plan B coz of the ending off, i don't think he did.

Playing with 14 instead of 15 isn't the big problem you would think, certainly not enough to alter any strategy to any great extent. Teams are well prepared in covering for a man down.
Finding ,and exploiting the 'empty space' left is very difficult. Just means the 14 must be a little more aware.

Borthwick wouldn't have changed any strategy, and I think he struggles with Plan A let alone any more.

[Kennyb41]

Playing with 14 instead of 15 isn't the big problem you would think, certainly not enough to alter any strategy to any great extent. Teams are well prepared in covering for a man down.
Finding ,and exploiting the 'empty space' left is very difficult. Just means the 14 must be a little more aware.

Borthwick wouldn't have changed any strategy, and I think he struggles with Plan A let alone any more.

I understand being a man down in rugby is nowhere near as bad as football, but to me, and perhaps i am getting carried away, that display last night showed a different England and the best England i've seen in a long time, i could easily be wrong, but i got the impression he's been building up to this knowing all along his best plan.

Time will tell now, and it was far from perfect, but it has given me renewed hope about our chances, i'm not saying they're great, but before this i thought we just can't compete with the big guns, i still wouldn't back us against the top 4 in the other half of the draw, we have to beat Australia at some point in this half unless there's a surprise somewhere, which i doubt, then we could find ourselves in the final.

But to me that was a more polished performance, with a plan executed, but more importantly to me a 'team' performance that for once in recent months seemed to know individually what was wanted from them, there was more cohesion out there than i've seen in ages, and that suggested to me he's been trying different things (without success) whilst knowing what he's building up to and how he'll go.

[Kennyb41]

I'm gonna have me some 9/2 on Scotland to beat Sith Afreeca.

20 dabs i reckon just for some interest, they can be quite explosive when it comes off.

[Kennyb41]

H'mmm got 5/1 on Betfair, probably thrown it away.

[Madron]

This could be explosive- SA by 6

[Madron]

Never understood Hogg not retiring after this WC- he was still top class

[Kennyb41]

Never understood Hogg not retiring after this WC- he was still top class

Me too, baffling, and you'd think he'd want to be in this best Scottish team for a while.

[CUSSIE01]

Very tight 1st half, Scotland doing well to nullify the SA game plan. Big second half. Apparently Hogg said his body nor his head could take any more & felt completely off the pace. Disappointing he couldn’t finish his career off with a World Cup appearance.

[Madron]

Graham butchering the 3 on 1 , needs shooting

[Prisoner37]

I didn't stay up to hear what the pundits thought ,but ,for me, it was Argentinas ineptitude that was the key factor. They were awful.
Calling Englands performance 'superb' is very generous. Defensively they were very good, helped greatly by Argentinas inability to form any sort of attacking moves.
Like I said before the game, I didn't expect to see too much in the way of running rugby and so it proved. I don't remember England threatening their line even once.
Argentina made more runs and more metres, Our back line weren't in the game offensively, May 2 runs for 14m, Daly 2 for 5m, Tuilagi 3 for 7m. Hardly earth shattering stats.
As i said ,defensively very good (and lucky) but as for calling their performance superb ?,far from it, from me.

Last time England won the World Cup it was through defence and a top kicking display.

That winning team also had a Rugby League defensive coach in Phil Larder.
Let's hope Sir Kev can deliver something special, as is his way.