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Who's to Blame?

Who's to Blame?

  • John O'Neill

    Votes: 31 25.4%
  • Robbie Deans

    Votes: 31 25.4%
  • Jim Williams

    Votes: 0 0.0%
  • David Pocock

    Votes: 7 5.7%
  • Bryce Lawrence

    Votes: 6 4.9%
  • Will Genia

    Votes: 5 4.1%
  • Tom Carter

    Votes: 10 8.2%
  • Poseidon

    Votes: 5 4.1%
  • Julia Gillard and the Greens

    Votes: 17 13.9%
  • Matt Giteau

    Votes: 10 8.2%

  • Total voters
    122
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ChargerWA

Mark Loane (55)
Robbie Deans.

Out coached at every turn. Who would have ever guessed that in wet weather, if you get up off your defensive line you can cut down all the opposition teams attack. Robbie didn't. No plan B......ever.
 

Athilnaur

Arch Winning (36)
The three people who failed to change it up after ten minutes of failing to get over the line in the second half with endless pick and goes. It got to the stage I was begging for box kicks and bombs.

Ath.
 

cyclopath

George Smith (75)
Staff member
Robbie Deans.

Out coached at every turn. Who would have ever guessed that in wet weather, if you get up off your defensive line you can cut down all the opposition teams attack. Robbie didn't. No plan B......ever.
We did that. I thought the basic plan was good - as evidenced in the first half. Pick and go, done well got us out of our 22 and half very nicely. Trying to hold the ball for 20 phases would always be tough, but they did it pretty well. Second half, we got into good position the same way, started to make some holes ( Barnes inside ball to Ioane) and should have capitalised. But we tried to do too much at the wrong times, when there was slow or back foot ball was not the time for moving it wider or going one out.
We should have taken the 3.
We should have kept them there with little grubbers or chips behind the fast defence if needs be.
The execution at critical times was poor, and some bad decisions made by players who probably should do better.
So yeah, maybe a Plan B, but I don't think what looked like Plan A was busted, just not done as well as it should have been.
I'm not apologising for the coaches necessarily, but I don't think they went about that all wrong, planning wise.
 

Reddy!

Bob Davidson (42)
I started laughing when this game finished and the Scots won. Good for them, they deserved it.

Bottom line: rugby is a game and Scotland won the game by playing better during the game. Keep things simple people, please.

I would like to pose the question, however, of what would have happened if Quade Cooper was starting at 10?
 

cyclopath

George Smith (75)
Staff member
I started laughing when this game finished and the Scots won. Good for them, they deserved it.

Bottom line: rugby is a game and Scotland won the game by playing better during the game. Keep things simple people, please.

I would like to pose the question, however, of what would have happened if Quade Cooper was starting at 10?
Hopping? Seriously, I'm not sure he'd have won it, nor been any worse.
 

Reddy!

Bob Davidson (42)
Oh, I wasn't inferring he would have been better either. But Quade + shithouse weather + rush defense doesn't paint pretty pictures in my head.
 

Riptide

Dave Cowper (27)
This Scottish team is poor. They will not have a single player starting for the Lions next year with Grey maybe getting into the 22.

Yes, the conditions were equalizers but the ABs would never lose to this outfit in the wet and neither would any of the 6N's teams who regularly beat up on Scotland. The Wallabies are the only team this very limited Scotland side has beaten this year.

There was a lack of game prep for sure, but this Wallabies team spends more time in camp together than ANY other test side. Admittedly, there were a few new faces but the patterns should have been familiar to them. Donald shows up as 4th choice fly half merely days for the ABs and performs adequately in the biggest game of any professional NZ'er rugby career.

More than anything, the attitude is wrong. It was evident in prior defeats to Samoa, Scotland, England and Ireland where the performances were just awful. It has been evident in several performances against the ABs. I can stomach the Wallabies losing to a better team on the day when we show up and play. Too frequently, the Wallabies do not show up with the necessary fight, commitment, belief and work ethic. It's not an occasional drop in standards; we have become infuriatingly inconsistent. We may not have the player depth of NZ, SA or France but too often back-ups fail to perform adequately because they fail to fire and perform to their abilities. To me this is a coaching issue.

It's easy to pile on and put the boot into Deans but I feel that there is something not right in this squad. Something is not gelling and hasn't for years.

At the very least, the Wallabies need to play up to their abilities and not down to the oppositions. Under Deans, we have not done so consistently. I really think McKenzie should be appointed after the Welsh series and allowed to develop the team before the Lions series next year which is so important for rugby in Australia. Rugby is Australia is suffering and people are turning away from the game. I am not that happy with McKenzie who seems to have engineered his getaway plan quite nicely at the Reds and saddled them with an inferior coach while taking care of his coaching mates and backroom staff. It works out well for him, for his staff but maybe not so well for the Reds. However, he is the best qualified man to lead the Wallabies forward and the ARU should bite the bullet and get it done.
 

cyclopath

George Smith (75)
Staff member
Oh, I wasn't inferring he would have been better either. But Quade + shithouse weather + rush defense doesn't paint pretty pictures in my head.
Indeed, but what if Robinson had been at LHP at the last scrum?
Who knows?
We had enough opportunity, with the players on the field, to win. We didn't, but it wasn't down to one of them. IMO.
 
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