I thought Foley was our MOTM on Sunday morning. Lead the attack really well and I think whilst Arnold or Coleman may have been better, I seemed to notice Foley more so.
I also think Kuridrani showed what he is capable of when he's operating with a bit of space, rather than basically getting tackled as soon as he catches the ball. I'd really like to see us go back to Kerevindrani when Kerevi is fit again and push Hodge back out to Speight's wing. Speight is the one player who's really struggled to impose himself on the game in any way these last 2 games despite the backline getting more opportunities.
But let's not get carried away with that game. Wales have shipped an average of 28 points per game in 2016 and 38.5 points per game their last 4 outings prior to this. One of those most recent outings was against the Chiefs without their top players, whilst the team we faced was missing 4 of their key players.
We were over twice as effective (frequency) in breaking the line as we were against the All Blacks but were largely dominant in the pack around the ground which enabled us to operate on the front foot. For most of the first half we enjoyed 90% possession also and ended with 68% for the entire half. I think this made us appear better than we were in that we scored tries so quickly, so it seemed that we could score 6 or 7, but ultimately when the possession evened out, we only created 1 more, with the last being an intercept.
Oddly Wales did make some big hits (I saw them smash Timani back a few times) but it seemed rather than dominate the contact area, they were only able to make the odd bell ringer and then go back to being on the back foot.
This allowed Phipps to operate with minimal pressure.
In the 2nd half (specifically around the first 15 minutes I noticed) they seemed to improve and that's where we saw the downside from Foley such as repetitive options (another kick to the winger, except around halfway and this time it was due to spotting the overlap again, throwing an intercept and aimless sideways running before distributing to somebody in a worse position to get tackled 5 meters further back.
Coupled with general kicking against the better packs like England and possibly Ireland, if our pack is under pressure it will be back to more of the same for us from earlier in the season unless we can be more composed when we are put under pressure.
Unsurprisingly Foley had a poor night with the boot. Not because he's a terrible kicker, but because he'd had a good run with easier kicks, so it was bound to even back out again at some point. This was the point where on the night almost every kick was outside the 15m lines rather than inside.
The other thing was the scrum really did not look that strong at any point and I imagine we will be more tested by other packs.
