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Wallabies v Pumas, GIO Stadium, Canberra, Sat 16th September

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fatprop

George Gregan (70)
Staff member
Fatprop, to be honest, I'm getting bloody tired of this "rainbow-love" for Timani!
Mate any fringe player not playing in this current back row is improving by simply not playing and selective memories


Sent from my Nexus 9 using Tapatalk
 

Slim 293

Stirling Mortlock (74)
Is the forum displaying like a bucket of shit for anyone else? The background has gone all black and I can't see the little dropdown next to my handle (right side menu) in order to get to subsections of my profile

Yarp, it's been that way for over a week now........
 

Micheal

Nicholas Shehadie (39)
Do we need to crowdfund some maintenance or something?

Any word from the mods?

I spend half my life here so would chip in if it ever comes to something like that.
 

Joe Blow

Peter Sullivan (51)
Its fantastic to finally get a win, but lets be honest. The Pumas are not the greatest finishing side in world rugby and they had us on the run for the first 50 minutes.
It was a good performance but there were still some of the same issues. Handling was poor again and the breakdown work was still not great. 6 continues to be an problem possy.
Scrum was much better as were the front rowers all around.
SA in the republic will be a big test
 

notapatrioticboneinme

Sydney Middleton (9)
Methinks viewers do not appreciate Simmons efforts / ability elsewhere and we're only talking about him because of that run and beautiful off-load. Admittedly the last time he had an opportunity to run in a similar position was when he played 6, yours truly, definitely not a Queenslander
 

Gnostic

Mark Ella (57)
The Wallabies played well in the last 40. Let me preface my next comments with that. They played well in that 40 minutes against the opposition they had.

1) The Argentines are a 40 minute side. In every game I have watched they have played very good rugby for 40 minutes and then gradually fall to bit. They struggle without Crevy on the field and perhaps that is why the other old hard head JM Laguizamon comes about the time Crevy goes off. Not to take away from the players they have starting but imagine if they had their other first class players available such as Hernandez and a few front rowers in Euroland.
2) Hanigan is not lightweight, he is the same weight in terms of mass as other backrowers of his position (apart from a couple of behemoths) what he is desperately lacking is technique and application. He is a modern Richard Brown or McCalman. All action and no impact. He makes lots of tackles to have good numbers, but there are glaring misses and those tackles he makes are invariably passive. None of the reasons for his selection stack up. The lineout, scrum and breakdown are weak, until the opposition is buggered.
3) The scrum worries me still. This Argentine scrum as I alluded to above is nowhere near its historical best and is without significant members such as Ramero Herera, Marcos Ayerza.
4) Tactics are still a major worry with restarts and exits being a massive concern, as they have been for two years. I seriously doubt the coaching intelligence of the Wallabies that sees Foley still the primary exit kicker when Hodge, Beale or DHP is/are in the team.
5) The crazy persistence of the run everything game plan. A few times Beale kicked for territory and we saw the shadows of a complete game plan. Against a solid effective defence like the ABs (who got their shit together in style last night), England and even Scotland the run everything game plan, especially when the exist strategy is Foley kicking from the in-goal, is just a recipe for being in your own half under pressure for the whole game. That coupled with a defensive structure which appears happy to concede metres on the fringes and rely on scrambling defenders to cover is a recipe for conceding points or penalties.

My conclusion is that the players have played well with the tools given them and even if they could put together a 80 minute performance the tools are fundamentally flawed in the areas of a)selection (especially at 6 and replacement), b) inconsistency in selection (identify a locking combination and stick with it FFS excluding injury), c) tactics - how about addressing the glaring issues surrounding exit strategy. How about developing a more balanced attacking structure tactic. d) defence - kudos to the players for showing the commitment and effort to scramble and dig deep, but a lot of that energy and effort is wasted as the structure is allowing the breaks to be made in the first place, and fatigue from that effort leads to other bad decisions and further errors and expenditure.

I suspect that with the tactics and structures we are seeing this is the ceiling of performance that we can expect. Yes it has been very good for 40 minutes three weeks running and the players are doing their part with admirable effort. I just don't think they are being well served before they take the field. My General Melchard video deserves another posting to explain the Wallaby's coaching tactical meetings.

 

Brumby Runner

David Wilson (68)
Is the forum displaying like a bucket of shit for anyone else? The background has gone all black and I can't see the little dropdown next to my handle (right side menu) in order to get to subsections of my profile

Yep - exactly the same for me. A couple of other new annoyances as well.
 

Brumby Runner

David Wilson (68)
2) Hanigan is not lightweight, he is the same weight in terms of mass as other backrowers of his position (apart from a couple of behemoths) what he is desperately lacking is technique and application. He is a modern Richard Brown or McCalman. All action and no impact. He makes lots of tackles to have good numbers, but there are glaring misses and those tackles he makes are invariably passive. None of the reasons for his selection stack up. The lineout, scrum and breakdown are weak, until the opposition is buggered.

Gnostic, I heartily agree with every point you've made. But particularly in relation to the No 6 spot, I note in an above post there is some suggestion Cheika might consider Tui for the 6 spot. I think that could be a move well worth having a look at. Tui was really strong playing for Brisbane City today and appears to have the skills, size and pace to handle the 6 spot. But even as good as Tui was, Matt Philip was better in his game for the Spirit v the Rams. He also has the skills, size and pace to play 6, as demonstrated today on a number of occasions he broke the defensive line and then set up his support players to make more ground or score. He had a belter.
 

fatprop

George Gregan (70)
Staff member
The Wobs press conference, (it won't embed)

And the it does o_O

For those interested he talks 6s & options
 
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