France v Australia, Saturday 19 November

[Hugh Jarse]

From the ARU PR Unit

How it happened:
6 mins: Maxime Machenaud pen AUS 0-3 FRA
17 mins: Virimi Vakatawa try AUS 0-8 FRA
22 mins: Bernard Foley pen AUS 3-8 FRA
24 mins: penalty try, Bernard Foley con AUS 10-8 FRA
24 mins: Charles Ollivon yellow card
37 mins: Bernard Foley pen, AUS 13-8 FRA
41 mins: Maxime Machenaud pen, AUS 13-11 FRA
HALF TIME
43 mins: Bernard Foley try, Bernard Foley con, AUS 20-11 FRA
53 mins: Jean-Marc Doussain try, AUS 20-16 FRA
58 mins: Tevita Kuridrani try, AUS 25-16 FRA
67 mins: Wesley Fofana try, Maxime Machenaud con, AUS 25-23 FRA
FULL TIME

Australia 25 (Bernard Foley, Tevita Kuridrani tries; penalty try; Bernard Foley 2 cons; 2 pens) defeated France 23 (Virimi Vakatawa, Wesley Fontana, Jean-Marc Doussain tries; Maxime Machenaud 1 con; 2 pens)

 

[Strewthcobber]

Big effort from some players tonight

Tackles
Simmons 17
Douglas 13
Godwin 12 (0 missed)
Pocock 12
Fardy 11

Missed tackles
Naivalu 3
Foley 2
Sio 2
Simmons 2

Carries
Simmons 12
McMahon 10
AAA 9
Pocock 7
Slipper 6
Douglas 6

 

[Brumby Runner]

An excellent win against a talented French side who wanted to play. And a good game of rugby to boot.

Initial thoughts;

Agree mostly Lindommer. If Henry is to be replaced (and I don't think he necessarily has to be on last night's offerings), then I'd have no objection to either Naivalu or Morahan getting a start. I'd like to really keep my powder dry on this atm though until we see the tackling stats come out. The two wingers swapped sides fairly constantly during the game, and I'm not sure that TOCC has it right that all thge missed tackles down the right side were by Henry.

Robbie Nock knows SFA about the laws of the game. He got every one of Jackson's rulings wrong as far as I can recall. Lyons actually corrected him on a few occasions.

 

[KOB1987]

After seeing those stats I'd just like to throw in that in 80 minutes Fardy had 4 carries for 1 meter and conceded 2 turnovers. By way of comparison Skelton in 10 minutes was 4-2-1.

I'll wait to see Forcefans stats but you want your 6 to have bigger impact than that. He made a few tackles but so he should.

The point to this is I don't think there is any question that Pocock has to be at 6 next week, which means Simmons starts with Arnold.

 

[USARugger]

Watching bits and pieces of the match before I go out but it looks like Naivalu put on a bit of a "how to defend an overlap as a wing" masterclass in Paris despite the missed tackle stats. Funny enough he was doing pretty much the exact opposite of what we've been seeing Speight do the last few weeks, funny stuff.

Which raises the question of how it's even possible two wingers in the same test side playing at the same time are singing from such seemingly different defensive hymn sheets/flow charts.

 

[ReggieJackson]

I'm not 100% sure on the Laws, but the 1st try from the French. The winger went past the ball at the breakdown and then reached back to pick it up. I thought they have changed the rules on this in the past few years.

Good win from the Wallabies.

 

[Strewthcobber]

Watching bits and pieces of the match before I go out but it looks like Naivalu put on a bit of a "how to defend an overlap as a wing" masterclass in Paris despite the missed tackle stats. Funny enough he was doing pretty much the exact opposite of what we've been seeing Speight do the last few weeks, funny stuff.

Which raises the question of how it's even possible two wingers in the same test side playing at the same time are singing from such seemingly different defensive hymn sheets/flow charts.

Speights been defending in the centres though hasn't he?

One of the issues with replacing him with Morahan or Naivalu. They have to defend in the midfield and there's no evidence that they would do any better

 

[TOCC]

I'm not 100% sure on the Laws, but the 1st try from the French. The winger went past the ball at the breakdown and then reached back to pick it up. I thought they have changed the rules on this in the past few years.

Good win from the Wallabies.

I thought so as well, I thought that if you went past the call you're considered part of the ruck and can't pick up the ball.. although the French player did it fairly fluidly, if there were a longer pause between joining the ruck and picking up the ball it may have been a penalty

 

[Rugrat]

Skelton much better tonight so far

Better because he didn't get a yellow only. Makes no metres with ball in hand, lost ball at breakdown, packs to high in scrum and we lose drive on thiat side of scrum. Average player based on average performance of core positional skills,

 

[Joe Blow]

A couple of blokes impressed tonight.
Simmons is really putting in and is trying very hard to emulate Colemans recent form. He is the best bloke to replace the injured Tasmanian.
Fardy was one of our best in the lineout and had a real presence at the breakdown. He should either start at 6 next week or be on the bench in place of Mumm.
Morahan is DHP mark II. He has all the skills and a back 3 of he, DHP and Folau has everything. enough said.

Our LH prop stocks are clearly struggling. Yes the enormous French TH was turning in and pulling down but just go in with the sole intention of staying up and straight. Don't rely on the ref to ping whats happening across from you. I would be tempted to start AAA at LH with Kepu on the tight side against both Ireland and England and hope that our bench blokes can play out the last 20 minutes against the replacements. Sio has been struggling as well.

It was a good performance and great to have another win. Others who showed good glimpses were Sefa, Godwin, McMahon and Douglas. Picking the side for next week should be pretty straight forward.

 

[BDA]

I'm guessing some poster is me. We all have different views of the game. I just happen to think he played as badly as you..Forums are all about differing opinions aren't they?

It wasnt specifically directed at you. Someone had a go at me a few weeks ago after i said that speight should be dropped after the welsh game. He's just not living up to my high expectations of him. Agree with comments on the podcast that he looks a bit small (?) Is it possible he's a few kilos lighter coming from 7s? Not sure.

 

[galumay]

Well i guess there is some irony in Foley's kicking winnning the Wallabies another game! Doubtless Cheika will be happy to scratch another win on the belt - as unconvincing as it was.

I guess the purpose was served, key players were rested, fringe squad members got a run in a real test match and it counts as a win regardless.

The French lost that game all on their own, probably should have won it by 10 or so at least if they had just taken their kicking opportunities, let alone the other mistakes in promising field positions.

I guess there is nothing really to take away from a game like this in terms of how they will go against the Irish, the exception being Foley's return to goal kicking accuracy. It still looks a big ask against a side that troubled the AB's much more than the Wallabies have all year.

 

[wamberal]

You might have been unconvinced - I thought it was a bloody good performance from a scratch side.

 

[Strewthcobber]

You might have been unconvinced - I thought it was a bloody good performance from a scratch side.

Don't get the negativity.

Godwin stood up, Morahan showed he would be an able replacement for either Izzy or DHP, second choice back row did the trick, our lineout actually disrupted theirs and our new hooker won all of his throws.

Maulling was a feature all game andwe saw one of australia's great tries.

Sure the scrum creaked up against a very wiley opposition, and the backline defended like they just met each other, but the French offload game was good, it was a terrific tight match an we just beat France in Paris with a drop goal between the teams.

Got to love test match rugby

 

[BDA]

Yeh i cant agree with the suggestion that "france should have won it by 10". If anything the wallabies probably should have closed out the game with about 20 minutes to go but just got sloppy and left the door ajar for the french. In all of the circumstances, the fact that it was largely a 2nd string starting side and beating france in france is no easy task, im happy enough with the performance.

 

[fatprop]

Yeah lots of positives out of this game including finding a way to win again against a side who played quite well at times, much tougher games ahead

Sent from my Nexus 5 using Tapatalk

 

[Mr Doug]

Watching the French News on SBS and the lead item is Le Rugby.

We will be lucky to get a mention at the end of the Sports news on our FTA TV stations, "Thanks for that report on the Combat Knitting match between Parramatta Chamber of Commerce and Footscray Heat, Jeff. Now in news to hand, the Australian Wallabies have beaten France in Paris by 25-23 in a close match. Next up will be Rachel with today's weather . . ."

Ch 7 and Ch 9 both had items (with film) in their sports reports at the end of the news this morning, and ABC "Offsiders" mentioned it briefly (no film), at the end of their regular half-hour segment.

 

[Gagger]

I completely stand by my opinion that it would have been better to rotate say 3 players per game in each of the first three rather than 11 in one game.

Better for continuity and better for the new players coming in while achieving a similar result in resting key players.

You can stand by it but it got well and truly smashed.

What that match proved was that even the fringe squad is now able to slot into Cheika's pattern of play - Godwin and Morahan were great cases in point.

Some of the attacking interplay in midfield was just excellent. It was on the edges of the tight forward range that things got rickety - I think that's when we were missing our new lock finds and probably Hooper.

BTW - anyone else notice just how similar the Wallabies and Ireland's attack patterns are? While the Irish create better set piece control as a platform for it, I think our pack's dynamism has the edge.

Both sides can give the ABs a big headache with it (notwithstanding Welsh refs ) and it'll be fascinating to watch next week.

Finally - as a moderator I will say that relentless negativity in a community like this is an insidious form of trolling that just ruins everyone else's enjoyment and quality of discussion.

Galumnay - you're a perfect example of this. Every one of your contributions I can remember seeing has just been negative bilge, regardless of fact. It's neither insightful or balanced, just boring and slightly unhinged.

To all - I would happily choose quality over quantity every time. See this as a big hint.

 

[galumay]

Finally - as a moderator I will say that relentless negativity in a community like this is an insidious form of trolling that just ruins everyone else's enjoyment and quality of discussion.

Galumnay - you're a perfect example of this. Every one of your contributions I can remember seeing has just been negative bilge, regardless of fact. It's neither insightful or balanced, just boring and slightly unhinged.

To all - I would happily choose quality over quantity every time. See this as a big hint.

Regardless of the irrelevance of your position as a moderator, it displays very poor analytical and discussion skills if you perceive those with a differnce of opinion to yours as negative. Its also a very poor form of argument to attack a person rather than their argument.

Calling my posts "negative bilge" is the sort of personal attack worthy of moderation, calling my comments "boring and slightly unhinged" is also playing the man.

How can you have an informed discussion that provides "enjoyment and quality.." if you are only going to allow commentary that aligns with your personal opinion?

Rather than launching a personal attack on me, you would improve the quality of the forum if you focussed on putting your opinions foward in an articulate and non personal manner, and where you disagree with someone else's opinion, then putting a counter point for discussion.

 

[Train Without a Station]

Geez that's a bit rich.

How did the view get well and truly smashed? The Wallabies snuck by what ended up being about a meter (the width of the missed drop goal). The only way you could think it was well and truly smashed is if you thought it was a great idea to begin with.

The team did what it needed to get the win so I guess it vindicates Cheika's decision as it puts them in the position they wanted to be for the last 2 games. You can't pretend it wasn't a risk, or e en an unacceptable risk though. But it came rather close to Reg's point about if this game was lost due to focusing on the next 2, it would make losing either unacceptable.

Wha it proved is that there's not a lot between the top team and the replacement options.

The positive is that the team was able to grind out the win when they weren't in the front foot which I consider important as we are not strong enough in the pack to be on the front foot regularly against top teams.

It's unfair to call negativity as trolling simply because you sit on the other side of it. A larger majority probably consider the negative views to be realism. The vast majority is a logical discussion debating the merits of certain things. Remember we had some similar wins in 2015 against similar teams when everybody wanted t say how good we were and rolled into 2016 losing 3-0 because we simply weren't as good many as we thought we were.

You made GAGR what it is so you have the right to run the forum how you like, but a small section from one region howling down anybody that disagrees and tries to label anybody who has has a view that is different to the coaching staff as lacking merit based on the coach's view being automatically superior, does just as much to ruin the enjoyment.

It's one thing to logically dissect opposing views and destroy the argument with facts, it's another to just dismiss them.

It's also a bit rich when much of the positivity brigade were happy to borderline troll about the disallowed try in Bled 3, then accuse any kiwi who dared simply point out that the laws aligned with the decision, of being a troll. Granted there were 1 or 2 real kiwi trolls, most simply tried to put together a valid argument citing things like laws and logic to support their argumen and were then called trolls by people who could only mount an emotive and unsupported counter argument.