Jim Williams BONED

[Hawko]

When Graham was skills coach many on here were calling for him to be sacked...

I was one of them and I don't resile from it. Disco's point about assistants doesn't make sense to me as Deans seems to have been the backs coach all along. I thought our backs skills and running lines were generally poor in 2010, hence my opinion about Graham's lack of success. The poor back play in 2011 was primarily down to selection and game strategy.

The crime against humanity is that our current crop of backs is a once in a lifetime gathering of talent that is being hopelessly squandered. Genia, Burgess, Cooper, Barnes, O'Connor, Tapuai, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper), Ioane, Mitchell, Beale (leaving out some really promising up-and-comers) are the greatest collection of backline talent that we have ever had and we should be murdering every other team even if we are existing on about 30% possession. We will look back on this era and the profligate waste Deans has made of it with sadness in years to come.

 

[Knuckles]

love that quote from nutta there hawko

 

[Bullrush]

I was one of them and I don't resile from it. Disco's point about assistants doesn't make sense to me as Deans seems to have been the backs coach all along. I thought our backs skills and running lines were generally poor in 2010, hence my opinion about Graham's lack of success. The poor back play in 2011 was primarily down to selection and game strategy.

The crime against humanity is that our current crop of backs is a once in a lifetime gathering of talent that is being hopelessly squandered. Genia, Burgess, Cooper, Barnes, O'Connor, Tapuai, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper), Ioane, Mitchell, Beale (leaving out some really promising up-and-comers) are the greatest collection of backline talent that we have ever had and we should be murdering every other team even if we are existing on about 30% possession. We will look back on this era and the profligate waste Deans has made of it with sadness in years to come.

The whole second part of this is just rubbish. The guys you named are not miles ahead of every other international player in their position. Some of them wouldn't even be in the Top 3 in 2011. And as for murdering teams on 30% possession - this is exactly the mentality the Wallbies need to get rid of and instead drill into their heads that forwards win rugby games.....the backs just decide by how much.

 

[Hawko]

The whole second part of this is just rubbish. The guys you named are not miles ahead of every other international player in their position. Some of them wouldn't even be in the Top 3 in 2011. And as for murdering teams on 30% possession - this is exactly the mentality the Wallbies need to get rid of and instead drill into their heads that forwards win rugby games.....the backs just decide by how much.

Maybe as individuals they are lesser than Campese and Horan, but as a collective group they have more natural talent than Jones grand slam team or McQueen's 1999 - 2001 team.

Being a Kiwi you probably don't know much about the Randwick teams in the 60's and 70's who regularly won games with 30% possession. It was all their backs ever needed. I agree that the conventional wisdom these days is that the pigs win the game, everyone says it and everyone believes it. But I saw then that a truth that everyone believed to be a fundamental law of the game was actually not necessarily so. Usually the forward influence on the game is what decides the outcome, but it doesn't have to be that way if the backs play with enough skill and belief.

That is not to say that I advocate crappy forward play, a glimpse of just a few of my posts will show that. Some of the best rugby memories I have are connected to days where our forward pack got over the top of New Zealand (few and far between though they were). But it just shits me to tears to see the talent in our current backline being so wasted by bad selection and coaching.

 

[Dan54]

Maybe as individuals they are lesser than Campese and Horan, but as a collective group they have more natural talent than Jones grand slam team or McQueen's 1999 - 2001 team.

Being a Kiwi you probably don't know much about the Randwick teams in the 60's and 70's who regularly won games with 30% possession. It was all their backs ever needed. I agree that the conventional wisdom these days is that the pigs win the game, everyone says it and everyone believes it. But I saw then that a truth that everyone believed to be a fundamental law of the game was actually not necessarily so. Usually the forward influence on the game is what decides the outcome, but it doesn't have to be that way if the backs play with enough skill and belief.

That is not to say that I advocate crappy forward play, a glimpse of just a few of my posts will show that. Some of the best rugby memories I have are connected to days where our forward pack got over the top of New Zealand (few and far between though they were). But it just shits me to tears to see the talent in our current backline being so wasted by bad selection and coaching.

To be fair Hawko, I think you can win club games with 30% possesion, but there is no way in present day professional rugby is it ever going to happen in test matches, not with any teams playing internaional rugby anyway, the gaps between the backlines in skill isn't that big, and defence is a lot tighter these days.

 

[Sully]

Australia v South Africa. World cup 2011

 

[Dan54]

This is what really gets me. Its like we have just become All Black Lite, really similar but not quite as good.

I think the 'its deans coaching' and the 'we don't have the cattle' agruments are actually one and the same. We don't have the deveopment pathways that produce enough good players to be the All Blacks and Deans is not being canny enough in using what we do have. He just keeps trying replicate the only game plan he knows, It works really well if you can develop players through lower grades to be the players you want but it takes time.

So my proposal is that we promote Deans to a position of National Coaching Director get him start running scrum camps and play whats in front of you drills at schools all over the country. If he sticks at it for another 5 -8 years he'll have the robots he needs and then he can be the nationl coach again (hopefully not). In the meantime he has nothing to do with the wallabies and the super teams can have him at their disgression.

Then we can get get a coach that better understands the Australian rugby landscape.

I actually think the trouble he has is he has too many robots now, not enough players that can think on their feet, I believe it is because too many players go into academies at a young age and get taught "systems" rugby,which I always thought that MacQueen and Jones as national coaches were strong advocates. My experience in club rugby since being in Aus is that players tend to play this way to quite a degree. I really think it is from over coaching in younger years.

 

[Dan54]

Australia v South Africa. World cup 2011

Fair enough Sully, but was it on 30% possession only? I know Wallabies had a lot less ball, not sure if amount was that much but am happy to be proved wrong. I also thought it not a case of a brilliant backline winning with little ball as much as a team not knowing how to win.

 

[disco]

I was one of them and I don't resile from it. Disco's point about assistants doesn't make sense to me as Deans seems to have been the backs coach all along. I thought our backs skills and running lines were generally poor in 2010, hence my opinion about Graham's lack of success. The poor back play in 2011 was primarily down to selection and game strategy.

The crime against humanity is that our current crop of backs is a once in a lifetime gathering of talent that is being hopelessly squandered. Genia, Burgess, Cooper, Barnes, O'Connor, Tapuai, AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper), Ioane, Mitchell, Beale (leaving out some really promising up-and-comers) are the greatest collection of backline talent that we have ever had and we should be murdering every other team even if we are existing on about 30% possession. We will look back on this era and the profligate waste Deans has made of it with sadness in years to come.

I thought our backs were much better in 2010 those two games in South Africa & then the way they performed in Sydney, Honkers & Paris I thought was the best our backs had ever played under Robbie Deans.

The complete RWC was just one big Cluster it still almost seems to me that it was an inside job it was that bad.

 

[Slash]

I thought our backs were much better in 2010 those two games in South Africa & then the way they performed in Sydney, Honkers & Paris I thought was the best our backs had ever played under Robbie Deans.

The complete RWC was just one big Cluster it still almost seems to me that it was an inside job it was that bad.

Some might even say the highest paid NZRU Coach was Robbie Deans...........I will NEVER understand or accept why Barnes was left out of the big games. Particularly after QC (Quade Cooper) was just so terrible and clearly a target for the AB's.

case in point below.................but we've all argued this point. QC (Quade Cooper) must have pictures of Deans shagging a donkey or something.

 

[qwerty51]

Would a proud Kiwi who has watched his nation struggle to win the WC for the last 24 years really want to see them knocked out again...

I bet he was secretly grinning afterwards

 

[Schadenfreude]

I will NEVER understand or accept why Barnes was left out of the big games.

He would probably suit Dingo's game plan better - but he's not as dangerous as Cooper.

 

[Slim 293]

He would probably suit Dingo's game plan better - but he's not as dangerous as Cooper.

That's true.

There was nobody more dangerous to the Wallaby's World Cup chances than Cooper...

 

[Slash]

Deans found out the hard way that you cannot hide someone at that level..............and look at how well Digby played on the UK tour. Stop and ask yourself why he was so good......................because he was so fresh because he wasn't having to do the defence of someone else! This reason alone should be good enough for Deans to only pick QC (Quade Cooper) on the bench for the remainder of both of their careers

 

[Inside Shoulder]

Deans found out the hard way that you cannot hide someone at that level..............and look at how well Digby played on the UK tour. Stop and ask yourself why he was so good......................because he was so fresh because he wasn't having to do the defence of someone else! This reason alone should be good enough for Deans to only pick QC (Quade Cooper) on the bench for the remainder of both of their careers

geez.....l thought Digby was pretty ordinary on tour: his handling was shocking. He did some flashy stuff but his fundamentals were poor.

 

[Schadenfreude]

This reason alone should be good enough for Deans to only pick QC (Quade Cooper) on the bench for the remainder of both of their careers

QC (Quade Cooper) is 23 - and I think I'm right in saying was the most dangerous player in S15 this year. Barnes is 25? and spent most of the year in a darkened room... so you think Barnes should be picked ahead of Cooper for the next 10 years based on a poorly planned WC and an underwhelming post season tour?

 

[qwerty51]

geez.....l thought Digby was pretty ordinary on tour: his handling was shocking. He did some flashy stuff but his fundamentals were poor.

You think everyone is terrible, everything that comes out of your mouth is negative

 

[Bullrush]

Deans found out the hard way that you cannot hide someone at that level..............and look at how well Digby played on the UK tour. Stop and ask yourself why he was so good......................because he was so fresh because he wasn't having to do the defence of someone else! This reason alone should be good enough for Deans to only pick QC (Quade Cooper) on the bench for the remainder of both of their careers

The complete RWC was just one big Cluster it still almost seems to me that it was an inside job it was that bad.

That's true.

There was nobody more dangerous to the Wallaby's World Cup chances than Cooper...

Before the RWC, so many people here were trying to tell me that the Wallabies couldn't win the thing without Cooper. Now he's the reason they lost. Both of which is rubbish.

The Wallabies were always gonna be in trouble from the moment the squad was named.

Ben McCalman - useless. Should have taken Phil Waugh.
Radike Samo - old and not a lot of international experience.
Wycliff Palu - injured. Hardly played in 12 months.
Rocky Elsom - way out of form before injury. Played 60 min of Super Rugby.
Rob Simmons - no exprience.
Nathan Sharpe - best lock in Aussie but hardly got used.
James Slipper - no experience.
Salesi Ma’afu - useless but who else do you take I guess?
Tatafu Polota-Nau - coming back from injury. Not even close to fit.
Drew Mitchell - rushed back from serious injury. Was always asking for trouble.
Rob Horne - no experience. Did he play any Super Rugby?
Pat McCabe/Anthony Fainga'a - again, zero experience. Should have taken Mortlock instead of one of these guys.
Quade Cooper - should have had better advice from Deans or whoever.

Probably all for a different thread but yeah......QC (Quade Cooper) wasn't responsible for the RWC performances. Look at the coaches - Jim Williams deserved to go I think.

 

[Newter]

That's true.

There was nobody more dangerous to the Wallaby's World Cup chances than Cooper...

The Quade-bashing here is strangely over the top. I think if you watch the semi-final over again, you'll see how important he was to the side. Especially as a ball runner and wide defender, believe it or not. Even putting aside the composed drop goal he slotted to put us 6-11 deep into the first half, there were about half a dozen occasions when his jinking runs in broken play beat the first and second tackler and put us on the front foot. On one occasion with the All Blacks attacking in our 22 and spreading it wide, he stopped a dangerous overlap with a big tackle on Cory Jane.

He made four or five mistakes in that semi-final, none of them fatal. What I think disappointed people most was that he wasn't the "follow me" type leader that he had been for the Reds. He wasn't making match-winning plays, just very valuable team-oriented plays.

Expectations for him were too high. He played well.

 

[Newter]

Will Genia on the other hand....