USA and Canadian Rugby

[Highlander35]

Stream completely stuffed up for mine, haven't seen the Scots v USA game.

But apparently Scotland played bad, and the USA played worse.

Both of the USA/Canada sides have quite a bit of work to do on those results though.

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[Omar Comin']

USA needs to fork out for a decent coach. The Scotland game was dreadful.

You have to think they're around the same level as Japan, but Japan are coached by Eddie Jones while the current coach of the American team is a local who as far as I'm aware has never coached at the professional level.

 

[Pfitzy]

but Japan are coached by Eddie Jones while the current coach of the American team is a local who as far as I'm aware has never coached at the professional level.

Yeah pretty even contest you'd think

 

[WorkingClassRugger]

USA needs to fork out for a decent coach. The Scotland game was dreadful.

You have to think they're around the same level as Japan, but Japan are coached by Eddie Jones while the current coach of the American team is a local who as far as I'm aware has never coached at the professional level.

Tolken only has experience as a high school and D1 coach and in programs that were well resourced in a time when their competition didn't. Most Eagles fans will agree he has been poor and that change is needed. They have issues in the scrum, they have a couple of good young props but continue with guys who have never performed at that level. The scrumhalf isn't of the required standard and smothers any momentum. Not considered the best option domestically. Same for the 13. Both players are trading off their personal relationships with the coach.

They have left a number of better players out of the squad. In the case of the 13, he was monstered by his opposite, Kingsley McGowan of St Mary' College when Cal and SMU met this season. Yet McGowan didn't even make the training squad.

To top it off most of the squad consists of player from two clubs. Neither of which comoete in the PRP which is easily the best comp in the States. The 7 teams in the PRP only managed to get three players in the squad.

 

[Sir Arthur Higgins]

Didn't see the Canada game but disappointing result. Believe it or not 6,800 sold out at suburban swan guard is a good result for van, the heart of Canadian rugby.
Not a great stadium for rugby. Vancouver crowds are fairly pathetic in general so this is actually a good result. I think they got 3,000 for a game against Romania a few years back. There will be. 20,000 in Toronto next week and safe to say we will have more attack than the USA offers

 

[Highlander35]

Full replay of USA vs Scotland, courtesy of the Daily Record.

 

[USARugger]

@Workingclassrugger

Tolkien (he lives in a fantasy world where Petri is a test 9) is a fucking shit coach and a nepotist of the highest order. You are being far too kind!

There are so many better coaches currently coming through the college ranks that it amazes me he still has a job. Plenty of guys who 3-4 years ago came into programs who were completely unknown/uncompetitive and have transformed them into nationa contenders in either 15s or 7s.

McGowan is just a monster of a player who should have been in the training group last year. He's been a star in an incredibly impressive Saint Mary's backbone for years. Best part of him getting on top of the 13 from CAL is that McGowan isn't even a 13..his best position is 15 or Wing.

OH and for the record Clever was absolutely robbed of that try by the referee over the weekend. What an actually garbage call..

 

[Omar Comin']

Tolken only has experience as a high school and D1 coach and in programs that were well resourced in a time when their competition didn't.

Seems weird he would get the job.

At the very least they should try and hire a Graham Henry like 'coaching advisor' for the 12 months leading to the world cup. Their pool isn't too bad outside of South Africa. Big opportunity for both Japan and the US to cause a shock.

 

[USARugger]

Not weird at all given the political climate within USA Rugby as an organization.

If you guys think the ARU is an old-boys club you literally haven't seen shit.

 

[mxyzptlk]

Not weird at all given the political climate within USA Rugby as an organization.

If you guys think the ARU is an old-boys club you literally haven't seen shit.

I get that sense every time I listen to Ruggamatrix America. That show sounds more like guys complaining after a board meeting than a rugby podcast, and it seems like they have reason to complain.

Part of the insularity and lack of development must be because there isn't much competition here. If the Premiership manages to start a competition in the US, would that extra attention give USA Rugby a kick in the tail?

 

[Harv]

Eagles were bloody awful. Seem to have gone backwards. I have no idea about the coach but the basics were missing: missed first up tackles, loose round the fringes, messy set pieces, the 10 stood so deep in the box he was in Mexico. Whoever agreed to allowing Scotland to be the game's pinup boys in the US a year after insulting the 20K crowd against Ireland in Houston needs a rocket too. They are just a terrible spectacle, win lose or draw. The Canada-Japan game on the other hand was promising. Canucks are organized and forthright. Seemed like a charged atmosphere in the small ground too. Japan are three players short of being a fine side.

 

[mxyzptlk]

The Canada-Japan game on the other hand was promising. Canucks are organized and forthright. Seemed like a charged atmosphere in the small ground too. Japan are three players short of being a fine side.

A good number of the Canadian players are either currently or were recently on the sevens team, and the fifteens head coach is the sevens assistant coach, no? That's got to contribute to their consistency and organization. Eddie Jones is also getting the best out of the Japan side.

 

[USARugger]

Part of the insularity and lack of development must be because there isn't much competition here. If the Premiership manages to start a competition in the US, would that extra attention give USA Rugby a kick in the tail?

I think the bigger problem at hand is that USAR just constantly fucks up or gets in the way of a viable Elite-Level competition forming.

I'll never forget the other year when USAR tried (or may have even successfully done, ironically this is the part I can't remember clearly) to make the two West Coast qualifiers (I think one was from California and one from Utah) play their playoff game in fucking Texas. This would be like having the top two club sides from Queensland drive out to Darwin to play one another.

The Pacific Rugby Premiership launching and having a successful season was a good step in the right direction this year - a step taken independently of USAR.

I think the PRP model is the immediate future as one of the biggest and most common headaches you're going to encounter with any Elite-Level competition in the USA is the sheer size of our geography. Focusing the competitions into a local/regional model for the time being guarantees a much higher level of competition because you aren't throwing teams in to balance a division, etc and teams who have talented squads but not the most resources aren't screwed by a ridiculous travel schedule (also works out much better for the guys considering lots of them are professionals, dads and high level rugby athletes).

The game has been growing and growing seemingly in spite of USAR the past few years but the Eagles (7s and 15s) being on fucking rollerskates at the moment is not helping the cause at all.

The other issue seems more to have to do with a piss-poor national recruiting structure (for 15s mainly, 7s has it down a lot better but there's a much smaller player pool to deal with and a more settled competition structure) that just does not do a good job of identifying talent or utilizing it either.

The reference to Kingsley McGown that @Workingclassrugger made is a perfect example of this. I even know Kingsley by face and name and I really don't follow West Coast rugby closely. He's been one of the best back-three players in college for years (as well as one of, if not our best U-20 player in 2012) but still hasn't even gotten an invite to an Eagles camp as far as I know.

I know that resources play a role in the recruitment process (especially with aforementioned geographic scale at play) but from what I've heard about the recruitment process it's just as much a failure to effectively marshall current resources as it is an acute lack of them.

I don't know enough about the legal implications and relationship between USAR and the IRB but the very least that needs to be done to fix things is a massive overhaul - starting with the inner offices of the USAR headquarters in Colorado.

 

[USARugger]

A good number of the Canadian players are either currently or were recently on the sevens team, and the fifteens head coach is the sevens assistant coach, no? That's got to contribute to their consistency and organization. Eddie Jones is also getting the best out of the Japan side.

Your backs are just literal streets ahead of the Eagles' backs right now in terms of functioning as an attacking unit. It's really chalk and cheese between the two groups in that regard.

You guys are developing steadily into a very good squad and I had a great time catching some of the tests between Canada and Fiji, etc last summer. The Canadian side plays a simple but effective and attack-oriented style that's really a good time to watch overall.

 

[Omar Comin']

I think the Pacific Cup competition between the US, Canada, Japan, Fiji, Samoa and Tonga has some promise. The teams are relatively even and all play a good style.

But they need to stick to a structure and play it all in June. Chopping and changing it every year will only devalue it. In the US they need to market those games better because the Pacific teams will all bring a more entertaining spectacle than the likes of Italy and Scotland. And Italy and Scotland aren't even better sides!

One day I hope all these teams are integrated into the rugby championship.

 

[Sir Arthur Higgins]

There has been a positive divergence the past 3-4 years in our favour and I have no doubt that is due to a) Kieran Crowley b) geraint John c) the two of them working so well together and d) better funding and the rugby centre in Langford.
All of our backs bar DTH, Pritchard and I think the new 9 have played sevens if they still don't.
I think that's helped to develop an attacking flair we didn't have pre 2007 or at least we didn't have across the back line.
The profile of the game has also raised and I do think the ability to see six nations top 14 rugby championship and super rugby on tv regularly. You get more exposure to what top class rugby looks like growing up now than you did ten years ago when I was in high school.
But mostly I think we have better systems in place from u-20 to senior rugby. We aren't great at the u-19 level but we improve after that.
Our system to feed into the national team seems better tuned than the USA and we don't have an obsession with recruiting 21 year olds from football.
Jason Marshall is our only example of that and he was a quarter back and is now a prop!

 

[Sir Arthur Higgins]

And I agree. Scotland is woeful. The game would be better served by more NZ Maori matches or an England Saxons team.

 

[Harv]

The Pacific Nations thingo is a good concept, especially from a development point of view, but as OC suggests it's inconsistent -- the Churchill Cup had potential but kind of came across as Pissweak World. Reckon it might be on stronger footing these days, but no way they'll go back to that. Suggest Test rugby will become even more meaningful to the domestic base if and when a pro franchise(s) gets a leg up in North America (and Japan). The concept of pro rugby is only 15-20 years old in the rest of the world and still a pretty well kept secret over here. Rather than striving to make a 'pro' comp in the US/Canada, accept it a niche sport (with an expanding grassroots) and focus on becoming very good in that niche using a combination of local and imported players. Become a 'franchise' to be proud of in professional sports is the essence of getting support in North American and contemporary Japanese sport. It would involve the small matter of finding an appropriate competition but reckon that could be worked out, especially if a decent broadcast deal accompanied the process.

 

[Sir Arthur Higgins]

highlights from the canada game on irb.com website under videos.
the third try by canada is beautiful

 

[SevensPhD]

There has been a positive divergence the past 3-4 years in our favour and I have no doubt that is due to a) Kieran Crowley b) geraint John c) the two of them working so well together and d) better funding and the rugby centre in Langford.
All of our backs bar DTH, Pritchard and I think the new 9 have played sevens if they still don't.
I think that's helped to develop an attacking flair we didn't have pre 2007 or at least we didn't have across the back line.
The profile of the game has also raised and I do think the ability to see six nations top 14 rugby championship and super rugby on tv regularly. You get more exposure to what top class rugby looks like growing up now than you did ten years ago when I was in high school.
But mostly I think we have better systems in place from u-20 to senior rugby. We aren't great at the u-19 level but we improve after that.
Our system to feed into the national team seems better tuned than the USA and we don't have an obsession with recruiting 21 year olds from football.
Jason Marshall is our only example of that and he was a quarter back and is now a prop!

DTH was a wonderful 7s player! Pritchard also played 7s. The fact that most of the current 7s team also plays 15s for Canada helps tremendously. The player familiarity alone gives advantage, let alone the consistency in coaching across both codes-as you pointed out with Crowley and John working side by side. Canada had 12 of the match day 23 from 7s: Moonlight, Ardron, Jones, Paris, Blevins, Hearn, Hassler, Pritchard, Kleegberger, Mack, Braid, and DTH, with 9 of those playing last IRB Sevens season.

I still have not found a proper answer to why only 1-3 total current 7s players ever suit up for any single 15s match? They are paid rugby players in a full time HP environment, working with each other, and playing consistent international contests on the 7s Series. The only answer is that they either make themselves unavailable (7s specialists) or are just not selected on form.

The only current 7s contracted player was Danny Barrett that played against Scotland. 6 total others have played 7s before, only 2 others recently- Shalom and Nuia)

Zack Test is the probably the best rugby player in the USA (often voted in the IRB Sevens dream team), yet has never been with the 15s team. It can't be because the 7s skills don't cross-over - just look at Canada who beats us in both codes!