Wallabies v Wales: Name Your Best XV

YES

Just read this on SMH and my first thought was "O RLY?"

Was reminded of a video on here showing the different roles of TH & LH. I don't think that's something you want to mess with or you will get owned.

I thought the point of what he was saying was that you could have 1 specialist and two people who can switch in your squad and have more ideal coverage on the day than 3 specialists? Logical and no big deal.

What seems weird is that everyone (including the coaches in the Wallabies' setup) appear to be aware that Kepu and Alexander played on the wrong sides of the scrum last year. I'd like to think it's part of some diabolical long term plan aimed at creating ultimate versatility to win the 2015 world cup.but the simplest explanation is usually the right one. Robbie Deans is a blockhead

I take your point. Wales will have a very good backrow. I think it is an area we will shine though. As you say we have what looks to be a well balanced backrow (one that screams test quality). Some good depth there as well. However I do think Genia represents a distinct advantage.

I've always been a believer in picking your best players in their best position first. Then picking the rest of the team with a view to combinations and balance. Too often coaches pick their best players out of position because they can cope with it better but the problem is that allows the opposition to better cope with your best players too.

Then other times coaches will pick their best players out of position in order to get all their best players on the park and end up unbalancing the team. It's better to have a balanced team with most, but not all, of your best players in it than a team with 3-4 guys playing out of position and therefore not at their optimum. Picking correctly will not only give you a balanced team with good combinations it will most likely leave you will a pretty strong bench too that can make an impact and potential win it for you.

^ I think that is a really good philosophy.

I wake up at night, in cold sweats, because of Ma'afu. I have nightmares about it.

I am really really scared that Deans is going to pick him to play.

Don't go putting the jinx on us. From the precedent Robbie has set, and the ridiculous comments from Andrew Blades, don't be surprised to see Ma'afood starting at loosehead.

That's quite the coincidence. Often, Ma'afu wakes up at night with the meat sweats.

God Help the Wallabies if that happens Red Baron

IMO: Maafu will start at THP (because Deans picked the bloke last yeart and he actually started to perform reasonably well) Palmer offers little around the park over and above Maafu and probably not that much more at scrumtime, irrespective of the high opinion of a few posters + he is an unknown quantity at test time

off topic but can someone direct me to a site that shows how many times players have played for Australia - not just the current batch but the ones that went before. - thanks

2040 - I find the statsguru on Espn Scrum very good, and incredibly comprehensive with vast ranges of data cuts available:

http://stats.espnscrum.com/statsguru/rugby/stats/index.html

Agree Bardon, a classic example was when Nick mallett put bergonmasco, (sp) at scrum half

We played the Ba bas saturday and we played a LH on the TH side I don't know if anyone saw it but he had a bad day at the office, in the loose he was fine, Although I don't necessarily like playinf players out of their regular positions, I do see the need to do it on times, As a TH we have Adam Jones arguably one of the best TH in world rugby, But thats it, without him we struggle at scrum time as was shown against you in the play off for the WC, But I would have thought it would be better to use a TH and try to get him up to speed.