Australia Vs. England, Twickenham, 2nd November 2013

[Inside Shoulder]

Falou was roundly criticized on these very forums a short while ago for throwing the ball wildly once he made contact.

I'd say he is most concerned with not losing the ball and it is the inability of any of his team mates to follow him and secure possession that is the real problem.

So he should be.
This is one of the fundamental differences between league and union, IMO: in league they almost never look to pass until they have 3 blokes on them. In union the brain needs to work so that, like an NFL QB, you have an option list and option 1 is let the ball beat the man with a pass, you don't always take it and depending on your position it may be taken less often than all the others but it is the first thing that should be on the table unless you are wearing a number between 1 and 8 (inclusive) going sideways in your own half.
IF should have passed prior to contact: its called "drawing your man". Like every other rugby skill in this country its a dying art.

 

[Quick Hands]

Falou was roundly criticized on these very forums a short while ago for throwing the ball wildly once he made contact.

I'd say he is most concerned with not losing the ball and it is the inability of any of his team mates to follow him and secure possession that is the real problem.

When a player is penalised for not releasing or the opposition gain possession legitimately, it's the fault of the support players rather than the tackled player in most cases.

The Wallabies don't work hard enough off the ball in attack or defence to win at international level.

I think that fact that England picked a 2nd string team for the match says a lot about how the Wallabies are going. The ABs or the Boks or even the French would have won that match by 30 plus against the team England put out last night. I suspect that they would have picked their best available team against those countries though.

 

[Quick Hands]

IF should have passed prior to contact: its called "drawing your man". Like every other rugby skill in this country its a dying art.

Which brings us back again to the way in which young players are being developed in this country. Almost all of them have spent their adolescenece in ARU or state elite programmes; so why can't they draw and pass, catch and pass both ways, kick the ball out of the hand etc.?

The over-reliance on GPS schools means that we get players who are developed, coached and selected to win at GPS 1sts level, where one can get away with having a mobile tight 5 who are "good around the park", but not necessarily able to dominate scrums and lineouts in senior rugby, and on and on we could go.

 

[I like to watch]

Look at the backline the Oz Schools have selected.
EVERYONE of them only look to pass when there is nothing left for them.
It does highlight the shortcomings in player development in this country.

 

[KOB1987]

Falou needs to pass the ball, every time he takes it himself.

I'd actually rather he hold onto it and backs himself!!

 

[wamberal]

Quick Hands,

I suspect the problem is a lot broader than just the GPS competition. Quite a few of our top tight forwards are not the product of the GPS system, and it is not all that easy to tell which is which. It would be interesting to know just who is actually from a GPS School amongst our current piggies. I know Ben Robinson and James Slipper are, Kepu is not, not sure about Alexander. TPN and Finger are not, not sure about Moore. Horwill? Timani and Douglas are not, AFAIK. Simmons?

 

[Intruder]

The Wallabies don't work hard enough off the ball in attack or defence to win at international level.

It's hard to say that. England players are coming off a fresh off season. The Wallabies have had a Lions series during Super Rugby, after heading to Argentina, SA and now in the UK. Most of these players have yet to have a rest. I believe we roll out a few Second XV players especially in the forwards against Italy giving others a rest (Second XV based on form/limited game time)

1. Robinson
2. TPN
3. Ryan
4. Simmons
5. Douglas
6. Dennis
7. Gill
8. Mowen (c)
9. White
10. Foley
11. Cummins
12. To'omua
13. Kuridrani
14. Tomane
15. Folau

16. Slipper
17. Fainga'a
18. Kepu
19. Horwill
20. McCalman
21. Phipps
22. Cooper
23. AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper)

 

[Hugh Jarse]

Which brings us back again to the way in which young players are being developed in this country. <snip>

What I see happening in Junior lineout development is that the future second row lads are chosen by their coaches as the lifters not jumpers. The Jumpers selected typically seem to the the skinniest kids that they can find. It is easier to lift them.

The end result is that the future jumpers do not get any lineout practice until open grade schoolboys, when the fatties are finally strong enough to lift them.

Scrums - 1.5 metre push max. Plenty of others have already observed that this only rewards a selection of 8 loose forwards. Colts 2 and 1 can be a rather rude wake up call. Same for the Aust Schoolboys going to the Northern Tour this year. I wonder that scrummaging rules they will work under.

Just a couple of examples where the pathway is not preparing for the future.

 

[Inside Shoulder]

Quick Hands,

I suspect the problem is a lot broader than just the GPS competition. Quite a few of our top tight forwards are not the product of the GPS system, and it is not all that easy to tell which is which. It would be interesting to know just who is actually from a GPS School amongst our current piggies. I know Ben Robinson and James Slipper are, Kepu is not, not sure about Alexander. TPN and Finger are not, not sure about Moore. Horwill? Timani and Douglas are not, AFAIK. Simmons?

Why, when the issue QH was addressing concerned the passing instincts of our backs do we go to the educational pedigrees of the pigs, whose passing instincts need to be cauterized. This week. Harley Street will do fine.

 

[Quick Hands]

Quick Hands,

I suspect the problem is a lot broader than just the GPS competition. Quite a few of our top tight forwards are not the product of the GPS system, and it is not all that easy to tell which is which. It would be interesting to know just who is actually from a GPS School amongst our current piggies. I know Ben Robinson and James Slipper are, Kepu is not, not sure about Alexander. TPN and Finger are not, not sure about Moore. Horwill? Timani and Douglas are not, AFAIK. Simmons?

The problem is certainly bigger than the GPS system but the over-reliance on that system by rugby magnifies the problem.

 

[ChargerWA]

Timani is a bully. He only ever makes big hits in defence when he can blindside a smaller back. Defending in tight he is no more effective than much smaller forwards, except he has less involvements. In attack he is content to make the gain line and flop over using his height to make a paltry 0.5M over the gain line each time.

I suspect that all the way through his rugby development he has been so much physically larger than the kids he competed against he didn't need to use leg drive into the tackle to make good gains and now he is playing in a similar weight division he is being found out.

I thought he was worth the development potential due to his strength in the scrum, but now I think we are just wasting our time as he doesn't have the desire to fix his deficiencies.

We are wasting time, Sam Carter should have been on the EOYT in his place.

 

[vidiot]

You know Clancy has had a bad game when you go to vandalise his wikipedia entry and someone has beaten you to it.

In the 2013 test match between Australia and England, he was subject to extensive criticism for his poor handling of the game. There were numerous decisions that were discovered to be in error after the fact and the majority of them were in favour of the England team. Most notably the only two occasions where England scored tries were littered with numerous incorrect decisions that favoured the England team.
The Australian coach, Ewen McKenzie stated after the match "You can't say those things don't have an impact on the game, but I guess that is the vagaries of rugby."
In the New Zealand vs South Africa test match of 2011, he controversially ignored the laws regarding the use of television match officials and their adjudication with respect to play prior to the ball crossing the plane of the try line. This led to an All Black try being disallowed for a forward pass which occurred prior to the ball going over the try line in contravention of the IRB laws at the time.
In 2009, he also courted controversy when refereeing a Wales vs Argentina match where he again favoured a home nation with poor decision making allowing three Welsh tries to be scored.
However, despite this record, he remains in the elite panel of international referees.

 

[Quick Hands]

Why, when the issue QH was addressing concerned the passing instincts of our backs do we go to the educational pedigrees of the pigs, whose passing instincts need to be cauterized. This week. Harley Street will do fine.

Multi-skilling is fine, but what's not fine is forwards clogging up the backline in attack and defence, when we're being smashed at the breakdown.

Backs certainly need to get involved at the tackle, and forwards need to have some catch and pass skills, but from my observations there are too many forwards unable/unwilling to carry out their core function.

 

[Quick Hands]

You know Clancy has had a bad game when you go to vandalise his wikipedia entry and someone has beaten you to it.

And yet the IRB ranks this guy in their top 9 elite referees.

 

[Itsactuallyfunny]

I think the Wallabies were thoroughly outplayed in the second half. The linesman really should have seen that foot on the line, but apart from that every other try was fine. There was no obstruction, that is for sure, and the English should've been allowed to run the field at the 60th minute with a play-on call.

 

[Inside Shoulder]

here they come

 

[GaffaCHinO]

I think the Wallabies were thoroughly outplayed in the second half. The linesman really should have seen that foot on the line, but apart from that every other try was fine. There was no obstruction, that is for sure, and the English should've been allowed to run the field at the 60th minute with a play-on call.

"Every other try was fine".......you only scored 2

Sent from my GT-I9300T using Tapatalk 2

 

[wamberal]

Why, when the issue QH was addressing concerned the passing instincts of our backs do we go to the educational pedigrees of the pigs, whose passing instincts need to be cauterized. This week. Harley Street will do fine.

Because he raised the issue. Sorry. I will check with you next time.

 

[I like to watch]

Multi-skilling is fine, but what's not fine is forwards clogging up the backline in attack and defence, when we're being smashed at the breakdown.

Backs certainly need to get involved at the tackle, and forwards need to have some catch and pass skills, but from my observations there are too many forwards unable/unwilling to carry out their core function.

The piggies are not carrying out their core functions by design,rather than not doing it out of apathy.
The forwards individually,and as a unit have deteriorated under Link's watch.

 

[Gnostic]

After some careful consideration and rethinking aspects of the game I thought perhaps my post of earlier today could be modified and made less harsh. A second reading and watching and I should have made it worse.

When Deans was invited not to come to work on Monday Blade and Scrivener should also have been delivered the same message.

The same fundamental errors that plagued the Wallabies for the last 7 or even 9 years are still apparent. The fact that all these problems have been discussed ad nauseum here and elsewhere for much of this time means that they are hardly the stuff of mystery.

Now when you consider that in one area, the scrum the problems were identified as a key failing in 2005 when knuckles Connolly took over the coaching job. This was re-inforced by every coach and assistant since and yet nothing has happened to fix the fundamental skill errors in the Wallaby props. Take Al Baxter for example, his bind was poor, but apart from that he was the best THP in Oz. was he coached to fix the bind? If he was there certainly was no evidence of it. he was replaced with Alexander (and rarely with Kepu) who has shown the same fundamental flaws in his scrummaging since he started. he has been penalised literally off the park more times than I can remember but these problems have not been addressed. It took until the Argentine test in Argentina for the Wallabies to even adopt a more thorough scrum set up to at least get the body heights correct.

I have to say the there remains a fixation on selecting players to fix skill and application errors. For example Timani would provide push in the scrum and go forward around the field along with some intimidation value at the ruck if he ever got there. How has that gone? IMO it has done little except compromise the only effective set piece the lineout. Would it not have been better to actually coach the better technical players like Simmons, Douglas, Pyle, Wykes et al to improve their deficits?

The jury is back on the Wallaby assistants and the verdict can only be that they are not competent for their positions and while they remain no player will improve in the key areas required.