3rd Test - AB Players Reviews

Looks like Aki was Sober and that chicken was going to be going to his mate to help him sober up.

@booboo said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Luigi said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Great game to watch. NZ response at the beginning of the 2nd half was classically ominous, but Ireland have played the ABs often enough recently to withstand. Tadgh Beirne was huuuuuuge.

First @BartMan now @Luigi

All Black losses bring them all out of the woodwork ...

Paging @Thomond78...

well that was quite something. Fucking great game. I couldn't watch live, and everything my mates had sent me, i was expecting it to be awful. But it wasn't, the ABs were pretty good, Ireland were just better.

Well done Ireland, what a performance, not just last night, but over the past few weeks. Their tour started so poorly, with those two losses, but they regrouped and just smashed us.

And you know what? I fucking love watching them play. Their short passing attack is beautiful. They get the ball in the hands of their most dangerous players as often as they can. They absolutely smash rucks. They are quick, hard and accurate in the tackle. And their set piece is fucking good.

Also, they are organised, so everyone knows not only their job, but also what everyone else is going to do so they know where to be. And they use depth to their advantage!! Fuck they don't half smash on to the ball.

Deserved series winners, good on them, fucking enjoy the shit out of it, especially the veterans.

@mariner4life Agreed, the big question is what are the Irish doing that we aren't. Clearly the coaching team are very switched on and they have 100% buy in from their players.

Wonder if anyone noticed who had the better points for and against this series? Or for all matches on this tour? ..........................................................................................................................ok, thought not. I guess it reinforces that this Irish team learned from it's mistakes and acclimatised to local conditions, after a very mediocre start

And so to the losers

What can you say? 2nd best again last night. For a team to do so much right at times, but come up with so little? Very disappointing.

The kick, kick, kick stuff is so bad. We get so little out of it, we just keep giving the ball back to Ireland at about half way.

The helter skelter, lets go both ways attack is useless. Hot take time, Aaron Smith is a big part of the problem. Those wide flat passes fired as early as possible very really hit a player to our advantage I think i saw at least 3 occassions where he hit a guy who was just turning around from getting back on side. that player was obviously immediately swallowed.
We play flat as fuck so there is no momentum on to the ball. But worst of all is, the helter skleter shit means eventually we run out of players to make a breakdown, and we turn it over.

The backline "attack" is abismal. It's nothing more inventive than "hands" sometimes with teh centre or the 12 standing in front of the intended recipient, but not in such a position that it attracts a defender. Ireland were asked no questions all night. What in the fuck is the point in backing that 13, 11, and 14 and then not giving them an opportunity? Just wasted.
Then we make it worse by sticking Ioane on the tram tracks, and never getting him the ball?! Yet when he hits it closer up he smashes them. No, i know, lets run Savea there, where he is least effective.

The defense is just terrible. Picked apart by the passing. No speed. No ability to put in dominant hits and then slow the ruck. Out wide they are all at sea. Will Jordan has no fucking idea what he is doing defensively. In? Out? Up? hold? no clue.

As or the breakdown. Fuck me dead. Accurate? no. So more numbers? also no. Maybe that's why Smith whips it out of there before thinking, because if he hesitates we'll get smoked on the counter-ruck. I lost count of missed clean out assignments today.

The whole plan is to play fast, one-off running for a few phases, and then kick, or we play that side to side shit. And hope someone breaks a tackle, or a defender makes a mistake. We won't try to create the mistake, we'll just hope it happens. And now we are giving up a heap of points as well, that will fail far more than it works.

So that is how you win every stat and yet still get pretty well beaten.

@chimoaus said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@mariner4life Agreed, the big question is what are the Irish doing that we aren't. Clearly the coaching team are very switched on and they have 100% buy in from their players.

structure. we are playing without a structure in a kind of "chaos ball" to break the field open, and it's not even close to working. Not least because our 6 of our forwards can't keep up.

I went to 2 games on tour and the team in black won both of them. NZR should have bought me a ticket for Wellington.

Congrats to Ireland. Easily the better side across the tour. The one side that genuinely looked coached, they deserved to win.

That being said, by fuck the All Blacks got shafted in the refereeing.

The coaching group has to go. It's not as if we were just bested, we looked like a team with no idea. We looked like we don't have coaches.

Well just got home after being at test, geez it was a bloody good match. Irish were a class above, I thought. Was a bit worried watching warm ups before game when all 3 halfbacks were throwing evey pass from phase etc to second receiver as I had thought Irish had covered that well week before. Sure enough they picked off a couple of intercepts from them. Really thought we needed more 1 of runners etc, and almost at times Ardie seems to be carrying team by himself with go forward ball.
Was a great night anyway, bloody disappointed with result, but apart from that was fun, and forgot how enjoyable it is with opposition supporters etc. lo even if one I was talking to (he was wrapped in Irish flag) said don't tell anyone I really Scots.

I will add Irish had great game management, and had some pretty judicial injuries whenever ABs were attacking in last 20, certainly slowed down momentum quite well.

@Victor-Meldrew said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@pakman said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Victor-Meldrew said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Victor-Meldrew said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Mrs Meldrew has just removed all throwable objects from the lounge.

There’s still the TV….

Thank fuck we don't have a piano or swimming pool.

Has she put a fresh pack of razor blades in the bathroom?

I don't shave.....

Exactly!

@Dan54 said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Well just got home after being at test, geez it was a bloody good match. Irish were a class above, I thought. Was a bit worried watching warm ups before game when all 3 halfbacks were throwing evey pass from phase etc to second receiver as I had thought Irish had covered that well week before. Sure enough they picked off a couple of intercepts from them. Really thought we needed more 1 of runners etc, and almost at times Ardie seems to be carrying team by himself with go forward ball.
Was a great night anyway, bloody disappointed with result, but apart from that was fun, and forgot how enjoyable it is with opposition supporters etc. lo even if one I was talking to (he was wrapped in Irish flag) said don't tell anyone I really Scots.

I will add Irish had great game management, and had some pretty judicial injuries whenever ABs were attacking in last 20, certainly slowed down momentum quite well.

Despite all the enjoyment you clearly had, do you think Foster should be replaced?

@Frank said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Dan54 said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Well just got home after being at test, geez it was a bloody good match. Irish were a class above, I thought. Was a bit worried watching warm ups before game when all 3 halfbacks were throwing evey pass from phase etc to second receiver as I had thought Irish had covered that well week before. Sure enough they picked off a couple of intercepts from them. Really thought we needed more 1 of runners etc, and almost at times Ardie seems to be carrying team by himself with go forward ball.
Was a great night anyway, bloody disappointed with result, but apart from that was fun, and forgot how enjoyable it is with opposition supporters etc. lo even if one I was talking to (he was wrapped in Irish flag) said don't tell anyone I really Scots.

I will add Irish had great game management, and had some pretty judicial injuries whenever ABs were attacking in last 20, certainly slowed down momentum quite well.

Despite all the enjoyment you clearly had, do you think Foster should be replaced?

Buggered if I know, I do know somethings have to change, as there seemed to be not a lot of commitment (they seemed flat as) or something in first half, So whatever or whoever will be the answer will I hope be decided by someone who can do something about it!

@Bovidae said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

I went to 2 games on tour and the team in black won both of them. NZR should have bought me a ticket for Wellington.

I had one of each mate, and ended up with a spare ticket last night (sister had covid) you should of bloody told me and we could of had a win!!!!Lol

@Tim said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Great try

Fuck it's a stretch to blame that on the front row alone! There are a huge number of people at fault for that. Look at the numbers they were left with.

And then BB with the dumb ass hero play

@Tim whats worse (for us) is how slow they started the movement due to us turning the scrum and JGP having to pivot around the back of thier scrum to get back on track, yet we still allowed them to get well over the gainline, defence was, as always, passive AF

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

The entire coaching staff should be in front of a firing squad. And several players should kiss their top 23 spot goodbye

First para: agree
Second para: front row, yes. Others? Cane? Backline Barretts?

@booboo said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

The entire coaching staff should be in front of a firing squad. And several players should kiss their top 23 spot goodbye

First para: agree
Second para: front row, yes. Others? Cane? Backline Barretts?

No Bower stays for sure
Taylor yes.
Fuck knows at tighthead
Retallick going down is a blessing because a new lock has to play
Cane, sadly (and the mafia will hang me as a heretic) yes.
The Barretts are obviously talented but I don't know where to play them?
Havili should be cut from the squad

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@booboo said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

The entire coaching staff should be in front of a firing squad. And several players should kiss their top 23 spot goodbye

First para: agree
Second para: front row, yes. Others? Cane? Backline Barretts?

No Bower stays for sure
Fuck knows at tighthead
Retallick going down is a blessing because a new lock has to play
Cane, sadly (and the mafia will hang me as a heretic) yes.
The Barretts are obviously talented but I don't know where to play them?
Havili should be cut from the squad

Oh yeah forgot Havili.

And yes Bower has played well. Although frankly, the rest of the front row selections were uninspiring across the board.

(Started on a wider whinge but was not making enough sense ... just hoping this nightmare will end... )

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@booboo said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

The entire coaching staff should be in front of a firing squad. And several players should kiss their top 23 spot goodbye

First para: agree
Second para: front row, yes. Others? Cane? Backline Barretts?

No Bower stays for sure
Taylor yes.
Fuck knows at tighthead
Retallick going down is a blessing because a new lock has to play
Cane, sadly (and the mafia will hang me as a heretic) yes.
The Barretts are obviously talented but I don't know where to play them?
Havili should be cut from the squad

We had 4 fullbacks in our backline ( Havili, Jordan, 2 Barrett’s - BB is much better at fullback, JB needs to play at 2nd all the time if he wants to be a 2nd ) last night, a wing playing centre ( by his natural instincts - pass the ball Reiko ) and a league player learning his trade in reserves. Last week we started with 3 sevens. We are not that so good that can do this anymore. We need players to be better at their core skills - so it would help if they played in their test match positions regularly, and we selected them for demonstrating those skills e.g defence, it’s 50% of the game, or in our casecloser to 65% given we kick our possession away aimlessly.

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Fuck it's a stretch to blame that on the front row alone! There are a huge number of people at fault for that. Look at the numbers they were left with.

And then BB with the dumb ass hero play

Yeah during live play I couldn’t understand why Cane comes from the openside and sprints across when we had enough cover - blindside (Akira) plus 1 lock (Whitelock) and the number 8 (Ardie).

@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Cane comes from the openside

Yeah, that was a real fuckup from him there.

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@booboo said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

The entire coaching staff should be in front of a firing squad. And several players should kiss their top 23 spot goodbye

First para: agree
Second para: front row, yes. Others? Cane? Backline Barretts?

Cane, sadly (and the mafia will hang me as a heretic) yes.

No they won’t, we watched the same as you, previously he stepped up internationally, not this time.

Havili was caught in no-man's land for a couple of the Irish tries.

@Bovidae said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Havili was caught in no-man's land for a couple of the Irish tries.

As anonymous a game as it's possible to have

@Bovidae several of our players didn’t read the decoy runners well and it cost us.

@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Bovidae several of our players didn’t read the decoy runners well and it cost us.

This ball v man thing o'gara talks about intrigues me

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Bovidae several of our players didn’t read the decoy runners well and it cost us.

This ball v man thing o'gara talks about intrigues me

To me, it essentially sounds like a way to read an attack that relies on sheparding.

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

And so to the losers

What can you say? 2nd best again last night. For a team to do so much right at times, but come up with so little? Very disappointing.

The kick, kick, kick stuff is so bad. We get so little out of it, we just keep giving the ball back to Ireland at about half way.

The helter skelter, lets go both ways attack is useless. Hot take time, Aaron Smith is a big part of the problem. Those wide flat passes fired as early as possible very really hit a player to our advantage I think i saw at least 3 occassions where he hit a guy who was just turning around from getting back on side. that player was obviously immediately swallowed.
We play flat as fuck so there is no momentum on to the ball. But worst of all is, the helter skleter shit means eventually we run out of players to make a breakdown, and we turn it over.

The backline "attack" is abismal. It's nothing more inventive than "hands" sometimes with teh centre or the 12 standing in front of the intended recipient, but not in such a position that it attracts a defender. Ireland were asked no questions all night. What in the fuck is the point in backing that 13, 11, and 14 and then not giving them an opportunity? Just wasted.
Then we make it worse by sticking Ioane on the tram tracks, and never getting him the ball?! Yet when he hits it closer up he smashes them. No, i know, lets run Savea there, where he is least effective.

The defense is just terrible. Picked apart by the passing. No speed. No ability to put in dominant hits and then slow the ruck. Out wide they are all at sea. Will Jordan has no fucking idea what he is doing defensively. In? Out? Up? hold? no clue.

As or the breakdown. Fuck me dead. Accurate? no. So more numbers? also no. Maybe that's why Smith whips it out of there before thinking, because if he hesitates we'll get smoked on the counter-ruck. I lost count of missed clean out assignments today.

The whole plan is to play fast, one-off running for a few phases, and then kick, or we play that side to side shit. And hope someone breaks a tackle, or a defender makes a mistake. We won't try to create the mistake, we'll just hope it happens. And now we are giving up a heap of points as well, that will fail far more than it works.

So that is how you win every stat and yet still get pretty well beaten.

This is a pretty good assessment of the AB’s and it’s been festering since toward the backend of the Hansen era. The over reliance of the individual to beat their opposing player to create an overlap etc is working against us when we run into really good sides who take away our time and space consistently.

We haven’t changed up our game whereas the NH sides especially have done so.

The question is whether Foster can come up with a new game plan in time for RWC?

@ACT-Crusader said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

@Bovidae several of our players didn’t read the decoy runners well and it cost us.

I don’t want to over simplify it too much but this is correct. Nearly every single break the Irish made was due to their manipulation of decoy runners, tips, the old double round to a double decoy runner to Sexton just drawing a defender in to put a runner into space. It was a thing of beauty to watch. What amazed me is the AB defence had no answer.

Again it’s not that simple but employing an effective rush defence focusing on Sexton may have worked along with putting more pressure on the Irish ruck would have at least denied Sexton time and space.

@mariner4life said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Fuck it's a stretch to blame that on the front row alone! There are a huge number of people at fault for that. Look at the numbers they were left with.

And then BB with the dumb ass hero play

To be honest, I don't really blame Beaudy for that at all.

Ireland has about 6 on 3 on the openside and with even vaguely competent passing they score.

The people at fault are the people who aren't there to defend.

Thought Havili was one of the better ones. Once again, being left to cover a number of players as the defensive structure isn't there. RI was all at sea as well as was everyone else. A lot of this talk of certain players like RI, Havili, shows more about the poster's provincial bias or their agenda more than anything else. This chaotic mess of a team is sacrificing good players and I assume destroying the confidence of new ones like QT and LF.

@Old-Samurai-Jack said in All Blacks vs Ireland - series decider:

Thought Havili was one of the better ones. Once again, being left to cover a number of players as the defensive structure isn't there. RI was all at sea as well as was everyone else. A lot of this talk of certain players like RI, Havili, shows more about the poster's provincial bias or their agenda more than anything else. This chaotic mess of a team is sacrificing good players and I assume destroying the confidence of new ones like QT and LF.

We don’t have any combinations and our players don’t seem to have any idea about what the player beside them is doing.

So, we can improve that with better coaching and perhaps choosing some selections that have combination. If they wanted RTS out there, it says everything about this coaching group that they decided to do it with Mo’unga at 10 and Havili shifted to 13, as opposed to starting him between Barrett and Roane.

I remember back in the day when ABs played Ireland I would estimate they could not get through 5 phases without a mistake. I would also guess that if they tried to play any open rugby over the course of a game the scre would blow up against them. Now their all round skills seem to match or perhaps be even superior to the ABs and that is across every position. How did this happen?