England 6N 2016 - General Chit Chat

[Ddanno]

And his 2014 form is nowhere to be seen

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Id love to see Tuilagi at 10

Sod off, we need him at 9 right now

 

[Every Time Ref]

Dan Cole has given away 12 penalties:
3 against Scotland
1 against Ireland
2 against Italy
6 against Wales

Since Brookes is now back, surely that swap has to be considered?

Christ I knew it was a lot but that really is a lot.

Do you happen to know how many were at scrum time and how many in the ruck?

Either way, I don't think EJ will do it for the France game but unless something massive changes in that game he needs to go

 

[barkinghooker]

Has anyone been watching the rankings ? England only 0.04 behind Wales.
The world cup draw is in December isn't it ?
We will be above Wales if we beat France .
Wales have to play NZ four times still this year and we won't be playing them till 2017.

Someone from the rugby championship (probably argentina) will drop out of the top four.

I think we may avoid being drawn in a tougher group ?

 

[Maverick1987]

Has anyone been watching the rankings ? England only 0.4 behind Wales.
The world cup draw is in December isn't it ?
We will be above Wales if we beat France .
Wales have to play NZ four times still this year and we won't be playing them till 2017.

Someone from the rugby championship (probably argentina) will drop out of the top four.

I think we may avoid being drawn in a tougher group ?

Yeh we should . If we can win the series against Aus then I think we will be cemented into the top 4 . Also we have 2 very winnable games in the autumn internationals . What's the 4 game we are playing ? The first 3 are against SA, Aus and Arg

 

[ncurd]

It works and it doesn't relatively any of the current top 8 nations would expect in 2019 to go through their group (yes even France). The group of death was caused by Wales dropping to 9th in world rankings and therefore badly seeded.

Argubly if you make it to the top 4 you should win your group and avoid any of the other top 4 by the semi-final's but it never works out like that. So yeah they key thing to worry about is France's freefall and if they bebound in 3.5 years or Scotland being actually resurgent against the other Tier 1 teams.

Us getting in the top4, just means we probably won't be playing one of the top SH nations at the group stage.

Is the draw before or after the AI's?


I'll throw in a standard comment of the draw should not be done for another 2 years yet.

 

[Ddanno]

If Jones accomplishes little else, a better WC draw will do.

(Not srs)

 

[itsonlyrugby]

And his 2014 form is nowhere to be seen

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Sod off, we need him at 9 right now

Let's get real people, all of his skills need utilising properly. Have you noticed the English player's not looking as relaxed as they should after the coach ride to the stadiums? He should be driving the bus. Now, where's that broom?

 

[saulan]

The first 3 are against SA, Aus and Arg

South Africa, Fiji, Argentina, Australia. In that order.

 

[johnmac99]

Yeh we should . If we can win the series against Aus then I think we will be cemented into the top 4 . Also we have 2 very winnable games in the autumn internationals . What's the 4 game we are playing ? The first 3 are against SA, Aus and Arg

I shouldn't think we will win the series as we are still re-building.

We have the game against France in the 6N this Saturday, then a game against Wales on 29th May at Twickenham, before we go to Australia.
There is no time to do any 'experimenting' in a match day setting, so I don't think we will be ready to beat Australia down under.

After the Aussie tour which finishes at the end of June, we don't have another match until Nov 12th against SA and I feel it's unlikely we will get any friendlies until WC qualification has finished, which is going on now having started 5th March, with the draw taking place in December 2016.

So we need to do well in the AIs and look to win at least the last three against Fiji, Argentina and Australia, that way we might scrape into the top 4.

 

[HenryChinaski]

Dan Cole conceded 6 penalties against Wales. Just saying.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Shameless repost, now with added logo

 

[Willodell100]

The simple fact Cole is a prop means conceding 6 penalties in itself doesn't necessarily mean he's been ill disciplined. Depending on which way the wind is blowing can sometimes define whether or not a prop gets pinged at a scrum. I thought he got unfairly penalised twice because of this on Saturday.

Also the fact that he is pretty good over the ball too means he is more likely to put himself in precarious situations too. Yes I would rather his decision making was better in these situations but I'm glad we have a prop that can pilfer effectively.

 

[Willodell100]

I can't see many changes for France. And the likelihood of Marler missing the game means it will be less likely that Cole loses his place. Brookes has been in outstanding form before injury and in all likelihood will get some more GameTime out in Australia.

I can see Manu staying on the bench for France. Farrell still isn't a very effective 12 but he didn't do anything wrong there & stood up to Roberts on the odd occasion when required too.

I thought Ford looked better and even bought North down effectively one on one when at full pace! His game management was very good bar the charge down & if Watson had told him he was on his outside he wouldn't have cut in on the potential 2 on 1 down the left hand touch line. He kept the tempo high & stood extremely flat that put the Welsh defence under exerted pressure for 60mins.

All in all a good team performance means the stating XV deserve a shot at a grand slam.

 

[Every Time Ref]

The simple fact Cole is a prop means conceding 6 penalties in itself doesn't necessarily mean he's been ill disciplined. Depending on which way the wind is blowing can sometimes define whether or not a prop gets pinged at a scrum. I thought he got unfairly penalised twice because of this on Saturday.

Also the fact that he is pretty good over the ball too means he is more likely to put himself in precarious situations too. Yes I would rather his decision making was better in these situations but I'm glad we have a prop that can pilfer effectively.

Agree, but also, how many turnovers is he making at the moment? I don't mind a bit of a win-some-lose-some philosophy from a turnover merchant, but if you're not winning any you're just a loser, and it seems to me Dan Cole is the latter

 

[Willodell100]

Agree, but also, how many turnovers is he making at the moment? I don't mind a bit of a win-some-lose-some philosophy from a turnover merchant, but if you're not winning any you're just a loser, and it seems to me Dan Cole is the latter

Good point. I haven't seen him win anything for a while but then he's never been prolific. As SL used to say a useful 'point of difference'.

I think it has helped having Hartley back on his inside too but when it comes to what he actually gets paid the big bucks for he has been pretty rock solid for us this Spring in my opinion.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

Good point. I haven't seen him win anything for a while but then he's never been prolific. As SL used to say a useful 'point of difference'.

I think it has helped having Hartley back on his inside too but when it comes to what he actually gets paid the big bucks for he has been pretty rock solid for us this Spring in my opinion.

He has been decent in the scrum, nothing special but has been a penalty machine too. Penalties win and lose games, look at how Wales couldn't get started because they kept giving away penalties whilst we weren't. If you are constantly giving them away, it kills your game. Ultimately I want to see either someone else start of for him to be subbed off earlier.

 

[Maverick1987]

I shouldn't think we will win the series as we are still re-building.

We have the game against France in the 6N this Saturday, then a game against Wales on 29th May at Twickenham, before we go to Australia.
There is no time to do any 'experimenting' in a match day setting, so I don't think we will be ready to beat Australia down under.

After the Aussie tour which finishes at the end of June, we don't have another match until Nov 12th against SA and I feel it's unlikely we will get any friendlies until WC qualification has finished, which is going on now having started 5th March, with the draw taking place in December 2016.

So we need to do well in the AIs and look to win at least the last three against Fiji, Argentina and Australia, that way we might scrape into the top 4.

If we beat France on Saturday we will be in the top 4 . Wales have 4 tests against NZ this year and I rate our chances of winning more games against Australia than they will against New Zealand . That alone should be enough to see us into the top 4 add to that a win vs Fiji and maybe another win in the autumn internationals which isn't unlikely imo

 

[Peat]

Cole's far from the only penalty machine in that side and I'd be surprised if he got dropped as a consequence. I can't say I'm particularly pleased with it, but so far this tournament I've thought his positives have outweighed his negatives and I won't be that disappointed right now by that.

I do want to see how we look with Brookes starting soon though.

 

[Every Time Ref]

Cole's far from the only penalty machine in that side and I'd be surprised if he got dropped as a consequence. I can't say I'm particularly pleased with it, but so far this tournament I've thought his positives have outweighed his negatives and I won't be that disappointed right now by that.

I do want to see how we look with Brookes starting soon though.

Penalties are big impacts though, either in terms of points or metres or loss of possession, or manpower.

I know the Haskell drum is old, but I'll beat it anyway ... Haskell and Cole both out of that team could dramatically reduce the penalty count without that much significant loss elsewhere.

 

[Peat]

Penalties are big impacts though, either in terms of points or metres or loss of possession, or manpower.

I know the Haskell drum is old, but I'll beat it anyway ... Haskell and Cole both out of that team could dramatically reduce the penalty count without that much significant loss elsewhere.

Oh, I agree. I love tight, disciplined sides.

I just look at Hartley, Cole, Haskell and Farrell and think Jones mightn't be too bothered. Particularly given all the talk about him wanting a more aggressive England.

edit: On the discipline front - we gave up 12 penalties to Scotland's 9; 15 to Italy's 9; 12 to Ireland's 10; and 12 to Wales' 14, the only match where we've conceded less than the opponent - but still gave up a large amount. 3 yellow cards, 2 against Ireland and 1 against Wales.

The penalties work out at

12 for Cole*
5 for Haskell*
4 for Robshaw, Farrell, Hartley
3 for Itoje, Launchbury
2 for Care*, Youngs, Billy
1 for Marler, Kruis, Ford, Joseph, Nowell, Watson, Brown, Mako, Lawes

Asterisks for the yellow cards

If I could be bothered, I'd break up the penalties into types; pulling down a dominant maul on the 5m line should be considered different to getting pinged in a breakdown 40 yards out should be considered different should be considered different to getting caught in possession should be considered different to scrum penalties should be considered different to unnecessary high tackle and so on. I have a lot more sympathy for Cole picking up a team yellow for a try saving technical foul than I do Haskell getting yellowed for a bad tackle. Alas, that data is not easily to hand.

Still, no surprise that the usual suspects are up high. Launchbury and Itoje shouldn't be that high given how little game time they had, but I guess are suffering for trying to get involved at the breakdown.