[2017 RBS Six Nations] Round 3: England vs Italy (26/02/2017)

[Scotty]

I think this sums it up, he is very calculated with the media and now the focus is all on Italy's tactics and how upset England are, not on their performance. I personally think Italy's tactics changed nothing in the game in terms of points wise. England were playing awful anyway, and the tactic just exacerbated the issue, but didn't cause it. Also Italy's opportunities all came from them playing regular rugby and the try from England not paying attention. Finally once England regrouped at half time, they were able to quickly expose the flaw in the tactic. For me Italy played well and took advantage of the situation, but it wasn't game changing. If they had a reliable kicker though, then England might have been under some more pressure.

As an English fan, my bigger concern is that we have gone backwards after 3 games. Hughes was terrible, as was Farrell. Only players I thought were above average were Daly, Launchbury and Itoje. Brown was better though and the subs as usual helped improve the situation. George and Nowell should definitely start against Scotland.

I disagree, the italy tactic changed the game massivle points wise our strength was out wide and they stopped that and got in our head. We would have put 60+ points easy past them. Nothing wrong with what they did and easily over come but we failed. Dont like the tactic as it stops flowing rugby but thats not for me to decide if it should be changed or not

Agree george and nowell start but also watson on bench, may out and mako start

 

[The Jones Boy]

I don't like the tactic either but it's easily remedied with a pick and go approach and then they won't want to do it again.

 

[Saint4805]

After Wales v England Eddie Jones stood in front of the camera and said he wanted to 'put Italy to the cleaners'.

Agree it'll be a one-off tactic for Italy, just like the Scottish line-out throw to a centre against Ireland.

 

[munstermuffin]

I disagree, the italy tactic changed the game massivle points wise our strength was out wide and they stopped that and got in our head. We would have put 60+ points easy past them. Nothing wrong with what they did and easily over come but we failed. Dont like the tactic as it stops flowing rugby but thats not for me to decide if it should be changed or not

Agree george and nowell start but also watson on bench, may out and mako start

Must say this sums it up brilliantly. Scotty you're accurate here.

 

[Goodey]

Italy's tactics stopped Farrell from kicking goals and made May drop it with a clear run to the line?

What stopped England posting a really big score was, predominantly, England. There's been a massive overrating of Italy's tactics just because weirdness.

 

[ratsapprentice]

What stopped England posting a really big score was, predominantly, England. There's been a massive overrating of Italy's tactics just because weirdness.

100% It's en effective shock tactic, but doubt even Italy thought it would work for more than a few phases.

It definitely did effect England's performance, and I'm sure that it ****** Eddie off.
I'm fairly confident that Eddie would have earmarked this game a loooong time ago, as one to experiment in.
His carefully laid out plans were scuppered by Italy doing something unconventional.

Having said that, I think Eddie is very calculating and manipulative with his media work - he can be both ****** off, and still calculating.
No reason he can't be both at the same time.

 

[The Jones Boy]

Storm in a teacup.
England won again, with a bonus point.
Move on to the next game.
I reckon Scotland are going to get battered like a fish by a slightly frustrated and angered England who want to get in there and rip chunks off an opponent who isn't trying a sly manoeuvre .
Could be a cricket score against the undergunned Jocks at Twickers in the next fixture.

 

[Scotty]

Italy's tactics stopped Farrell from kicking goals and made May drop it with a clear run to the line?

What stopped England posting a really big score was, predominantly, England. There's been a massive overrating of Italy's tactics just because weirdness.

Agreed to an extent but we allowed them to get in our heads therefore we were rattled, faz had a shocker, and may just swap for watson straight out. The reaction to their tactic was massive because it had a massive effect on england even though we should have dealt better but we didnt, without it we would have prob got the BP before half time ir deffinatly won by a big margin.

 

[Goodey]

100% It's en effective shock tactic, but doubt even Italy thought it would work for more than a few phases.

It definitely did effect England's performance, and I'm sure that it ****** Eddie off.
I'm fairly confident that Eddie would have earmarked this game a loooong time ago, as one to experiment in.
His carefully laid out plans were scuppered by Italy doing something unconventional.

Having said that, I think Eddie is very calculating and manipulative with his media work - he can be both ****** off, and still calculating.
No reason he can't be both at the same time.

I don't really think he's calculated at all. He just says a lot more and the most controversial bit gets reported on.

 

[Mumbles119]

Storm in a teacup.
England won again, with a bonus point.
Move on to the next game.
I reckon Scotland are going to get battered like a fish by a slightly frustrated and angered England who want to get in there and rip chunks off an opponent who isn't trying a sly manoeuvre .
Could be a cricket score against the undergunned Jocks at Twickers in the next fixture.

Agree, yes a storm in a tea cup. England were the ones at fault for taking too long to adapt, not Italy for choosing the tactic, but England still played badly and got the result done.

It is the playing poorly part that has me disagreeing with your view on England getting a cricket score against Scotland. Yes, optimistically, if England have played poorly so far and still won each game, that could mean everything will click this time against Scotland and we could see a superb performance. But this is still an if.

The area that worries me the most is the breakdown. Scotland have excelled here without the gigantic players others sides have, and England have poorly controlled their own breakdown and could well give up a lot of turnovers if things either don't click or are changed in squad/tactics.

 

[Mrs. Peter Quinn]

Some of the criticism of Jones here is quite lame.Its not his job to sing pretty songs to the media about how clever Italy were and how ****ed off he is with his senior players. In fact it's a sign of how little we expect from coaches that we expect them to stand there and reveal exactly what everyone's feeling in the camp. Managing the media is a key competency of the head coach and you're doing a pretty ****ty job if you always say what you're really thinking.

Make no mistake Jones will be studying Haskell and Farrell very closely in the coming games to see whether either have what it takes to take over from Hartley, whose days IMO are extremely numbered.

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

Honestly i think jones did a great job on Saturday.

He was obviously upset that he hadn't prepared his team well for the game (to be fair not many coaches would have expected this defense.) and what was worst was his team being utterly clueless about how to attack this defense.

He did a great job making adjustments at half.

Afterwards he took the blame off his players by attacking O'Shea. I really don't think he believes O'Shea to be a detriment to the game of rugby (not basketball I'm a moron) but rather wanted his players to feels as if they've weren't to blame.

Spot on. Stole the words from my mouth.

 

[Saint4805]

I reckon Scotland are going to get battered like a fish by a slightly frustrated and angered England who want to get in there and rip chunks off an opponent who isn't trying a sly manoeuvre .
Could be a cricket score against the undergunned Jocks at Twickers in the next fixture.

Pity this isn't a quote from the English press as it could be pinned up in the Scottish dressing room in a couple of weeks.

I think cricket score might be going a bit far. Scotland are getting better at putting in 80 minute performances and were solid in the second half against Ireland and particularly Wales.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

Pity this isn't a quote from the English press as it could be pinned up in the Scottish dressing room in a couple of weeks.

I think cricket score might be going a bit far. Scotland are getting better at putting in 80 minute performances and were solid in the second half against Ireland and particularly Wales.

It's Scotland v England they shouldn't need extra motivation.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

I suspect going into the game with the mentality of wanting to play a certain way way part of what caused England to take so long. If we had aimed to go into the game and batter Italy through the forwards (as Ireland probably would have) I think we would have adapted to it pretty quickly. I'm convinced England went into that game with the specific aim of scoring lots of points by avoiding a front up game and playing wide. It was because they were always looking to move it wide that they failed to front up, a desperation to try to force the game to fit what they had planned to play for rather than just facing the reality.

I'm no coach but you would think in training he would split it into 2 teams and tell 1 team that the defense are going to play a certain way and how he wants them to play then go to the defending team and tell them to defend a different way and then see if the team cotton on and adapt. I did that when I was teaching some young players some hockey, they failed and just complained the defense weren't doing what I said they would do. Sound familiar?

 

[Mike Rolls]

Storm in a teacup.
England won again, with a bonus point.
Move on to the next game.
I reckon Scotland are going to get battered like a fish by a slightly frustrated and angered England who want to get in there and rip chunks off an opponent who isn't trying a sly manoeuvre .
Could be a cricket score against the undergunned Jocks at Twickers in the next fixture.

If only. If England continue to play as poorly as they to date, compared to last years last autumn, I will be happy if we manage to win by one point - I cannot see a cricket score!
Mike

 

[Mrs. Peter Quinn]

Whilst England obviously need to buck their ideas up I never find it particularly helpful to say stuff like "if x play like they against Y against z they will lose". The game against Italy had a particular set of circumstances and a background of Italy bring talked about as at rock bottom..Nothing will be the same against Scotland. Food side though they are, I don't yet fear them when they're away from home, provided we can get our ducks in a row.

I also really hope Jones took away from the Italy game how dire the need is for an alternative to Care/Youngs.

 

[Raggs]

Rewatch the game.

Our errors killed us in the first 15-20 minutes. The no-ruck popped it's head up, but only really got going around the 15m mark, and by 20m we were sending pick and goes through the tackle area, along with forming mauls etc before half time. We adapted, but the real thing stopping us from playing was us.

Farrell showed that without his kicking, there's a big question on how much he's worth. Hughes had a nightmare start, but again grew into the game (his ruck work was very good at times), Brown doesn't pass (almost), the other players don't even look to expect it anymore. Thought May showed that if it's an ugly game, he's about as useless as a Ferrari in a field.

Hartley still doesn't look to add much for me, Farrell's was the voice I heard over the ref mike the most during the game (no commentary).

We were our own worst enemies, and whilst Poite got the wrong call on the ruck/tackle thing a few times, the no-ruck approach wasn't what stopped us dominating that game.

 

[Pieter Steph du Teague]

Agree with Raggs, I think a lot of the players clearly went out there with the mindset that it was gonna be a walkover and so didn't perform at all, and once they realised that it wouldn't be, most were too unnerved to build anything.

Makes me seriously question the mentality of the team.

 

[Goodey]

Rewatch the game.

Our errors killed us in the first 15-20 minutes. The no-ruck popped it's head up, but only really got going around the 15m mark, and by 20m we were sending pick and goes through the tackle area, along with forming mauls etc before half time. We adapted, but the real thing stopping us from playing was us.

Farrell showed that without his kicking, there's a big question on how much he's worth. Hughes had a nightmare start, but again grew into the game (his ruck work was very good at times), Brown doesn't pass (almost), the other players don't even look to expect it anymore. Thought May showed that if it's an ugly game, he's about as useless as a Ferrari in a field.

Hartley still doesn't look to add much for me, Farrell's was the voice I heard over the ref mike the most during the game (no commentary).

We were our own worst enemies, and whilst Poite got the wrong call on the ruck/tackle thing a few times, the no-ruck approach wasn't what stopped us dominating that game.

I like the analogy of May as a Ferrari and Nowell as a range rover.

May probably not that valuable tbf. Probably one of those rapid track-only fiberglass things