[2021 Six Nations] England vs Italy (13/02/21)

[TRF_Olyy]

Better than Mike Brown on the wing mind.

Considering our gameplan the last year or so he'd probably be pretty successful in it

 

[Reiser99]

Sorry, mate, didn't mean to upset you. I don't think England are anywhere near where they could be, I think there are definitely issues, but almost 3 years out from the next WC, I think there are a lot of positives, and everything else is just a problem to be solved. Is Eddie the man to solve it? Yes, I think so.

See this is where I disagree because for me the negatives are almost entirely down to EJ.

Negative tactics. There is no way that the players are choosing those tactics, because then EJ wouldn't select them. Yes defence is important and kicking can get you territory, but the extent to which we are relying on these aspects is absurd.

Poor selections. I've already said it elsewhere, but competition for places is one of the best motivators to get the best out of a team and there are some players who clearly know they can turn up, have a bad game or run of games (how high, only EJ knows) and still keep their place. Moving Faz from 10-12 is not a demotion, this combo has been used plenty of times. If anything the implication is that Lawrence isn't good enough and we need Faz to improve that position. If you are not going to drop players when they play badly they have less incentive to fix it, simple. Also if reports are accurate about Billy and that he doesn't train well and maintain his fitness, then it's an insult to other players who do that he's allowed to get in shape through playing. Honestly who else would be given that opportunity.

Lack of depth in key positions. We all know we're a couple of injuries away from have no experience in a few key positions, mainly 8 & 9 and that's all down to EJ refusing to give other players a chance. The 9 situation is probably one of the most ridiculous situations in the history of rugby. How can you have one player with over 100 caps and the next highest has 13 (Heinz btw) then it's Robson with 8. We lose Youngs to injury (blessing in disguise) and suddenly we are left we no experience what so ever. This tactic has also cost us players heading to other countries and could well cost us more before long.

Attitude. Honestly I feel that England just assume they can turn up and win. All the talk in the build up about how they want to take sides apart and they are going to try new ideas. Nothing about respecting opposition and having to earn the win. I think he's created a culture where England believe they are better than they are and if they lose it's not their fault, or it was an off day etc... We've seen England scrapping wins for a while and the good performances are the exception. Yet at no point do they seem to even contemplate that it might be their own fault. Yes I can understand trying to spin it as positive, but there is a difference between spin and delusional and they are the wrong side of that line.

Inability to change tactics. This is more about the players, but I do think EJ has coached it into them. We've seen time and time again that England have almost zero ability to change tactics and adapt a gameplan when they go behind. Yes they managed to scrape a victory at the end of the ANC against a second string France, but for me that was an exception and more to do with France giving into the pressure than England adapting. When losing they just stick with the same tactics and hope eventually it works, especially with Farrell at 10. When they get on the wrong side of the ref they just whine instead of adapting their game to suit the ref. If I was Franco Smith I'd be aiming to get a quick early lead on Saturday and then put England under pressure and watch them implode.

I agree with you earlier, this is a good England squad, but they are not adding up to the sum of their parts and there are too many games like Scotland and not enough games like New Zealand. Games where England play poorly are the norm and that reflects more accurately on them than the occasional great performance. For me EJ has created a culture of laziness and expecting to win in this squad and as long as he's there, that isn't going to change.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

I do take your point, but I suppose the question is: when does Eddie get a chance to experiment? Every time he loses a game, fans and media are calling for his head. He got us all the way to a WC final, knocking off the Wallabies and All-Blacks along the way, then lost the opening game to France in the 6N and there were calls for his head to roll. He then wins 8 in a row, claiming two trophies along the way, and then when he loses a single game against Scotland, people are demanding he's sacked. How can he put unproven players on the field when he knows the next loss could cost him his job? Let's say he put Randall, Lawrence, Malins etc out there against Italy. It's now a huge gamble for him. If it turns out they're not international class and England lose as a result, Eddie could be joining the dole queue. Fans can't have it both ways.

Every coach has to feed new players in without the team falling off a cliff, that's part of the art. SAF at Man U was a master at this, ruthlessly ditching players who weren't performing or past their best and constantly evolving his team while remaining successful.

When does Jones get the chance to experiment you ask. In the meaningless bloody Autumn matches that's when. Golden opportunity. He didn't. For this tournament the Saracens situation wasn't of his making and he really wouldn't have taken much criticism if he hadn't picked those players or at least benched them to give others a chance. He didn't. So he's made his bed.

If he sticks with fundamentally this team all the way through to the RWC we'll be an ageing and predictable unit. By properly blooding so few new players and sticking with favourites too long there's also a risk that we'll fall off the edge of a cliff post RWC with a new coach having to pick up the pieces. Make no mistake, Jones only cares about the results on his watch and doesn't give a toss about the longer term.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

I do take your point, but I suppose the question is: when does Eddie get a chance to experiment? Every time he loses a game, fans and media are calling for his head. He got us all the way to a WC final, knocking off the Wallabies and All-Blacks along the way, then lost the opening game to France in the 6N and there were calls for his head to roll. He then wins 8 in a row, claiming two trophies along the way, and then when he loses a single game against Scotland, people are demanding he's sacked. How can he put unproven players on the field when he knows the next loss could cost him his job? Let's say he put Randall, Lawrence, Malins etc out there against Italy. It's now a huge gamble for him. If it turns out they're not international class and England lose as a result, Eddie could be joining the dole queue. Fans can't have it both ways.

That is a distortion. Jones had plenty of chances to experiment, he hasn't taken them. People aren't annoyed that we lost but annoyed at the manner of it and the worst part, that it really doesn't seem all that surprising. It's a repeat of 2018 all over again, we had been scraping wins and people could see we could only maintain that for so long before it collapsed and collapse it did, resulting in our worst 6N since the 6N started. The warning signs that that was coming there and Jones ignored it, only responding when the **** really hit the fan and his job was on the line.

This feels like a repeat. Problems in the squad were identified all the way back at the world cup final (lack of leadership and inability to adapt when we can't bully sides). That's just over a year Jones has known about these weaknesses. In that time NONE of the leadership group have changed, the roles in the leadership group are unchanged, the core of the squad is unchanged and now we have France and Scotland both targeting exactly the same weakness that has been there for all to see. To add to that, our gameplan has become even more predictable and we have become even worse at executing it. Positions like 8, 9 and 10 were all recognised as being areas where we had not looked at depth all the way back in 2018! In 4 years Jones has done nothing, absolutely nothing to address that. If anything the 9 situation got even worse, we used to say we had 2 settled SH and didn't know who the third was. He then ditched one of the settled ones and now we have 1 SH with no idea who is even the one who goes on the bench. That is ******* ridiculous.

Had Eddie lost whilst trying to remedy long standing problems then he would have been given some slack but he isn't, he has lost by changing nothing as he has changed nothing in these positions for years. Now the problem has been highlighted with another historic defeat and what has he done? Nothing. What will he do if we lose to Italy? Nothing. That is why people are angry, he simply is refusing to recognise the problem, refusing to take a multitude of chances to fix it and it's showing in the performance of the side.

Also Dunn did not get significant gametime. In 2 of his 3 caps he came on at the 79th minute and in 1 cap he got 12 minutes. That's about 5 minutes per cap. He had the carrot of England internationals dangled in front of his face, would come on at the 79th minute and as soon as LCD was back, he kicked Dunn to the kerbside without a second thought, despite his clear passion to play for England. Farrell has a whole year playing mediocre rugby? Completely untouchable. Not even benched.

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

See this is where I disagree because for me the negatives are almost entirely down to EJ.

Negative tactics. There is no way that the players are choosing those tactics, because then EJ wouldn't select them. Yes defence is important and kicking can get you territory, but the extent to which we are relying on these aspects is absurd.

Poor selections. I've already said it elsewhere, but competition for places is one of the best motivators to get the best out of a team and there are some players who clearly know they can turn up, have a bad game or run of games (how high, only EJ knows) and still keep their place. Moving Faz from 10-12 is not a demotion, this combo has been used plenty of times. If anything the implication is that Lawrence isn't good enough and we need Faz to improve that position. If you are not going to drop players when they play badly they have less incentive to fix it, simple. Also if reports are accurate about Billy and that he doesn't train well and maintain his fitness, then it's an insult to other players who do that he's allowed to get in shape through playing. Honestly who else would be given that opportunity.

Lack of depth in key positions. We all know we're a couple of injuries away from have no experience in a few key positions, mainly 8 & 9 and that's all down to EJ refusing to give other players a chance. The 9 situation is probably one of the most ridiculous situations in the history of rugby. How can you have one player with over 100 caps and the next highest has 13 (Heinz btw) then it's Robson with 8. We lose Youngs to injury (blessing in disguise) and suddenly we are left we no experience what so ever. This tactic has also cost us players heading to other countries and could well cost us more before long.

Attitude. Honestly I feel that England just assume they can turn up and win. All the talk in the build up about how they want to take sides apart and they are going to try new ideas. Nothing about respecting opposition and having to earn the win. I think he's created a culture where England believe they are better than they are and if they lose it's not their fault, or it was an off day etc... We've seen England scrapping wins for a while and the good performances are the exception. Yet at no point do they seem to even contemplate that it might be their own fault. Yes I can understand trying to spin it as positive, but there is a difference between spin and delusional and they are the wrong side of that line.

Inability to change tactics. This is more about the players, but I do think EJ has coached it into them. We've seen time and time again that England have almost zero ability to change tactics and adapt a gameplan when they go behind. Yes they managed to scrape a victory at the end of the ANC against a second string France, but for me that was an exception and more to do with France giving into the pressure than England adapting. When losing they just stick with the same tactics and hope eventually it works, especially with Farrell at 10. When they get on the wrong side of the ref they just whine instead of adapting their game to suit the ref. If I was Franco Smith I'd be aiming to get a quick early lead on Saturday and then put England under pressure and watch them implode.

I agree with you earlier, this is a good England squad, but they are not adding up to the sum of their parts and there are too many games like Scotland and not enough games like New Zealand. Games where England play poorly are the norm and that reflects more accurately on them than the occasional great performance. For me EJ has created a culture of laziness and expecting to win in this squad and as long as he's there, that isn't going to change.

Some interesting points, some of which I agree with, some I don't.

Negative tactics: I really couldn't say who's responsible for this. Eddie has said time and time again he wants England to play heads-up rugby, to play what's in front of them. When they don't, Eddie gets the blame. Is it just hot air from Eddie? Is he really micromanaging everything? I have no way of knowing. But yeah, I'd like to see them play what's in front of them too, and there are plenty of players on the pitch capable of doing that. The fact that they don't... I just don't know why.

Poor selections: he selected a winning team in 8 out of 9 matches last year, and 0 out of 1 so far this year. I'm gonna give Eddie a bit of time on this one.

Lack of depth in key positions: okay, that's a good point about SH. I totally agree.

Attitude: England think they can turn up and win. Most of the time they do. That's not delusional. They have an absolutely awful habit of turning up for the occasional game and looking like not one of the players has ever been on a rugby pitch before, but its occasional. It damn well needs fixing, but honestly, in almost 50 years, I've rarely experienced England just turning up and winning so often. It makes me happy.

Inability to change tactics: totally agree. No question. What's the answer? I'm not sure. Probably a lot of the answer depends on the Negative Tactics bit above.

Not adding up to the sum of their parts: not so far, no. Are they lazy? No, I don't think so, not when I see them knocking ten tons of crap out of the opposition game in, game out. Games where England play poorly are the norm? Teams that play poorly don't go on winning streaks, win trophies regularly etc. Well, except maybe Wales under Gatland, but that's probably just me being bitter.

 

[Reiser99]

Negative tactics: I really couldn't say who's responsible for this. Eddie has said time and time again he wants England to play heads-up rugby, to play what's in front of them. When they don't, Eddie gets the blame. Is it just hot air from Eddie? Is he really micromanaging everything? I have no way of knowing. But yeah, I'd like to see them play what's in front of them too, and there are plenty of players on the pitch capable of doing that. The fact that they don't... I just don't know why.

See this is where I think it is EJ because if it was the players, then surely he'd drop them for those who can do what he asks. I've said for a while, EJ talks about heads up rugby, but this team seems to do the complete opposite and play pre-planned tactics for almost the entire game. This links to having no adaptability. Again if this is truly what EJ wanted then he'd select players who do the job, not stick with players who ignore him.

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

That is a distortion. Jones had plenty of chances to experiment, he hasn't taken them. People aren't annoyed that we lost but annoyed at the manner of it and the worst part, that it really doesn't seem all that surprising. It's a repeat of 2018 all over again, we had been scraping wins and people could see we could only maintain that for so long before it collapsed and collapse it did, resulting in our worst 6N since the 6N started. The warning signs that that was coming there and Jones ignored it, only responding when the **** really hit the fan and his job was on the line.

This feels like a repeat. Problems in the squad were identified all the way back at the world cup final (lack of leadership and inability to adapt when we can't bully sides). That's just over a year Jones has known about these weaknesses. In that time NONE of the leadership group have changed, the roles in the leadership group are unchanged, the core of the squad is unchanged and now we have France and Scotland both targeting exactly the same weakness that has been there for all to see. To add to that, our gameplan has become even more predictable and we have become even worse at executing it. Positions like 8, 9 and 10 were all recognised as being areas where we had not looked at depth all the way back in 2018! In 4 years Jones has done nothing, absolutely nothing to address that. If anything the 9 situation got even worse, we used to say we had 2 settled SH and didn't know who the third was. He then ditched one of the settled ones and now we have 1 SH with no idea who is even the one who goes on the bench. That is ******* ridiculous.

Had Eddie lost whilst trying to remedy long standing problems then he would have been given some slack but he isn't, he has lost by changing nothing as he has changed nothing in these positions for years. Now the problem has been highlighted with another historic defeat and what has he done? Nothing. What will he do if we lose to Italy? Nothing. That is why people are angry, he simply is refusing to recognise the problem, refusing to take a multitude of chances to fix it and it's showing in the performance of the side.

Also Dunn did not get significant gametime. In 2 of his 3 caps he came on at the 79th minute and in 1 cap he got 12 minutes. That's about 5 minutes per cap. He had the carrot of England internationals dangled in front of his face, would come on at the 79th minute and as soon as LCD was back, he kicked Dunn to the kerbside without a second thought, despite his clear passion to play for England. Farrell has a whole year playing mediocre rugby? Completely untouchable. Not even benched.

Is it a repeat of 2018 all over again? I remember us losing 6 in a row in 2018. So far, we've lost 1. I might regret saying that if we lose to Italy, but hey, English arrogance.

None of the leadership group have changed? Well that's normal isn't it? Surely it's better that they learn from negative experiences than you just rip them out of the team when they fail? Wilkinson started that 78-0 defeat to Oz (b*****r me, I've still never got over that!). Dallaglio and Johnson as captains blew multiple grand slams by failing to adapt. Leadership isn't this automatic thing that you're good at or you're not, it takes time, experience and, most importantly, failure. Learning from their mistakes is what will make our leadership group work, not throwing them out as soon as they get something wrong.

Agree with you about the number 2 scrum half, it is ridiculous.

"That is why people are angry, he simply is refusing to recognise the problem, refusing to take a multitude of chances to fix it and it's showing in the performance of the side."

1 loss in 9 games. 2 trophies last year. I'm sorry, I don't get why you think it's showing in the performance of the side.

Agree about Dunn. It's weird. Farrell though? The dude's won us a lot of games, played some great rugby and proved himself again and again. Is he out of form? Yes, absolutely. Do I want him to play himself back into form so that he is once again a top player who annoys the **** out of the opposition and leads us to victory after victory? Hell, yeah! Can he do that if we drop him? Er... I dunno.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Negative tactics: I really couldn't say who's responsible for this. Eddie has said time and time again he wants England to play heads-up rugby, to play what's in front of them. When they don't, Eddie gets the blame. Is it just hot air from Eddie?

1000000%
Otherwise he would have dropped the players who were deviating from his (supposed) heads up rugby gameplan

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

See this is where I think it is EJ because if it was the players, then surely he'd drop them for those who can do what he asks. I've said for a while, EJ talks about heads up rugby, but this team seems to do the complete opposite and play pre-planned tactics for almost the entire game. This links to having no adaptability. Again if this is truly what EJ wanted then he'd select players who do the job, not stick with players who ignore him.

Fair point. But I don't think any of us really know what Eddie is up to. When he says things like 'We'll sort out our attack after the Lions tour', that sounds completely mental, but he's spent his entire coaching career misdirecting the media and the opposition. Back in 2018, England were awful. In 2019 they stormed to the WC final, got a record victory over Ireland, scored 4 bonus points in 5 6N games. You really do never know what the ******* is gonna do next.

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

1000000%
Otherwise he would have dropped the players who were deviating from his (supposed) heads up rugby gameplan

Or persevered with talented guys who he thought had potential to do what he wanted?

 

[BrokenWing]

Farrell though? The dude's won us a lot of games, played some great rugby and proved himself again and again. Is he out of form? Yes, absolutely. Do I want him to play himself back into form so that he is once again a top player who annoys the **** out of the opposition and leads us to victory after victory? Hell, yeah! Can he do that if we drop him? Er... I dunno.

Alright, rather than dropping him, how about just getting him off the park for 20 minutes if he's having a poor game as opposed to just moving him out one place?

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

That is a distortion. Jones had plenty of chances to experiment, he hasn't taken them. People aren't annoyed that we lost but annoyed at the manner of it and the worst part, that it really doesn't seem all that surprising. It's a repeat of 2018 all over again, we had been scraping wins and people could see we could only maintain that for so long before it collapsed and collapse it did, resulting in our worst 6N since the 6N started. The warning signs that that was coming there and Jones ignored it, only responding when the **** really hit the fan and his job was on the line.

This feels like a repeat. Problems in the squad were identified all the way back at the world cup final (lack of leadership and inability to adapt when we can't bully sides). That's just over a year Jones has known about these weaknesses. In that time NONE of the leadership group have changed, the roles in the leadership group are unchanged, the core of the squad is unchanged and now we have France and Scotland both targeting exactly the same weakness that has been there for all to see. To add to that, our gameplan has become even more predictable and we have become even worse at executing it. Positions like 8, 9 and 10 were all recognised as being areas where we had not looked at depth all the way back in 2018! In 4 years Jones has done nothing, absolutely nothing to address that. If anything the 9 situation got even worse, we used to say we had 2 settled SH and didn't know who the third was. He then ditched one of the settled ones and now we have 1 SH with no idea who is even the one who goes on the bench. That is ******* ridiculous.

Had Eddie lost whilst trying to remedy long standing problems then he would have been given some slack but he isn't, he has lost by changing nothing as he has changed nothing in these positions for years. Now the problem has been highlighted with another historic defeat and what has he done? Nothing. What will he do if we lose to Italy? Nothing. That is why people are angry, he simply is refusing to recognise the problem, refusing to take a multitude of chances to fix it and it's showing in the performance of the side.

Also Dunn did not get significant gametime. In 2 of his 3 caps he came on at the 79th minute and in 1 cap he got 12 minutes. That's about 5 minutes per cap. He had the carrot of England internationals dangled in front of his face, would come on at the 79th minute and as soon as LCD was back, he kicked Dunn to the kerbside without a second thought, despite his clear passion to play for England. Farrell has a whole year playing mediocre rugby? Completely untouchable. Not even benched.

Nail on head.

 

[Which Tyler]

The trouble is, I don't see anyone who's an improvement over Eddie, and away from the on-pitch performance, he's fulfilling his brief.

I also see what he's doing strategically, and quite honestly, it makes a refreshing change to have a head coach who's actually looking further ahead than the next match of batch of matches.

What Eddie does is he develops a game-plan for the opposition he feels is most dangerous to his team, and relies on 95% of that being good enough in the other matches - it worked for Australia in 03 (targeting NZ), South Africa in 07 (targeting Eng), Japan in 15 (targeting SA) and got us to the final in 19 with arguably 2 of the best displays England have ever produced (before failing horribly in the final).
He sees the first 2 years of a RWC cycle as a time when laws and interpretations change, and by the time the next RWC comes around, rugby is a different sport around the margins. The basics are always the same, but the margins are different. If you spend the first 2 years of a cycle fine-tuning your game plan, then A] you're fighting the last war, B] you'll be constantly tinkering and changing, potentially confusing the players, and C] showing your hand too early.

He (seems to) see the first 2 years as a time to drill the basics - 10-man rugby. Nail the fitness, lineout, maul and the kicking game This should be enough to win against all but the top 2-3 teams in the world, although obviously when it fails, it looks absolutely dire. Once things have settled down in terms of law interpretations and style of play (AKA, "after the lions") then work on the attack, the tackle area, the ruck - the stuff that's constantly changing. Ideally, work on your perfect gameplan in practice, and only show 20% of it in any one game; until less than a year out. Maybe try the whole lot in 1 single game to make sure you can actually put it together.
No point giving your opponents any more time to look at what you're doing than you absolutely have to.

5 years ago he told us all that year 2 of that RWC cycle would be about fitness, and decision making / skills whilst absolutely knackered, and that performances and results would take a hit whilst doing so, but the benefits should be seen 2 years later at the RWC. He then did exactly that, and everyone was shocked because we took a hit to performances and results that he told us to expect - and people called for his head and claimed that he didn't know what he was doing.
This year he's told us that he's working on the basics, and ignoring the attack until after the lions. It looks like he's working on the basics and ignoring the attack until after the lions, and people seem shocked that he's doing exactly that, and are calling for his head.


I don't necessarily like it, but anyone saying that he doesn't have a plan or doesn't know what he's doing (or excessively over-simplify what he's doing - "oh he thinks 8, 9 and 10 have to be hyper-experienced, and that's all he cares about") is plainly not paying attention. There's a difference between not liking the plan, and denying its existence.

I, as most of us, would far rather he came up with 2 plans (say, one for NZ, and one for SA), and put them into practice more often - &/ concentrate on our assets rather than negating our most-dangerous-opponent's - make them worry about us for a change. Of course, I'd also like to see us experiment a little more with the playing pool - especially in those first 2 years of a cycle.



Apologies for the wall of text, I'm not sure how I can do dense it though. I'm also far from the first in this thread

 

[j-dawg]

Serious question; what are Farrell's chances of making the lions?

I don't see how his selection can be justified based on form since the last World Cup. The only thing I can think of to his advantage is that he's been involved in the last two and Gatland knows him well.

 

[Pieter Steph du Teague]

@Which Tyler Spot on

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

The trouble is, I don't see anyone who's an improvement over Eddie, and away from the on-pitch performance, he's fulfilling his brief.

I also see what he's doing strategically, and quite honestly, it makes a refreshing change to have a head coach who's actually looking further ahead than the next match of batch of matches.

What Eddie does is he develops a game-plan for the opposition he feels is most dangerous to his team, and relies on 95% of that being good enough in the other matches - it worked for Australia in 03 (targeting NZ), South Africa in 07 (targeting Eng), Japan in 15 (targeting SA) and got us to the final in 19 with arguably 2 of the best displays England have ever produced (before failing horribly in the final).
He sees the first 2 years of a RWC cycle as a time when laws and interpretations change, and by the time the next RWC comes around, rugby is a different sport around the margins. The basics are always the same, but the margins are different. If you spend the first 2 years of a cycle fine-tuning your game plan, then A] you're fighting the last war, B] you'll be constantly tinkering and changing, potentially confusing the players, and C] showing your hand too early.

He (seems to) see the first 2 years as a time to drill the basics - 10-man rugby. Nail the fitness, lineout, maul and the kicking game This should be enough to win against all but the top 2-3 teams in the world, although obviously when it fails, it looks absolutely dire. Once things have settled down in terms of law interpretations and style of play (AKA, "after the lions") then work on the attack, the tackle area, the ruck - the stuff that's constantly changing. Ideally, work on your perfect gameplan in practice, and only show 20% of it in any one game; until less than a year out. Maybe try the whole lot in 1 single game to make sure you can actually put it together.
No point giving your opponents any more time to look at what you're doing than you absolutely have to.

5 years ago he told us all that year 2 of that RWC cycle would be about fitness, and decision making / skills whilst absolutely knackered, and that performances and results would take a hit whilst doing so, but the benefits should be seen 2 years later at the RWC. He then did exactly that, and everyone was shocked because we took a hit to performances and results that he told us to expect - and people called for his head and claimed that he didn't know what he was doing.
This year he's told us that he's working on the basics, and ignoring the attack until after the lions. It looks like he's working on the basics and ignoring the attack until after the lions, and people seem shocked that he's doing exactly that, and are calling for his head.



I don't necessarily like it, but anyone saying that he doesn't have a plan or doesn't know what he's doing (or excessively over-simplify what he's doing - "oh he thinks 8, 9 and 10 have to be hyper-experienced, and that's all he cares about") is plainly not paying attention. There's a difference between not liking the plan, and denying its existence.

I, as most of us, would far rather he came up with 2 plans (say, one for NZ, and one for SA), and put them into practice more often - &/ concentrate on our assets rather than negating our most-dangerous-opponent's - make them worry about us for a change. Of course, I'd also like to see us experiment a little more with the playing pool - especially in those first 2 years of a cycle.

This. Exactly this.

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

Serious question; what are Farrell's chances of making the lions?

I don't see how his selection can be justified based on form since the last World Cup. The only thing I can think of to his advantage is that he's been involved in the last two and Gatland knows him well.

Why do you want Farrell to make the Lions? The fewer English players that make the Lions, the fitter they'll be for England.

 

[Which Tyler]

Why do you want Farrell to make the Lions? The fewer English players that make the Lions, the fitter they'll be for England.

So that England can get 2-3 games without Farrell in the lineup?
I'd be happy for all the undroppaboes to go on the lions, and no-one else (actually, that's not tried, as I solve the lions, and want them to do well with a decent representation from England

 

[Not Eddie Jones]

So that England can get 2-3 games without Farrell in the lineup?
I'd be happy for all the undroppaboes to go on the lions, and no-one else (actually, that's not tried, as I solve the lions, and want them to do well with a decent representation from England

Fair enough. I never saw the Lions as anything but a distraction from England. A nice thing and all, but not particularly important.

 

[ncurd]

When was the last time Farrell had a MotM performance for England?

I mean if we're going to state we've won matches be one of him I'd like to know when was the last time it occured.