England 2024/25

[Vieux Talonneur]

Mixed news for England that Fasobgon did a number on Baxter last night.

TH is starting to look encouraging with Stuart upping his game and big strong youngsters emerging.

Less so at LH. Genge seldom lives up to his reputation, while Baxter and Rodd definitely need to improve their scrummaging. I really can understand why England are interested in AOF there.

 

[Not Mike Brown's Sock]

Mixed news for England that Fasobgon did a number on Baxter last night.

TH is starting to look encouraging with Stuart upping his game and big strong youngsters emerging.

Less so at LH. Genge seldom lives up to his reputation, while Baxter and Rodd definitely need to improve their scrummaging. I really can understand why England are interested in AOF there.

Idk, I this this is an overreaction - Baxter has been really solid and improving for a couple of years now. Fasogbon getting a game over him doesn't change that, especially given he's had plenty poor scrummaging showings himself.

 

[BPM]

Baxter didn't have a good game but actually, in typical hype train fashion, I thought the commentators largely created the narrative that it was Fasogbon winning all the scrum penalties. To me it looked like the main issue was Knight dominating Kerrod on the other side of the scrum. Baxter seemed to have more of a problem with Gotovtsev, although some of that was interesting/generous reffing.

Fasogbon left with an unfortunate ankle/foot injury so I doubt he will be available for the 6N anyway.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

Idk, I this this is an overreaction - Baxter has been really solid and improving for a couple of years now. Fasogbon getting a game over him doesn't change that, especially given he's had plenty poor scrummaging showings himself.

Baxter's definitely worth investing in, but it's not just that though. It's up a notch, but he had scrum struggles in NZ and the AI too. Those are high standards, but that's the international game.

Not overhyping Fasogbon but he definitely had the upper hand last night. And is 2 years younger. Until he went off it had been a good night for him.

They're both young. To succeed at the top level they'll need to be consistent, if not outright dominant, in the scrum. They have plenty of time, but aren't there yet.

 

[Saintjay]

You're talking about the coach who's used Smith at FB and Earl in the centres…..

That also didn't at first think either Mitchell or Slade were good enough for the RWC squad.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

That also didn't at first think either Mitchell or Slade were good enough for the RWC squad.

Or Underhill….

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

Feature in today's Times on The Next Big Thing Pollock.

One of the stats used was Prem tackle completion rate where he ranks pretty high. Didn't say anything about % dominant etc, but that table's topped by Isiekwe who I think is consistently underrated for not being a highlight reel player.

 

[Booboobang]

That changed the day the game went professional unfortunately.

While Sweeney's made mistakes, his targets and pay have been set by the Board and Remuneration Committee. They should be drawing most of the anger.

Bonuses and redundancies isn't a good look but who's to say that without Sweeney's interventions it wouldn't have been 70 redundancies not 40? We outsiders can only assume, but we simply don't know. Of course if the workforce was bloated in the first place the blame lies at his door too….

Thats not how CEO's work, ever. The CEO is there to make the most amount of profit regardless of personal or ethical cost for the shareholders. If there was room for 70 redundincies he would of done it without thinking. We already saw this mentality from him and the boardscwith things like setting financial sucess as record losses and combining womens and mens results.

Look at out water situation, there was money to invest so we didnt have to have human **** in our water, was this done? No, instead larger and larger pay outs to shareholders. Energy bills through the roof yet there has been record profits and hand outs to shareholders.

This is the reason grassroots will never get anything unless, like they are doing now they effectively go on 'strike' and force change by being a pain for the board. We already kind of saw the lack of moral integrity by pumping disproportionate money into womens rugby knowing it is easier to maintain targets in that side of the game. I am all for funding in female rugby, but the tying result together makes it extrmely dubious as to why the RFU has been so hot on it.

 

[Don't Skip Leg Day]

Convince me otherwise but Baxter, Ross, Manny and Genge all too small at LH.

All visibly smaller than nearly every nation we play.