England Post-WC discussion

[McTallshort]

The business side of the RFU is very strong AFAIK, so I'm not sure the individual owners really trump the RFU there.

In fact, given that the majority of clubs are loss making businesses, I think the RFU has a fairly clear foot up on them.

Well it's not that strong now given how much money they have lost commercially due to selecting the wrong head coach. Something the club's will be feeling too.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

I think you have to look at who are the best players in their specific position and then look at those players and see which ones have the X factor and potential to be world class.

So for example with pack I'd say

1 best scrummager/ ball carrying in the tight
2 best line out/ scrummager
3 best scrummager/ tight ball carrying
4 best solid jump/ best Rucker
5 best line out jumper/ ball carrier in the wide
6 best tackler/ Rucker
7 best breakdown/ support player
8 ball carrier / tackler/ Rucker/ support player


If we pick on these and stop focusing on the wrong things we'd be in a much better place.

Case in point is marler and mako, picked for their loose work and the. We tried to make them good scrummagers but what we needed is solid scrummagers who can do a bit of tight ball carrying.

I love posts like this!

The front 5 is the foundation of the whole team. Without that being rock solid, you're building on sand, so....

1. Best scrummager, everything else is secondary.

2. Equal weight to scrummaging and darts.

3. Best scrummager, everything else is secondary.

4&5. Don't believe in balanced 2nd rows, both should be beasts. Top scrummagers and heavy duty in the close exchanges. Good line out operators for sure, but unless you have Matfield at the peak of his powers I really don't believe in the whole line out guru thing. Borthwick and Parling for instance compromised too much else in my book.

If you have a powerhouse front 5, things can get a bit more interesting in the back row. You could play 2 open sides for instance, but my preferred set up is:

6 Wrecking ball, both in defence and attack. Big bloke, no refinement, just a licence to cause havoc

7. Breakdown specialist

8. Line breaking carrier

Either 6 or 8 must be able to jump competently.

So what does that mean for the 6N?

1. If firing, Corbs but he won't be so Marler I guess. Will watch Mullan's start to the year closely. Mako is a bench sitter.
2. Simples, Hartley with George coming off the bench.
3. Cole. He was excellent for chunks of last year. I think the conditioning & selections around him made him look ordinary in RWC. He's much better than that (except against the French).
4. Attwood
5. Launch
6. No-one totally fits my model at the moment. Burgess probably will in time, but maybe Ewers with Itoje covering from the bench
7. Kvesic
8. Morgan, assuming he's actually fit as he patently wan't in the RWC

 

[Peat]

For all the calls here for set-piece dominance to be the crowning thought of all tight five selection - particularly the scrum - I don't think I've seen too many international teams go through with it. With most teams making more set-piece concessions to the lineout rather than the scrum.

I agree.

I've talked to Peat about it a couple of times - I've thought for a while now that the clubs were going to become very, very aggressive in their efforts to wrest control from the RFU post RWC. In fact I think it might get extremely ugly at some point.

I think this is probably right. I'd like the RFU and PRL to be more closely aligned, I'd like the two to tap up each other's knowledge, but it's very difficult when you get the feeling some people won't be happy until there's total control. Which this is probably more about.

I can see where the AP is coming from TBH.

Not in how it is run but on how the players might be used etc.

WHY did Lancaster/England want the players to be a different type of fit? Why was he so focus on getting them to be the fittest England team ever.

Because international teams, and New Zealand, play the game at a much higher tempo, with the ball staying in play longer. England simply weren't fit enough to stay at the NZ level.

 

[Josht36]

I love posts like this!

The front 5 is the foundation of the whole team. Without that being rock solid, you're building on sand, so....

1. Best scrummager, everything else is secondary.

2. Equal weight to scrummaging and darts.

3. Best scrummager, everything else is secondary.

4&5. Don't believe in balanced 2nd rows, both should be beasts. Top scrummagers and heavy duty in the close exchanges. Good line out operators for sure, but unless you have Matfield at the peak of his powers I really don't believe in the whole line out guru thing. Borthwick and Parling for instance compromised too much else in my book.

If you have a powerhouse front 5, things can get a bit more interesting in the back row. You could play 2 open sides for instance, but my preferred set up is:

6 Wrecking ball, both in defence and attack. Big bloke, no refinement, just a licence to cause havoc

7. Breakdown specialist

8. Line breaking carrier

Either 6 or 8 must be able to jump competently.

So what does that mean for the 6N?

1. If firing, Corbs but he won't be so Marler I guess. Will watch Mullan's start to the year closely. Mako is a bench sitter.
2. Simples, Hartley with George coming off the bench.
3. Cole. He was excellent for chunks of last year. I think the conditioning & selections around him made him look ordinary in RWC. He's much better than that (except against the French).
4. Attwood
5. Launch
6. No-one totally fits my model at the moment. Burgess probably will in time, but maybe Ewers with Itoje covering from the bench
7. Kvesic
8. Morgan, assuming he's actually fit as he patently wan't in the RWC

This really puts into perspective the forward issues that suddenly started this world cup. Lancaster and Rowntree seem to have gone down the opposite route in nearly all these positions. Aiming to create 8 slimmed down mobile players rather than concentrating on the primary task of each position first.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

Because international teams, and New Zealand, play the game at a much higher tempo, with the ball staying in play longer. England simply weren't fit enough to stay at the NZ level.

England IMO we were fine we looked shattered coming into the first game we looked shattered in warm up games.

He clearly got something very wrong in Colorado.

 

[Peat]

England IMO we were fine we looked shattered coming into the first game we looked shattered in warm up games.

He clearly got something very wrong in Colorado.

That's God's own truth.

There's been a lot of scorn from NZ coaches for England trying to play the NZ way when they didn't have the ball skills. Which is fair.

Equally though, has to be pretty hard to beat them if they routinely run you into the ground so... *shrugs* Bit of a lose-lose scenario, maybe in retrospect. Still, whatever the correct solution was... it wasn't what we just did.

 

[msf]

The problem with picking a big pack is that coaches have a tendency to think the same thing works for the backline too - and then you get a team like Wales or South Africa (the old South Africa) if you´re lucky, and a team like the one we played against Wales if you´re unlucky.

- - - Updated - - -

I think some of that stuff is Kiwi arrogance/misconceptions of NH rugby. South Africa have actually become more dangerous by playing more like New Zealand, as shown in 2014 game. I don´t think our players (if we pick the right ones) are any less skilled than the South Africans, in fact if anything we are less likely to win much by playing it tight than they are, since our players aren´t typically as big as theirs. Perhaps a middle way then, between South Africa and Wales on one hand, and New Zealand and Australia on the other - kind of like how we played when we won the World Cup?

 

[RedruthRFC]

Well it's not that strong now given how much money they have lost commercially due to selecting the wrong head coach. Something the club's will be feeling too.

Tricky comparison. According to the Micawber Principle, the RFU are happy while many AP clubs are miserable. However continuing the card playing analogy, you could argue that the RFU have been dealt the nuts and are only just scraping home to win the hand, while some of the clubs have been dealt rags and are doing well to avoid losing their shirts.

 

[McTallshort]

Tricky comparison. According to the Micawber Principle, the RFU are happy while many AP clubs are miserable. However continuing the card playing analogy, you could argue that the RFU have been dealt the nuts and are only just scraping home to win the hand, while some of the clubs have been dealt rags and are doing well to avoid losing their shirts.

So the RFU for all its resources and rich collective audience should always be a commercial success but the level of that success can vary and currently it should do better, while the club's are managing to cling on under much much tougher circumstances?

 

[RedruthRFC]

England IMO we were fine we looked shattered coming into the first game we looked shattered in warm up games.

He clearly got something very wrong in Colorado.

This. Around the time that teams were forming their training camps, the question of what they should be doing with their time. Most were in favour of plenty of strenuous conditioning work towards the start of the camp. I argued against it on the basis that it increases the chance of injuries and wears players out and that they should be arriving in close to peak condition anyway.

In the sports sciency world that it modern rugby, no doubt there will have been all sorts of fitness testing going on. I'd love to see what improvements were made. These guys are professional athletes, any sort of fitness improvement must be hard to come by.

I'd also be interested to hear how the big southern hemisphere sides chose to use their time in camp.

- - - Updated - - -

So the RFU for all its resources and rich collective audience should always be a commercial success but the level of that success can vary and currently it should do better, while the club's are managing to cling on under much much tougher circumstances?

That's pretty much the way I see it.

My point is that given the big difference in circumstances, it's difficult to say for sure who is doing a better job. Maybe any AP club's board could do a better job of running the RFU and improve revenues. On the other hand, maybe the RFU board could turn a loss making AP club into a commercial success.

I tend to agree with your take on the RFU. I don't know all that much about the finances of AP clubs, although my impression is that Leicester's board do a good job (they were dealt a much better hand than most, but have been astute in making the most of it), Exeter appear very well run too having built their business slowly but surely. Given the massive losses regularly announced by Newcastle, I would have to question how well run they are, although it's fair to acknowledge that they are trying to build on a lot shakier foundations than a club like Leicester.

 

[McTallshort]

This. Around the time that teams were forming their training camps, the question of what they should be doing with their time. Most were in favour of plenty of strenuous conditioning work towards the start of the camp. I argued against it on the basis that it increases the chance of injuries and wears players out and that they should be arriving in close to peak condition anyway.

In the sports sciency world that it modern rugby, no doubt there will have been all sorts of fitness testing going on. I'd love to see what improvements were made. These guys are professional athletes, any sort of fitness improvement must be hard to come by.

I'd also be interested to hear how the big southern hemisphere sides chose to use their time in camp.

- - - Updated - - -



That's pretty much the way I see it.

My point is that given the big difference in circumstances, it's difficult to say for sure who is doing a better job. Maybe any AP club's board could do a better job of running the RFU and improve revenues. On the other hand, maybe the RFU board could turn a loss making AP club into a commercial success.

I tend to agree with your take on the RFU. I don't know all that much about the finances of AP clubs, although my impression is that Leicester's board do a good job (they were dealt a much better hand than most, but have been astute in making the most of it), Exeter appear very well run too having built their business slowly but surely. Given the massive losses regularly announced by Newcastle, I would have to question how well run they are, although it's fair to acknowledge that they are trying to build on a lot shakier foundations than a club like Leicester.

And that's the tragic thing, club's like Newcastle and London Irish were hoping for a successful English WC as it could have generated more interest in the game and bigger crowds but the team failed to live up to expectations because in simple terms the RFU selected the wrong head coach.

To say the club's have different priorities to the RFU is wrong, they both need a successful English team and its perhaps more important to the club's from a commercial point of view than it is to the RFU, so the club's should be involved in the RFU's decision making on the England team and perhaps it might break up the cosy boys club up a bit.

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

The problem with picking a big pack is that coaches have a tendency to think the same thing works for the backline too - and then you get a team like Wales or South Africa (the old South Africa) if you´re lucky, and a team like the one we played against Wales if you´re unlucky.

- - - Updated - - -

I think some of that stuff is Kiwi arrogance/misconceptions of NH rugby. South Africa have actually become more dangerous by playing more like New Zealand, as shown in 2014 game. I don´t think our players (if we pick the right ones) are any less skilled than the South Africans, in fact if anything we are less likely to win much by playing it tight than they are, since our players aren´t typically as big as theirs. Perhaps a middle way then, between South Africa and Wales on one hand, and New Zealand and Australia on the other - kind of like how we played when we won the World Cup?

You're right but that's also a ridiculous mindset from the coaches. Surely the whole point is that a solid aggressive pack on the front foot gives licence to pick the likes of Ford or Cips and Joseph? Playing a lightweight pack with hybrid flankers means you end up with Farrell Burgess and Barrett.

As for the NZ way, that suits them but trying to beat someone at their own game is plain daft. Football teams don't out Arsenal Arsenal, they bully them out of the game. Work out what your strengths are and play to them. Just look back to Campese's con job in 1991 and cry.

 

[RedruthRFC]

And that's the tragic thing, club's like Newcastle and London Irish were hoping for a successful English WC as it could have generated more interest in the game and bigger crowds but the team failed to live up to expectations because in simple terms the RFU selected the wrong head coach.

To say the club's have different priorities to the RFU is wrong, they both need a successful English team and its perhaps more important to the club's from a commercial point of view than it is to the RFU, so the club's should be involved in the RFU's decision making on the England team and perhaps it might break up the cosy boys club up a bit.

Absolutely. The trickle down effect of a successful World Cup could have been massive all the way down the pyramid. I agree with your point about common goals, but there's a good bit of self interest on both sides too. As things are structured at the moment, I don;t believe that the AP clubs having an inordinate influence would be unconstitutional - as I understand it, rightly or wrongly, an AP club has no more sway than a level 12 club.....that who structure is something that should be up for review sooner rather than later.

 

[Maverick1987]

You're right but that's also a ridiculous mindset from the coaches. Surely the whole point is that a solid aggressive pack on the front foot gives licence to pick the likes of Ford or Cips and Joseph? Playing a lightweight pack with hybrid flankers means you end up with Farrell Burgess and Barrett.

As for the NZ way, that suits them but trying to beat someone at their own game is plain daft. Football teams don't out Arsenal Arsenal, they bully them out of the game. Work out what your strengths are and play to them. Just look back to Campese's con job in 1991 and cry.

This is so true . We have to be flexible in our game plan every time we take to the field . What works against Ireland may not work against someone else . We have a huge pool of players so why do we pick a style and stick .

Edit : actually we don't have a style at all

 

[Peat]

This is so true . We have to be flexible in our game plan every time we take to the field . What works against Ireland may not work against someone else . We have a huge pool of players so why do we pick a style and stick .

Edit : actually we don't have a style at all

Because pretty much everyone else does? And constant chopping and changing results in less cohesion, which is damn important of which we have less than everyone else to begin with?

Ok - I'll throw this one out there - what is the natural English game? Does such a thing even exist?

 

[Tony Manx]

Well it's not that strong now given how much money they have lost commercially due to selecting the wrong head coach. Something the club's will be feeling too.

Beat me to the exact same response!!

 

[Every Time Ref]

Because pretty much everyone else does? And constant chopping and changing results in less cohesion, which is damn important of which we have less than everyone else to begin with?

Ok - I'll throw this one out there - what is the natural English game? Does such a thing even exist?

Historically, I would say it's ten man rugby with a powerful scrum, big forwards and a good kicker. Powerful but slow you might call it. But is this a "natural" strength or just what we've always gone for?

Currently ... I've no idea, there are too many players to choose from, too many coaches and too many variables. But here's one way to approach it - who are our best players? I'm not convinced that this is the best way to find our natural game, but it's an interesting thought experiment.

I'd say Launchbury, Joseph and Brown. Not enough to pick a style around, but I guess leaning towards the wide game as Launchbury can roam about a bit and JJ is obviously a weapon with good ball. Add in May and Watson, who I'd say are our form players ATM (not the same thing as our best players necessarily) and this becomes stronger.

I still hit a buffer at this point though, because how do you build around that? There are a lot of different ways of looking at it. Does a playmaking 12 suit this game best because he can put the wide runners into space, or does a bosher compliment him because he creates that space by holding defenders? Does a flyhalf who can out-kick his opposite number in open play create opportunities for the back 3 to run in broken field, or does a take-it-to-the-line ten create indecision in defences? Do you pick a back row to smash the breakdown and create quick ball, or do you pick them to turnover ball and attack from that?

 

[RedruthRFC]

4&5. Don't believe in balanced 2nd rows, both should be beasts. Top scrummagers and heavy duty in the close exchanges.

What do you mean by "beasts"? I said further up the thread that ideally you want two beasts (not sure if that's the term I used, but it's a synonym of what I meant), but failing that a balanced pairing. What I meant is that if you have a couple of big lumps who get stuck in and also post frightening stats in open play (it's hard not to mention the young South African pairing at this point), great, play them and reap the rewards. However I can't think of one English lock who could tick all of these boxes, which is why I still see the merit in a big, hard lump and a more athletic player to play a looser role - something that gives England options.

If you simply mean sticking the two biggest lumps available in the second row (within reason) even if their work rate is poor, the only way that I can see this working is if the rest of the pack performs their role exceptionally well and has a great work rate. If you look at it in the terms of what you require out of your pack in terms of carries, tackles, turnovers, etc over the course of a match, selecting two second rows who are going to post poor numbers in these categories means that either you miss out on something, or the rest of the pack must pick up this slack.

 

[Maverick1987]

Because pretty much everyone else does? And constant chopping and changing results in less cohesion, which is damn important of which we have less than everyone else to begin with?

Ok - I'll throw this one out there - what is the natural English game? Does such a thing even exist?

I don't mean changing a whole team but changing the way we play is definitely possible . We don't need to resort to our stereotypical game . We can have a big forward pack with the backs like bath have

 

[Vieux Talonneur]

Because pretty much everyone else does? And constant chopping and changing results in less cohesion, which is damn important of which we have less than everyone else to begin with?

Ok - I'll throw this one out there - what is the natural English game? Does such a thing even exist?

Great question. I'll give it some thought but whatever it is, its been diluted by the number of imports in the AP, ditto France. Much less of an issue for the super teams and Irish provinces.

Another interesting question would be to identify Argentina's natural game. A few years back it started and finished with the front 5. Now look at them and all with no domestic set up to speak of.

Some fundamentals are constant but maybe it just centres on the strengths of each particular crop of players.