[EOYT] England vs New Zealand 16/11/13

[Ragey Erasmus]

I really want to see England develop the backs and better utilise them. There is no denying our forward play is easily up there but the transition from dominant forwards play to then getting tries with the backs just isn't working. With our forwards we do actually go forwards but when we then try to bring the backs in, we end up going sideways and worst of all, our back play at the same pace as our forwards. The only back worthy of mention is Brown, who has been playing phenomenally well for England. The amounts of times he has covered England and actually then gone on to get us attacking again is the mentality we need in all our backs. With a group of backs who work like Mike Brown, we could actually start scoring tries.

 

[The Jones Boy]

Like Chikwa I believe that Craig Joubert walked England back into the game with a succession of easily kickable penalties for the young maestro Farrell.

It wasn't that England were not good.
It wasn't that the All Blacks didn't make mistakes, it was that Joubert wasn't seeing English mistakes even though they were happening right in front of him and the binning of Read left me and the others in the pub from both sides completely dumbfounded, especially when the replay showed Read had entered the ruck from some distance behind the last feet at t he rear of the ruck.
It was an appalling decision.
I know ref's have to make their decisions without the advantage of hindsight but that was a stone cold shocker.

Another shocking decision was to make Julian Savea Man of the Match.
Two English players shone above the rest on the pitch and for me MotM should have gone to a completely rejuvenated Courtney Lawes, he was everywhere and showed real gusto in his performance.
The other Pommie player that impressed me was Mike Brown the Pommie fullback who made some superb defensive plays.
Billy 12trees tried his heart out, he's one for the future.
Ben Morgan carried up awesomely well when he came on. What a handful.
Vanipolo was excellent in the first half. Marler also had a good game and I have to say I was a bit disappointed with both Robshaw and Hartley who had been stand out performers of the previous 2 weekends. The English bench performed as well if not better than the AB bench.

Crotty was excellent for the AB's when he finally got on.
Dagg had a good game and Piatau has started looking comfortable.
Would like to have seen Corey Jane get a run.
The young locks were not overshadowed.
Kieran Read was enormous and McCaw still has the goods to command at the breakdown
Englands pack was strong, Brown apart i felt their backline was clueless.

 

[04perryo]

So much moaning going on about the ref... does it really matter the All Blacks got the win in the end, stop trying to undermine a great match by saying the ref was on Englands side. The man gave you the world cup!!!

 

[Sweatybee]

Glad the English supporters see a silver lining to this game and have not been left despondent. 3 tries to 1 seems a fairly good reflection of each teams level of ability in both attack and defense.

 

[austingtir]

So much moaning going on about the ref... does it really matter the All Blacks got the win in the end, stop trying to undermine a great match by saying the ref was on Englands side. The man gave you the world cup!!!

It does matter because the standard of officiating is pretty bad in a few games this year. Most teams in the world can claim that a reff has been either dead against them or made some flat out wrong calls in a game this year and imo thats just not good enough.

Had England won this game id be fair spewing right now and thats the only reason im not totally going off about this reffs performance. If you think the banter thats been going on so far on here is bad think about that! The AB's were good enough to win the game after England got alot of help at around the three quater mark that is fact. And im not saying calls didnt go against England but i thought the calls against us were particularly influential.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

Well of course you would....you're a kiwi. I'm yet to see anyone say the ref was biased towards England that wasn't a New Zealand fan.

 

[Bada-Bing!]

Breakdown, breakdown, breakdown. Overall I though England won that battle. All blacks were great for the first 15 minutes, then England really were on the front foot. Our only problem really was we did not have that ingenuity to find holes in the All Black defence to score tries. I would have accepted a loss by 8 points without Corbs and Tuilagi before the game, now I feel a little frustrated. This All Black side are there for the taking, but to beat them, we need some guile to get past their defence; that is for next time. I think ABs are a different proposition in NZ, which will make next summer a difficult proposition in their place, but now we've put down a marker in the last two games v the ABs at Twickenham and for two years time that is what counts.

 

[Zapphod]

Glad you agree, man. NZ "can't reciprocate" in fairness to them because the defensive efforts of France were incredible. Intense, organized, and consistent. If not for those two tries !! aaaaah, those damn All-Blacks...
France still has bursts of aesthetic, "sexy" looking attack even now, but they also look BAAAAD during some bad moments. They need to play together more, they just don't have the time to prepare man, impossible to cement those combinations and play a fluid style on attack when you're not sure what that guy's last name is !...

And yes it's quite remarkable how England, being slower in comparison, still managed to impose their rhythm on that match.

But I think that is precisely the All Blacks weakness now they can no longer seemingly change game plans to suit a more defensive pattern, all we seem to be able to do is attack.
In order for attacking to be successful you have to be able to neutralise the defences not just continually throw yourself at them and in the case of France they never adapted to the densive patterns so the attacks broke down.

So yes the French defence was excellent but an "all conquering" team as people seem determined to make the All Blacks should have had the ability to adapt to it and they just don't, in many respects I fear they are becoming one dimensional.

 

[The Jones Boy]

I thought Joubert had a shocker however...

It is the case that when the home teams play at the following venues they seem to get a points advantage from the support the fans show and how it influences decisions from the officials

Twickenham
Eden park
Kings Park or Jo'Burg
Paris
Millenium Stadium.

Winning away at those destinations is an extra difficult task because the home support at these venues always seem to sway the officials marginally in their favour.
Please note I left Australia out of that equation because they don't seem to have a 'spiritual home' for their fans to flock to...

 

[admartian]

Great game. England played extremely well.

We're definitily missing the defensive abilities and organisation of Conrad. We're a bit softer in those channels now when teams ask questions of our backline.

 

[ABs2011]

But I think that is precisely the All Blacks weakness now they can no longer seemingly change game plans to suit a more defensive pattern, all we seem to be able to do is attack.
In order for attacking to be successful you have to be able to neutralise the defences not just continually throw yourself at them and in the case of France they never adapted to the densive patterns so the attacks broke down.

So yes the French defence was excellent but an "all conquering" team as people seem determined to make the All Blacks should have had the ability to adapt to it and they just don't, in many respects I fear they are becoming one dimensional.

Jeeze man, but harsh no? What more do you expect form the ABs? They are on the verge of an undefeated season which includes playing ALL of the best teams in the world AWAY from home and have only lost one game since Hansen took over!

My point is we can knit pick on minor issues (and that in itself is probably a tribute to how good this team is), but the reality is, at the end of the day, this team has been pretty much unstoppable for several years now. Simply too good for the rest of the world!

 

[The Jones Boy]

Amen to that brother.
Nevermind blowing our own horn, the home and away stats do not lie.

 

[Bazzy]

Thought it was a good game, tense all the way through.

Interesting to read some of the comments about referring here. Have to admit when I was watching the game I definitely thought England were getting the rub of the green with some of the decisions. I mean that Read's yellow, shouldn't it have been penalty for us before Read came in. Messam was well and truly over the ball and it just didn't look like England had any plans of releasing it. I am not complaining too much though. We got the rub of the green in a couple home games in the RC and we won the game, which always helps right .

Interesting to see that most (all?) the England supporters on here didn't see anything wrong with the referring. I am curious to see what some of the neutrals think.

 

[austingtir]

Thought it was a good game, tense all the way through.

Interesting to read some of the comments about referring here. Have to admit when I was watching the game I definitely thought England were getting the rub of the green with some of the decisions. I mean that Read's yellow, shouldn't it have been penalty for us before Read came in. Messam was well and truly over the ball and it just didn't look like England had any plans of releasing it. I am not complaining too much though. We got the rub of the green in a couple home games in the RC and we won the game, which always helps right .

Interesting to see that most (all?) the England supporters on here didn't see anything wrong with the referring. I am curious to see what some of the neutrals think.

I would like to see someone disect a bunch of the decisions in this game from a neutral point of view. The video posted earlier in the thread was made by a clueless wombat (almost everything he was going on about was totally out of context) yet it did have some merit to it.

 

[Jaguares]

Well, IMO ABs dropped their level in these last games against Wallabies (Third Test), France and England. We'll see next year if they can maintain the high level they showed for much of this year.

 

[Kapa O Pango]

All Blacks to lose against Ireland.

BRAIN O'DRISCOLL!!!

 

[james5000]

All Blacks to lose against Ireland.

BRAIN O'DRISCOLL!!!

Are you just dumb or what? why do you keep spelling his name like that?

 

[james5000]

Well, IMO ABs dropped their level in these last games against Wallabies (Third Test), France and England. We'll see next year if they can maintain the high level they showed for much of this year.

You can add the Japan game to your list as well, the AB's were poor in that one as well. Hopefully its just a small blip in form. The Irish are the last hurdle now, we need to up our game in that one as well.

I thought England did play pretty well and had the better of this match for the most part. They can't just kick goals and expect to beat the AB's though.
No real standouts for me. I thought Aaron Smith should have been subbed earlier though. Too many errors today for my likeing. Hope TJ gets a run next week.

 

[easy2288]

If the ABs coaching team do not spot the weakness and still in dreamland..Then I cannot for foresee ABs retaining the world cup. So many weakness easily spotted. The most obvious, the front row. Woodcock and Owen were struggling. I recalled seeing one incident when both of them together and cannot even stop the England No 8.

 

[rugby_mad]

If the ABs coaching team do not spot the weakness and still in dreamland..Then I cannot for foresee ABs retaining the world cup. So many weakness easily spotted. The most obvious, the front row. Woodcock and Owen were struggling. I recalled seeing one incident when both of them together and cannot even stop the England No 8.

agree.. AB front row had a bad day, i'm impressed with Crockett work rate, this was his best test in my opinion.. AB backs was almost invisible at times, especially when Carter went off injured, Ben Smith was struggling at center and his values only shown after Crotty came in with Ben moved to wing; Jane should starts in next match against Ireland, Piutau probably bench, i thought he faded after the brilliance in last test against France, the foul quick throw had unnecessary put AB on pressure.

My MOTM is Mike Brown from England, he is simply brilliant and the best full back for 2013.

Villain is the ref, Joubert was hopeless, couldn't believe he missed Parling obstruction to McCaw and next his called a foul against AB Crockett.. dumb ass!

Read has a massive game, despite the bin, he is my IRB player of the year!