<div class='quotemain'> <div class='quotemain'> I am the only one who thinks that simply the other teams are now reading ireland tactical approach very easily and that the team should have changed somehow its gameplan?????
Plus i think the team was overrated over the 6th nations. With england doing **** for 4 years, france being very moody and scotland and wales having some good/very bad years alternatevely, the irish consistency suggested they were stronger that what they actually are. [/b]
They're a very experienced team, at the height of their athletic power, so if changes are needed on the field they should be capable. I think it's down to ROG being limited in his options: slow ball from the pack + midfield defences rushing up to cut out the D'Arcy/BOD threat.
Ireland weren't overrated - they should have taken the Grand Slam, and they put three SH teams to the sword last November. Argentina point to their record against France, and everyone thinks the ABs were powering for world dominance in 2006 - so it's fair to say that Ireland's record over the last 10 months showed their RWC preparations coming to the boil.
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Ireland
were very overated - overnight they suddenly became the form team in the North just because they got lucky with the schedule - if it was the Irish who got to play the All Blacks on the November Tours last year instead of the French, no one would be talking about the Irish as they would've been roasted as badly, if not worse than the French were at Lyon that one fateful night.
Ireland haven't beaten the French since
before the 2003 Rugby World Cup - And yet they were rated the best team in the North? They bumbled there way past Scotland by a solitary point and struggled to beat Wales by Double Digits, before losing to France for what... the 6th straight time, and they are now the best team in the North?[/b][/quote]
No, no - Ireland were never rated the best NH team: up to 03 that was England, who only took over from France, and then gave it back to France pretty quickly.
It's Irish supporters who rate this the best Ireland team of all time, and we're right. Except it looks like we're about to be proven wrong. But then we were all brought up on cup rugby - so anything can happen.
Good luck with the French!
