[Natwest 6 Nations] Round 3 : Scotland Vs England 24/02/2018 16:45

[Leonormous Boozer]

Presuming we hold home court Paddy's day will be for the number 2 spot in the World Rankings.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

New to the forum, are you guys being serious or sarcastic? (about Barnes and Nz being reffed properly).

what do you mean?

 

[87Dreamer]

True but he is the best ref in the world really.

Feels bad that we could never have him in charge of us.
If only other countries could produce top refs like us.

Yup the end of that Wales France game last year was world class refereeing

 

[Zero]

what do you mean?

You asked when was the last time NZ was reffed properly, and the other guy responded with "when Barnes reffed them".

Wasn't sure if that was a sarcastic comment or a serious one.

 

[Reiser99]

So...just got back from watching the game. All I can say is well played Scotland. They gave the exact performance that not only beat us, but highlighted all our flaws. They completely dominated the break down. They played at quick tempo, not allowing England to play their game and took advantage of all the penalties we gave away. Finally when plan A wasn't working England showed they had no ability to adapt and change tactics, just as they struggled against Italy last year.

Was Nigel Owens perfect...no, but would it have changed anything...no. We were outplayed and the better team won. My only consolation is that this wake up call has happened early enough, so that England can adapt before the world cup.

 

[ncurd]

Both

 

[KanyeWest]

We got destroyed at the breakdown all game really. The primary responsibility of an openside flanker is to secure ball when their own team has it and disrupt the oppositions ball. We kept losing the ball all game and Scotland were able to play with tempo. As a result we had forwards tied to close to the ruck and every time they shifted the ball out wide they made breaks. Was always going to be difficult after that first half.

Second half we played with a 7 and were able to play on the front foot a bit more but it's always difficult when a team is chasing the game. Too many errors, too many poor decisions and there was a period of the game after about 50 minutes where it was just set piece after set piece and England just couldn't get a foothold in the game.

Credit to Scotland, they identified England's line speed close to the ruck and played around it. Russell kept putting the ball in behind, their long passing was accurate and they exploited that gap out side the fourth defender where there is a gap in line speed. Second half we fixed a few things up but the damage was done.

We lacked ball carriers and dominance around the break down. I was surprised during the week that Underhill wasn't started, purely because of the way Scotland play.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

If only other countries could produce top refs like us.

I know this is in jest but it's a legitimate issue.
The standard of NH refereeing is low, and then we can't even have the good referees we're stuck with the muck that Ireland and Wales put out

 

[Zero]

A great result for the neutral. It's going to come down to the wire.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

How it feels being an England fan currently

 

[Lé Ddanno]

First match I've switched off before the end since the WC - and I watched France Italy last night.

 

[Reiser99]

I was going to start this post with sorry, but that's such an English thing to do. Can English fans pull their heads out of their arses and stop focusing on the ref to try and cover our abysmal performance. All you're doing is justifying view that we are arrogant and poor losers. We lost and a different ref would not have changed that.

 

[Zero]

I was going to start this post with sorry, but that's such an English thing to do. Can English fans pull their heads out of their arses and stop focusing on the ref to try and cover our abysmal performance. All you're doing is justifying view that we are arrogant and poor losers. We lost and a different ref would not have changed that.

Well said, I thought Scotland was great and scored some very good tries.

 

[TRF_Olyy]

I was going to start this post with sorry, but that's such an English thing to do. Can English fans pull their heads out of their arses and stop focusing on the ref to try and cover our abysmal performance. All you're doing is justifying view that we are arrogant and poor losers. We lost and a different ref would not have changed that.

Except every England fan on here said we were ****

Us being **** doesn't excuse the absolute incompetence of "This is not soccer" Owens

 

[ThebigARena]

It's good to see that after the storm the calm has become apparent from the latter comments that England weren't quite good enough today...

Owens wasn't perfect and there are always marginal calls on every game that the losing team will feel aggrieved for the most part his calls were just.

England just got outplayed by the superior team on the day and dominated at the breakdown clearly Scotland had done their homework .

Ireland showing they are the team to beat today , just feel they had their bad game against the French and now will go through the gears and have got better as tournament progressed (they went up another level against us today) as good as Scotland were today I don't see them beating Ireland in Dublin .

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

Personally i don't think a pro 14 ref should ref a pro 14 country.

 

[TheSaffycen]

I was going to start this post with sorry, but that's such an English thing to do. Can English fans pull their heads out of their arses and stop focusing on the ref to try and cover our abysmal performance. All you're doing is justifying view that we are arrogant and poor losers. We lost and a different ref would not have changed that.

I thought every poster has put we were the worse team, and the ref didn't decide it

 

[Zero]

I find it kind of hypocritical England fans complaining about the ref after they were telling Wales fans to get over the wrongly disallowed try a few weeks go...

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

I find it kind of hypocritical England fans complaining about the ref after they were telling Wales fans to get over the wrongly disallowed try a few weeks go...

Yeh but i'm Scottish fan sooooo.


Also even if i was a english fan i don't remember telling the welsh to get over it.

 

[Leonormous Boozer]

Personally i don't think a pro 14 ref should ref a pro 14 country.

I think that's fair, familiarity does help. That said, Owens was definitely favouring France a few weeks back!