RWC: Canada - Japan (27-09-2011, 17:00)

[rusty_lock]

Call it a premonition, but when O'Toole knocked on in the opening minute (with an overlap on the blindside) I figured it was gonna be a tough one for Canada.

Just a shame Monro couldn't sort the boot out.

honestly I'm a big O'toole fan but he was not looking his best today.

 

[LittleGuy]

honestly I'm a big O'toole fan but he was not looking his best today.

O'Toole has yet to really break out this entire RWC perhaps the injury early against Tonga was the issue.

 

[IKALETAHI]

This argument about Fiji is ridiculous. People forget Fiji has basically brought its 3rd team to this World Cup. Isa Nacewa, Naevo, Ratuvou, Rabeni, Bobo, Delasau, Dewes, Nagusa, Caucau to name a few pulled out of this World Cup or were controversially left out.

Cant imagine any of the minnows without that many starters. Those players listed are far better players than any starters in the minnows. Any other questions would be silenced if you watched the 2007 RWC when Fiji were at Full Strength.

 

[monkeypigeon]

This argument about Fiji is ridiculous. People forget Fiji has basically brought its 3rd team to this World Cup. Isa Nacewa, Naevo, Ratuvou, Rabeni, Bobo, Delasau, Dewes, Nagusa, Caucau to name a few pulled out of this World Cup or were controversially left out.

Cant imagine any of the minnows without that many starters. Those players listed are far better players than any starters in the minnows. Any other questions would be silenced if you watched the 2007 RWC when Fiji were at Full Strength.

Ngwenya.

And by the looks of it, Necewa doesn't want to play for Fiji and doesn't count himself as a fijian player.

 

[CDN_Rugby]

Ngwenya.

And by the looks of it, Necewa doesn't want to play for Fiji and doesn't count himself as a fijian player.

DTH Van der Merwe too. Not only is he one of the best players to come from a minnow nation, but he could probably play on any six nations side.

 

[psychic duck]

Holland's Tim Visser would get in most 6 nations sides ... and probably will be in one soon enough

 

[JW.]

Holland's Tim Visser would get in most 6 nations sides ... and probably will be in one soon enough

Yep, qualifies for Scotland this Six Nations and they're stupid if they don't pick him. Hell of a player.

 

[Shane@JPN]

I am very dissappointed for the result. Ono and Brice were to be in starting lineup. Endo's poor handling was terrible. Most of Japanese fans consider JK is equivalent to Zico, who was a head coach of Japanese national soccer team and failed to success in World Cup campaign.

 

[Dizzy]

Man, poor Japan, almost had it there, credit to Canada for coming back in the end and deciding to deny Japan the win by taking that last penalty. Overall, a great game from Ryan Nicholas, Arlidge, Vatuvei, Tanaka and Kikutani. Kaplan was pretty harsh at the breakdown area where Japan clearly won turnover ball or should have been awarded penalties for holding on. That one point where I think it was DTH who was outnumbered at the breakdown by like 4-1 on the far side of the field, I don't see why Kaplan blew that up. It's not Japans fault none of the Canadians could be bothered to get over there to the breakdown. But all in all, a great game to watch on a sunny afternoon..

 

[kovana]

Lol.. another DRAW!!

 

[peks89]

This argument about Fiji is ridiculous. People forget Fiji has basically brought its 3rd team to this World Cup. Isa Nacewa, Naevo, Ratuvou, Rabeni, Bobo, Delasau, Dewes, Nagusa, Caucau to name a few pulled out of this World Cup or were controversially left out.

Cant imagine any of the minnows without that many starters. Those players listed are far better players than any starters in the minnows. Any other questions would be silenced if you watched the 2007 RWC when Fiji were at Full Strength.

Exactly!!!! Kava sessions a filled with ppl who would want domoni's head in their kava bowl lol...Weakest fiji team i've ever seen! We deserve to lose every match in this WC so we can sack the whole FRU board lol

 

[sigesige00]

I was thinking that tie-games are decided by the number of tries. Why did Canada not win?
And, what was the last whistle? Unplayable?

 

[sigesige00]

The ingoals of the stadium of the Canada-Japan game was very short. About 6m? Is it a Rugby League stadium?

 

[TRF_Olyy]

No, a tied game ends in a draw

 

[LittleGuy]

The ingoals of the stadium of the Canada-Japan game was very short. About 6m? Is it a Rugby League stadium?

It was a cricket ground converted into rugby.

193,000 viewers for the game in Canada, lets hope TSN keeps covering the friendly matches that Canada will play next year, (especially with three at home and one in the States), we need to have these games covered in non world cup years by big networks as well.

 

[Canucks]

This argument about Fiji is ridiculous. People forget Fiji has basically brought its 3rd team to this World Cup. Isa Nacewa, Naevo, Ratuvou, Rabeni, Bobo, Delasau, Dewes, Nagusa, Caucau to name a few pulled out of this World Cup or were controversially left out.

Cant imagine any of the minnows without that many starters. Those players listed are far better players than any starters in the minnows. Any other questions would be silenced if you watched the 2007 RWC when Fiji were at Full Strength.

Yes this argument is ridiculous, if you don't dress your supposed vastly superior players then you can't say you're better.
If your players don't want to compete for your country or they get left out the national team side, then they aren't playing for your team so they don't count. This isn't Fiji's 3rd team, this is Fiji's 1st team as the guys that are actually playing for their country deserve a bit more credit.
I can make an equally ridiculous argument by stating if we dressed Sidney Crosby, Ryan Getzalf and Shea Weber, no one would be able to beat us.
Potential never beats results and the result is Fiji rugby is currently 16th in the world right now.

I think you need to watch some more rugby, I will agree that those are some great players that either choose not to play or were left out, but other countries have excellent players as well. DTH Van Der Merwe and Adam Kleeberger are good examples. As is James Arlidge who is better than any fly half in Fiji. Tonge'huia is one of the best props in the world and he plays for Tonga. Mamuka Gorgodze plays for Georgia and was best foreign player in Top14 last year.

About Fiji silencing people last world cup. Did you actually watch the whole pool stage or just one game?)

Fiji:
Vs Australia 55-12 (While Canada went 37-6)
Vs Canada it 29-16 (And you had Naevo, Ratuvou, Rabeni, Bobo, Delasau and Dewes. Conversly, today Canada only has 8 players in it's 22 from that squad.)
Vs Japan 35-31 ( hardly silencing anyone.)

Only thing you really did well was take down Wales, which was a very good win for Fiji, played outside their minds that day but hardly capable of saying that those players are better than any player on any other minnow team.

So one good game and you silence anyone. Not like any other minnows have ever beat a top 10 team before. Oh wait.

 

[Surefire]

[QUOTE193,000 viewers for the game in Canada, lets hope TSN keeps covering the friendly matches that Canada will play next year, (especially with three at home and one in the States), we need to have these games covered in non world cup years by big networks as well.[/QUOTE]

I agree this is huge. TV coverage in the U.S. is very poor, and I think this is a big reason it does not draw more interest. Canada, and the U.S. ,should really build on WC momentum and broadcast more games. After following a few of the Canada threads on this forum, it still seems that the club level is more advanced than in the U.S. I would really like to see Canada develop further, and the U.S. follow suit.

 

[Shaggy]

It was a cricket ground converted into rugby.

193,000 viewers for the game in Canada, lets hope TSN keeps covering the friendly matches that Canada will play next year, (especially with three at home and one in the States), we need to have these games covered in non world cup years by big networks as well.

Well, it's a dual purpose ground (like many grounds have been in the past, although this is starting to change) ... Hawkes Bay play their home ITM cup match games (rugby) there, and Central Districts play some of their cricket games there.

I would have said it's better suited to rugby, but it's been used for both for many years now ... I must confess, I haven't noticed a small in goal area before

 

[james5000]

Yes this argument is ridiculous, if you don't dress your supposed vastly superior players then you can't say you're better.
If your players don't want to compete for your country or they get left out the national team side, then they aren't playing for your team so they don't count. This isn't Fiji's 3rd team, this is Fiji's 1st team as the guys that are actually playing for their country deserve a bit more credit.
I can make an equally ridiculous argument by stating if we dressed Sidney Crosby, Ryan Getzalf and Shea Weber, no one would be able to beat us.
Potential never beats results and the result is Fiji rugby is currently 16th in the world right now.

I think you need to watch some more rugby, I will agree that those are some great players that either choose not to play or were left out, but other countries have excellent players as well. DTH Van Der Merwe and Adam Kleeberger are good examples. As is James Arlidge who is better than any fly half in Fiji. Tonge'huia is one of the best props in the world and he plays for Tonga. Mamuka Gorgodze plays for Georgia and was best foreign player in Top14 last year.

About Fiji silencing people last world cup. Did you actually watch the whole pool stage or just one game?)

Fiji:
Vs Australia 55-12 (While Canada went 37-6)
Vs Canada it 29-16 (And you had Naevo, Ratuvou, Rabeni, Bobo, Delasau and Dewes. Conversly, today Canada only has 8 players in it's 22 from that squad.)
Vs Japan 35-31 ( hardly silencing anyone.)

Only thing you really did well was take down Wales, which was a very good win for Fiji, played outside their minds that day but hardly capable of saying that those players are better than any player on any other minnow team.

So one good game and you silence anyone. Not like any other minnows have ever beat a top 10 team before. Oh wait.

The current rankings are distorted by Fiji's poor performance in this years Pacific Nations cup (where they had a really weak team).
If you look past that result you will see Fiji have been the highest ranked minnow for the last four years.

Fiji historically has the best win/loss record amongst the minnows, they have also beaten the most tier 1 nations.

You can't say if France beat Canada by X margin, and Samoa beat Fiji by X margin, then Canada must be better than Fiji because France are better than Samoa. That's plain silly.

If they all had their strongest sides Fiji would beat all the minnows 7 times out of 10, Historically they beat all minnow nations 7 times out of 10.

 

[Canucks]

The current rankings are distorted by Fiji's poor performance in this years Pacific Nations cup (where they had a really weak team).
If you look past that result you will see Fiji have been the highest ranked minnow for the last four years.

Fiji historically has the best win/loss record amongst the minnows, they have also beaten the most tier 1 nations.

You can't say if France beat Canada by X margin, and Samoa beat Fiji by X margin, then Canada must be better than Fiji because France are better than Samoa. That's plain silly.

If they all had their strongest sides Fiji would beat all the minnows 7 times out of 10, Historically they beat all minnow nations 7 times out of 10.

The current rankings aren't distorted because Fiji is playing like a 16th ranked nation in the world right now. It happens, Canada's been there not to long ago. I agree that Fiji has been around top of the tier 2 (not a minnow) exchanging places with Argentina, Italy and Samoa.

Your second group of points are both terrible and completely wrong. From the top of my head I believe Fiji only has something like a 65% against both Tonga and Samoa and plays most of their games against those 2 teams. As well, Fiji have only beaten Scotland and Wales, whereas Canada has beaten Scotland, Wales and France. So those points are moot.

I never said that comparision, you should brush up on your reading comparision. I was comparing direct results against roughly similar teams that both Canada and Fiji played at roughly the same time and they show that Fiji played 1 really good game last world cup, they aren't so godlike that any game against anyone around their ranking is an auto win. They are apart of the upper echelon in their rankings but as rugby shows if a team is around your ranking then they have a chance.

Your last point is incorrect but rather than waste my time having a little look to prove your wrong, I'll just say source please.

I'm not trying to say Fiji haven't been a good team. I'm simply stating that you can't go around and say they are better then everyone else around them if they had so-so players. That argument is not applicable because they don't have those players for whatever reason.
As well, you cannot say that they would automatically thrash all of their opponents because unfortunately, history disagrees with you. Looking back at the last world cup, when they had their supposed awe-inspiring team they only beat a bad Canada team 29-16 (need a disallowed try as well) and Japan 35-31. Hardly thrashings against 2 teams vastly below their class.

Once again, if Canada played Sidney Crosby, Ryan Getzlaf and Shea Weber, Fiji would be annihilated. The ABs better watch out then. Exact same ridiculous argument that I'm making.