What's the story with English rugby?

The game has moved on since the last world cup.... England are still trying to play their old game, though the rest of the top teams have started to move on.. theres no point trying to bully the oposition like England do, they tend to try and overpower their oposition, except when the oposition is just as powerful, and far faster in mind and foot... they get a wake up call. new Zealand handed them one wake up call, and NZ didnt really turn up for that game, they sat there and scored mainly off Englands mistakes, they are THE top team in punishing oposition mistakes.....

Its not really about England being crap, its about them playing the wrong type of game.. if you come up against oposition who WILL score tries.. you can only fight fire with fire.... New Zealand are one of those teams who only need a sniff of your try line.. even in their own 22, and they WILL run at you...

Englands game has been stick it up your jumper, and kick for the corners and try and strangle the opposition until you can score some points, and hope the defence is good enough to not conceed points... defences can be breached, and Englands game plan was found out during the world cup, but they didnt come across any teams that could push them about.. so after the world cup, England still tried to play their old game, except the world had moved on.. and Clive Woodward made a mess of the Lions then... and thus was prooved.. the game had moved on in less than a year. England had better move on as well, and need to pick a back line that can do more than just run with the ball, but think on how to use it. They have the forwards, but verfy much lack in the backs... Watching Guscott talking about the backs is always funny, as he hits the nail on the head.. England are only playing in one dimension rugby at the moment, other teams are now starting to play higher tempo quick rugby... where pace is out doing muscle...

just my take on it..


p.s. Hovi5... you cant be welsh if you say that

Yeah. I was always sort of appalled at how well English tactics work, ie kick and force peno's and oppressing the crap out of the match.
I am thrilled to see Wales, the Blacks, and Ireland are really playing classy rugby. It would be nice to see Wales get a top notch team... for some reason I am a closet Wales fan.

Out here I am lucky if I see the matches at all, and there is no analysis at all. Guscott does know his stuff, but he is such an unmercifully smug git I can barely watch him. Grr. Martin Johnson is another tosser. Is he a pundit yet?

(Rugby League. Pfft. I might as well watch American football. )

With Wales, its a question of having all our players match fit at the same time.. though changing to Regions is starting to pay off... the Ospreys 2nd team beat Australia the other week plus some really good players are coming to the top.. thers quite a few players now knocking on the door for team selection.. where as a few years ago we were lacking any replacements, now, Wales have too many...

plus, from 1 -15 the players are comfortable in handling the ball.... even our props are quite adept at running and trying to offload in the tackle... we also have a habit of nurtering a back row that are closet fly halfs.. Michael Owen is very good at spotting gaps and putting in long passes...

Ireland have always played well as a team, over the past few years they have really started to click, all it takes is one half break, and Ireland always have supporting men to go through the gap...

France blow hot and cold.. one day they will be untouchable, and it will be like trying to catch ghosts... the next day they simply cannot be arsed.. and several players have said, they rather play against New Zealand than France.. as you know which NZ team will turn up.. with France, if they click you could be in for a torrid day... and that is Frances biggest enemy... if they loose faith in themselves they give up almost straight away.. where as the other big teams tend to plug at it regardless...

Australia seem to always be there, no matter how badly they play rugby, they always seem to have knack of scoring tries... propper athel;etes in the backs which run all day...

South Africa can play good rugby when they want to.. but I dont think Im the only one here, but everytime they play against England, it turns into a grudge match.. they only seem to be interested in how many black eyes they can give the opposition..


England really do miss the leadership of Dalaglio or Johnson... big lumps who scared the crap out of the opposition, but also kept things together for their teams when stuff started to hit the fan... they were good at keeping their players heads focused, where as Corry now doesnt seem to be able to cope when things go wrong, as well as having Hodgson at Fly Half... who can be a liability in himself (rather like our Arwel Thomas at times!) he is far better than Wilkinson was at getting the backs moving... but seems to go into his shell when even one thing looks like it could go wrong...

Anyway, I reckon England will beat South Africa over the next two tests.. simply due to my reasons given above.. South Africa dont turn up to play rugby against England anymore...

Originally Posted by valleyboy

South Africa dont turn up to play rugby against England anymore...

You wanna take this outside

Thats just my opinion on previous games...

We all know you can play rugby rather well when you want to.. its just every game Ive watched the Springbks play against England in the past few years has turned into a boxing match rather quickly... the Springboks winning on points for punches landed, England winning for points scored in a rugby game

This time may be different, as Im sure South Africa can sense the opertunity for two wins... it wont be as bad as Englands loss to New Zealand, but South Africa also have that ability to score from their own line rather easily at times...

France blow hot and cold.. one day they will be untouchable,

I know!!! France kill me. They can literally be unbeatable, or rubbish. There is no telling what's going to happen in a France match. (Was it a world cup match a while back when they wiped the floor with the Blacks? And then barely turned up for the England match where they lost miserably?)

The Aussies are the exact opposite. No matter what, they will blood and guts it out.

I dunno why I like Wales so much. They always seem to want to give sexy rugby one more try, even if they are getting hammered, and are playing rubbish. Dunno. Great Rugby country though.

The problem with South African rugby at the moment is that politics has played a huge role with people trying to get more black players in the squad leaving out players of "fairer skin"...not necessarily white players... and they have only just given the coach/manager full control of the squad again which could be seen by that dismal performance against the Irish. Lets hope he can pull it all together by this weekend...and hopefully the games will be clean as well. As far as dirty play goes...well it goes both ways doesn't it

Originally Posted by philipMac

I dunno why I like Wales so much. They always seem to want to give sexy rugby one more try, even if they are getting hammered, and are playing rubbish. Dunno. Great Rugby country though.

I love Welsh rugby because they always seem to have a good "spirit" about the team and supporters...even when they're getting their asses kicked.
And they have a bloody nice stadium to boot as well

I think its in our up bringing.. we honestly dont mind our team loosing as long as it looks like we tried our best... in the past decade, some of our players simply didnt put the effort in... things have started to change now, so fitness levels have increased, and the players themselves are enjoying the way they play the game.. after all.. who wants to scrap it out in a ruck or a maul when you can run around like a mad man throwing back handed passes.. and scoring tries...
we have started to play lik Wales should play rugby.. or as rugby should be played..
We have produced some of the worlds greates talented rugby players, and continue to do so.. which for such a small country, is no mean feat

2005 was a great year for us.. we not only played some great rugby... but got the grand slam in some truely brilliant games... I had no finger nails left after the France-Wales game... and for the grand slam decider against Ireland, I was in a pub full of people who had lost their voices by half time... plus, it is true, you will hear people singing in the pubs around here on international games... even though we only just had voices to do so on that day..

Originally Posted by valleyboy

and for the grand slam decider against Ireland, I was in a pub full of people who had lost their voices by half time...

Ah here. There is no need for that now.

Bloody Wales.