RugbyRebels

I R Geech wrote:Contrast the intensity and surety of purpose that England played with around the time of the series in Straya to the aimless and mindless faffing that they have shown recently. What has happened?

Fatigue and an absence of the physical edge Haskell (age) and Vunipola (injury) brought up front.


I'm also not sure our pool of players should be beating all the other sides notably more often than not without Billy Vunipola. Without him our back row lacks world class quality and balance - which to add to indifferent tighthead options, generally doesn't make for game winning packs. Backs are good but not enough to regularly rescue that.

Peat wrote:

I R Geech wrote:Contrast the intensity and surety of purpose that England played with around the time of the series in Straya to the aimless and mindless faffing that they have shown recently. What has happened?

Fatigue and an absence of the physical edge Haskell (age) and Vunipola (injury) brought up front.


I'm also not sure our pool of players should be beating all the other sides notably more often than not without Billy Vunipola. Without him our back row lacks world class quality and balance - which to add to indifferent tighthead options, generally doesn't make for game winning packs. Backs are good but not enough to regularly rescue that.

There's also England just weren't that good in Oz, and frankly we should have lost that series 2-1 but were saved by some truly weird halfback play by the Aussies. So we haven't fallen that far it's just results were considered far beyond performances

One bad tournament. That's it. One. Solo. A single data point. Yes, it was very crap, but I'm astounded how people have managed to extrapolate from, "We had a crap 6N" to "The trajectory is down, everything is doomed, how did it all go so wrong, why have we fallen into this terminal decline!"

If they do get whitewashed, then yes, I will agree with you all, as that will be two international windows and a clear trend. However, you're discussing "How did it come to this?" when it's hardly clear what it's actually come to yet.

Puja

Digby wrote:

Peat wrote:

I R Geech wrote:Contrast the intensity and surety of purpose that England played with around the time of the series in Straya to the aimless and mindless faffing that they have shown recently. What has happened?

Fatigue and an absence of the physical edge Haskell (age) and Vunipola (injury) brought up front.


I'm also not sure our pool of players should be beating all the other sides notably more often than not without Billy Vunipola. Without him our back row lacks world class quality and balance - which to add to indifferent tighthead options, generally doesn't make for game winning packs. Backs are good but not enough to regularly rescue that.

There's also England just weren't that good in Oz, and frankly we should have lost that series 2-1 but were saved by some truly weird halfback play by the Aussies. So we haven't fallen that far it's just results were considered far beyond performances

While this is true, I don't think it changes that they brought a different intensity in defence back then, and were smarter about executing on their limited opportunities.

Puja wrote:One bad tournament. That's it. One. Solo. A single data point. Yes, it was very crap, but I'm astounded how people have managed to extrapolate from, "We had a crap 6N" to "The trajectory is down, everything is doomed, how did it all go so wrong, why have we fallen into this terminal decline!"

If they do get whitewashed, then yes, I will agree with you all, as that will be two international windows and a clear trend. However, you're discussing "How did it come to this?" when it's hardly clear what it's actually come to yet.

Puja

While this is true, I think most of those worrying weren't happy or impressed even when we were winning.

Peat wrote: I think most of those worrying weren't happy or impressed even when we were winning.

Even on here it feels to me like people went too far with the praise on the run of 18 and have reacted too much to the run these last few games.

Yep. Other than the Scotland game I don’t think we were that much worse than we had been in the previous 6N.
The sudden drop in belief after that match, rather than quality of play, is what worried me most.
This tour should be fascinating.

We looked tired Mellsblue, little explosive power. We also didn't have obviously strong enough carriers. Finally we had Lawes at 6. That might work if we have other advantages (more carriers elsewhere, a tighthead who does stuff...) but as our pack was, it was a failure.

The Ireland game we looked better. I suspect Eddie was feeling the heat a bit, and tried to get a bit of a result, but it was too late.

I think there's a lot more to be had from this England side, but I don't know if Eddie is going to let us see it. It wouldn't surprise me if we lose this series 2-1. I reckon we look knackered in the first 2, then we look much fresher in the 3rd, because again, Eddie is trying to get a result and doesn't blitz the players as hard.

In some ways I'd be more concerned if every player looked very fresh and explosive in the tests, since it would seemingly mean a complete change in strategy gearing towards the rwc.

Maybe. I wouldn’t definitively say we were more knackered than the previous years. Not without seeing some data. I very much doubt Jones beasted then any harder than he did the year before. Mainly as I’m not sure he could by all accounts.
The breakdown issues which so undermined us in the 6N were there in the AIs at the start of the season when tiredness can’t be an issue. Scotland/Russell punching huge holes in our defence was nothing to do with tiredness, it was another structural weakness.
Personally, I think that the tiredness is an excuse for some chickens coming home to roast. The data may well prove me wrong, though. I believe we would’ve found a way to beat France the previous year, whereas we didnt ever look like we would this year. This is a France team whose conditioning is notoriously bad. So, by the ‘they were knackered logoc’ Jones has beasted them so hard they were in a worse state than unfit France.

Raggs wrote:We looked tired Mellsblue, little explosive power. We also didn't have obviously strong enough carriers. Finally we had Lawes at 6. That might work if we have other advantages (more carriers elsewhere, a tighthead who does stuff...) but as our pack was, it was a failure.

The Ireland game we looked better. I suspect Eddie was feeling the heat a bit, and tried to get a bit of a result, but it was too late.

The lock at 6 was (very oddly) becoming a fixture in games we won, and I don't know we looked much better Vs Ireland, indeed Ireland was imo our worst game

Mellsblue wrote: The breakdown issues which so undermined us in the 6N were there in the AIs at the start of the season when tiredness can’t be an issue.

Why not? 1-3 extra sessions in a week depending in length/intensity is huge to what the players can bring on the weekend, physically and mentally

Digby wrote:

Mellsblue wrote: The breakdown issues which so undermined us in the 6N were there in the AIs at the start of the season when tiredness can’t be an issue.

Why not? 1-3 extra sessions in a week depending in length/intensity is huge to what the players can bring on the weekend, physically and mentally

You think our issues at the breakdown are because of fatigue/tiredness?

Mellsblue wrote:

Digby wrote:

Mellsblue wrote: The breakdown issues which so undermined us in the 6N were there in the AIs at the start of the season when tiredness can’t be an issue.

Why not? 1-3 extra sessions in a week depending in length/intensity is huge to what the players can bring on the weekend, physically and mentally

You think our issues at the breakdown are because of fatigue/tiredness?

Maybe

I certainly think you can fatigue fit players with training, but I also have issues with both our selection and tactics. I remain cross with England since 2002

Digby wrote:

Mellsblue wrote:

Digby wrote:
Why not? 1-3 extra sessions in a week depending in length/intensity is huge to what the players can bring on the weekend, physically and mentally

You think our issues at the breakdown are because of fatigue/tiredness?

Maybe

I certainly think you can fatigue fit players with training, but I also have issues with both our selection and tactics. I remain cross with England since 2002

Sitting on the fence. That’s a new look for you

Of course you can send players in with tired legs and minds a few weeks into the season. However, a few beastings won’t have as much of an effect in autumn as it will in late winter/early spring. Especially when your AI oppo are at the end of a long season and are probably even more shattered.

Puja wrote:One bad tournament. That's it. One. Solo. A single data point. Yes, it was very crap, but I'm astounded how people have managed to extrapolate from, "We had a crap 6N" to "The trajectory is down, everything is doomed, how did it all go so wrong, why have we fallen into this terminal decline!"

If they do get whitewashed, then yes, I will agree with you all, as that will be two international windows and a clear trend. However, you're discussing "How did it come to this?" when it's hardly clear what it's actually come to yet.

Puja

It was not just the 6N. England were on a winning streak before that, but most posters on this board were aware that the winning performances were not as great as the results suggested and that the team was in need of significant tinkering in a few areas to reach world class. Not sure the SA tour will answer any questions since SA themselves are at the beginning of a rebuilding process and will have a pretty raw squad. A whitewash is not that likely, but if it should happen then yes - England should be very worried. Likewise, a series win by England against a bunch of new Boks would not mean a hell of a lot either.

Well the Boks didn't look much last night.

richy678 wrote:Well the Boks didn't look much last night.

None of that lot will be involved in the first test though.

Puja

Mellsblue wrote:

Digby wrote:

Mellsblue wrote: You think our issues at the breakdown are because of fatigue/tiredness?

Maybe

I certainly think you can fatigue fit players with training, but I also have issues with both our selection and tactics. I remain cross with England since 2002

Sitting on the fence. That’s a new look for you

Of course you can send players in with tired legs and minds a few weeks into the season. However, a few beastings won’t have as much of an effect in autumn as it will in late winter/early spring. Especially when your AI oppo are at the end of a long season and are probably even more shattered.

It is both though, I don't like our selection/thinking, but if the players are tired they're less likely to dominate contact which is imperative for us else we're reliant on technique and decision making

Puja wrote:One bad tournament. That's it. One. Solo. A single data point. Yes, it was very crap, but I'm astounded how people have managed to extrapolate from, "We had a crap 6N" to "The trajectory is down, everything is doomed, how did it all go so wrong, why have we fallen into this terminal decline!"

If they do get whitewashed, then yes, I will agree with you all, as that will be two international windows and a clear trend. However, you're discussing "How did it come to this?" when it's hardly clear what it's actually come to yet.

Puja

It's impressive work, turning 5 matches into a single data point...

Eugene Wrayburn wrote:

Puja wrote:One bad tournament. That's it. One. Solo. A single data point. Yes, it was very crap, but I'm astounded how people have managed to extrapolate from, "We had a crap 6N" to "The trajectory is down, everything is doomed, how did it all go so wrong, why have we fallen into this terminal decline!"

If they do get whitewashed, then yes, I will agree with you all, as that will be two international windows and a clear trend. However, you're discussing "How did it come to this?" when it's hardly clear what it's actually come to yet.

Puja

It's impressive work, turning 5 matches into a single data point...

Yes, but once a course is set for a tournament, it's somewhat hard to change tack and go a completely different direction. If we succeed in SA and look like we've solved (or at least started to solve) some of our structural problems, then I'll be happy to write off the 6N as one bad tournament.

Puja

It may turn out that it was just a bad tournament in terms of results, but I think for a lot of us it was a case of finally seeing the inevitable failure of quite a few different issues in the team. If Eddie is able to react and fix them all then brilliant, but I feel like that process could/should started at least a year ago.

Is next week going to be any better?

If the Boks went in to the first test with some hesitancy or a lack of confidence that they could beat us with a less experienced side, they’ll be going in to the second with the knowledge that they can beat us easily.

They certainly won’t allow us to build the lead we got yesterday and they now know they can easily dominate possession and territory.

Moreover, I don’t think Eddie knows how to fix things. As we saw in the 6 Nations, he’s quite happy to stick to his guns with tactics that plainly don’t work.

Scrumhead wrote:Is next week going to be any better?

If the Boks went in to the first test with some hesitancy or a lack of confidence that they could beat us with a less experienced side, they’ll be going in to the second with the knowledge that they can beat us easily.

They certainly won’t allow us to build the lead we got yesterday and they now know they can easily dominate possession and territory.

Moreover, I don’t think Eddie knows how to fix things. As we saw in the 6 Nations, he’s quite happy to stick to his guns with tactics that plainly don’t work.

I've officially given up my pollyanna act. We've clearly not learned and, while Wisemantel appears to be earning his corn, I've got no idea how our defence coach is in demand. We might win the next two tests, but that will be more because the Boks are weak than because we've become stronger.

Puja

What is a ‘Pollyanna’? I’ve seen it a few times and got the gist of it without really knowing what it is ...

Scrumhead wrote:What is a ‘Pollyanna’? I’ve seen it a few times and got the gist of it without really knowing what it is ...

An excessively optimistic person, to the point of delusion.

The sort of person who'd post this:

Puja wrote:So, out of interest, what does happen if we get whitewashed?

Puja

Peat wrote:

Scrumhead wrote:What is a ‘Pollyanna’? I’ve seen it a few times and got the gist of it without really knowing what it is ...

An excessively optimistic person, to the point of delusion.

The sort of person who'd post this:

Puja wrote:So, out of interest, what does happen if we get whitewashed?

Puja

That post was the jinxy turning point #justsaying