RugbyRebels

He is a couple of steps away from selling dietary supplements to treat COVID.

morepork wrote:He is a couple of steps away from selling dietary supplements to treat COVID.

Kolisi is on the same pathway. There have been media spats before games but I don't recall anything this bad.I usually cringe and was never a fan of Gatland getting his digs in early, but this is a whole new level. Can Twitter do the kind thing and have an outage for 24 hours?

Sandydragon wrote:

morepork wrote:He is a couple of steps away from selling dietary supplements to treat COVID.

Kolisi is on the same pathway. There have been media spats before games but I don't recall anything this bad.I usually cringe and was never a fan of Gatland getting his digs in early, but this is a whole new level. Can Twitter do the kind thing and have an outage for 24 hours?

Oooh. Imagine the outrage. And the painful cliches.

Sandydragon wrote:

morepork wrote:He is a couple of steps away from selling dietary supplements to treat COVID.

Kolisi is on the same pathway. There have been media spats before games but I don't recall anything this bad.I usually cringe and was never a fan of Gatland getting his digs in early, but this is a whole new level. Can Twitter do the kind thing and have an outage for 24 hours?

And the South African backs coach has now gone off, both supporting Erasmus's ramble and saying that Gatland "destroyed the integrity of the game" by questioning Jonker's appointment as TMO. One assumes that this false equivalence is so they can claim further aggrievement when Erasmus is punished and Gatland isn'. The difference of course being that Gatland's complaining, while still a bit distasteful, was putting pressure on a particular issue before the game to gain an advantage, rather than whining about decisions already made in a game already finished.

The only benefit that I can think of is that the South Africans are trying to deliberately put themselves into a backs against the wall, circle the wagons, "everyone's against us and we'll show them" mindset to try and get a big performance, but it seems risky to me - there's a very fine line between "everyone's against us" and a victim mentality. I could easily see a few people losing their heads if there's a positive Lions start or a few decisions going against South Africa (not mentioning any Jasper Wieses). Wonder what the odds are on a red card in the game?

Puja

It will be interesting to watch Itoje, Biggar, Murray et al. going about their provocation.

Mr Mwenda wrote:It will be interesting to watch Itoje, Biggar, Murray et al. going about their provocation.

I am suddenly absolutely distraught that Joe Marler isn't touring. At least we've got his apprentice in shithousery on the bench in the 18 shirt.

Puja

This is all just a bit of a smokescreen from the Boks. They are shiitting their breeks because they found out in the second half of last week's game that they could not bully the Lions pack as they expected. When their physicality is challenged or matched or bettered, they have no plan B. They are demoralized and they won't be much fitter than last week at all. The Lions won't be intimidated but they do have to stop giving away soft penalties. I do expect a slugfest with a few cards dished out. Hope the ref is on the ball from the start and will take no crap.

I’m sort of hoping they hit back with something more. Both teams have a lot of room to improve.

More from OPTA:

https://theanalyst.com/eu/2021/07/lions ... t-battles/

Listened to the BBC preview of the next test and they used the phrase bomb squad about 3000 times.

Mellsblue wrote:More from OPTA:

https://theanalyst.com/eu/2021/07/lions ... t-battles/

Yet these guys are talking about it being the SA box-kicking game and not having a whole replacement tight 5?

Throw spiral bombs in to the mix and this is going to be unbearable.

RSA players will be as fired up as a paedo in a playground. One of two things will happen:
They hump us 30-9
They fizzle out and get three players carded and lose 26-17

I'm leaning towards the latter.

Swedish commentators talking about refereeing in the build up... Sigh.

No concussion check for Kolbe and Curry?

du Toit off ( injury ); quicker back row now.
VDM could be in trouble for trip..

VDM rightfully binned. Pretty stupid.

Du Toit late tackle poss. too..

Kicked off..Kolbe in trouble now - could be Red.
(A few Lions appeared to hear '99' in the afters.)

Galfon wrote:Kicked off..Kolbe in trouble now - could be Red.
(A few Lions appeared to hear '99' in the afters.)

Swedish commentators think Kolbe did nothing wrong beyond a penalty. They clearly haven't watched rugby these past ten years.

Kolbe was lucky, rackon. Itoje doing some good shitbaggery.

6 - 6 after 30min (50 min in..)
50m effort from Pollard
Attacking 5m. scrum now to Lions.

Henshaw in ??.O'Keefe needs more ividence...not enough

Faf wtf ?
6 - 9 pen Biggar, 37 min.

Why was the de klerk 'tackle' ignored? I didn't understand that.

Buggaluggs wrote:RSA players will be as fired up as a paedo in a playground.

Love this one, too.