Forum Rugby Club - new season, new thread

quote:

Originally posted by antony d:

Are you still working on the "we got off to a bad start in 2006/7??

Right up until the last game of the season Antony!

Only 102 points conceded and a massive 26 points scored against the Big Three.

I'd call that a success!

It really is time RFU went grovelling back to Clive...if he'd take them back

Whine?

quote:

Originally posted by JamieWednesday:
It really is time RFU went grovelling back to Clive...if he'd take them back

I'm prety sure Sir Clive would accept a mentor role or something similar - the 3 last home internationals were a fair and very brutal reminder of were England are in the world pecking order - prob 5 behind Wales

He can't change the past but he had better take bloody notice pre 6 nations otherwise support with disapear fast - for me the England team in 2009 needs
[LIST]A new Captain - Borthwick just ain't upto the challenge - good player Not a Captain

New and strategic re think on the roles of the tight 5 - 6,7 and 8 also

cut out the new disapline ELV's - ref's are very whistle happy

Build on the positives - Armitage flutey and the 3/4

Kick Ciaprani back into the player he should be

Review coaches -

Prety easier stuff - we have the players so why can't they play!!

For me the Lions team are going to be half Welsh and half Irish - with a couple of England reserves

PS - Tigers were crap vs Sale on Friday night - we need to pull our fingers OUT all of the International players will be back and fighting for their clubs we have H Cup game vs Perpignan on Sat - should be a real cracker

quote:

Originally posted by JamieWednesday:
Whine?

Just my little joke with Steve (Yo-Yo Master) who lists himself from 'Wine Country', me being a whinging pom etc.

Great win for the Tigers last night - certainly the best I have seen the boys play in 2008 - Flood did kick away too many times for my liking we should of kept the ball more.

Our pack last night would of prob played any team off the park - Julian White was at his finest

Tigers really have the team to push on now we have some work to do in the GP! we are on our way in H- Cup

Bath v Glasgow, blimey what a game!

quote:

Originally posted by Chillkram:
Bath v Glasgow, blimey what a game!

For a moment or 2 I thought that the breakaway in the last seconds was going to seal it. Bath need to learn that you play until the final whistle not for 65 minutes!

quote:

Originally posted by antony d:
Great win for the Tigers last night - certainly the best I have seen the boys play in 2008 - Flood did kick away too many times for my liking we should of kept the ball more.

Our pack last night would of prob played any team off the park - Julian White was at his finest

Tigers really have the team to push on now we have some work to do in the GP! we are on our way in H- Cup

20.08.2008 Another valuable win (at least) for Tigers, but they're going to have to do better to get back into, and stay in, the play-off zone. This match against Newcastle should have been bonus point territory, but it really was very laboured.

The first half was very tentative and disconnected, resulting in a marginal lead at HT, but this did look fragile. Even though most of the half was spent in Newcastle territory, Tigers did not look that dominant.

The 2nd half got off to much more of a flyer. Corry came on and started directing (whether he should or not, I don't know, Kay was technically captain) and strategically the game lifted for Tigers, who were all over Newcastle. But far too many errors, far too many unambitious moves, far too many penalties conceded (though that might have been the ref, to whom I nearly offered the loan of m'specs). There should have been more decisive finishing, and there simply wasn't. Tigers won't get away with that against better opposition.

Yet, all in all, another great day out, though this time I really am going to be complaining to the Chief Executive of 'Cross Country Trains', who seemingly couldn't organise the proverbial what not in a brewery!

They put on a two carriage train for the Stansted-Birmingham run, calling at such small places as Cambridge, Ely, P'boro, Leicester and B'ham, and lots of tiddly stops in between (incl Leicester hinterland). Shoppers, rugby watchers, football watchers, airport traffic (with luggage) and everybody else - on a two carriage train!!! Talk about Cattle Class... And it's every one I've been on, not a one-off! Sorry, environment, but I'm driving from now on!

James

I thought Irish looked awesome against Glaws today - they are the ones to beat this season in my opinion.

There was also a great game yesterday 'twixt Bath and Sale. The best news of the weekend though? - another win for Wasps!

Mark

Exciting stuff at Twickenham yesterday James...and what a crowd for a Guinness Premiership game!

Well done Nick Evans !


ps. Thanks for the online card, I just picked it up as I haven't really been online much lately. Sorry not to have sent you one, but I am rather poor at that sort of thing. The wife normally takes care of the card sending!

Defeat (or a draw, at any rate) snatched from the jaws of victory. I ask you...

Ah well, happy new year.

quote:

Originally posted by JWM:
Ah well, happy new year.

You too.

quote:

Originally posted by JWM:
Defeat (or a draw, at any rate) snatched from the jaws of victory. I ask you...

Ah well, happy new year.

James - agree we should of won by at least 13 points and to draw - then as you said in prev thread should of got a bonus point vs Newcastle - so with my maths thats at least 3 points we have given to the other teams in top 4 and this year no one can afford to give those points away even if it is XMAS! - however great to see 50k at twickers -

so to 2009! we have Bath at home this Sunday lets hope we can not loose to them in the last 5 again!

Happy New Year to all my readers.

Not been very impressed with the team this season, so far! They can only get better

Hi FF! Happy New Year to you too. Are you coming up for Leicester vs Gloucester on 7th March?

Delighted to have squeezed a win today against former league leaders Bath. And I see those pesky Pests have dragged themselves off the bottom rungs.

On another matter (source GP website):

Saracens director of rugby Eddie Jones (and assistant to 2007 RWC winners South Africa's Jake White) has launched an attack on the rules of rugby...

...it was the breakdown area which frustrated both Australian Jones and Gloucester head coach Dean Ryan.

"We have to have officials out there who want to referee but the IRB have made the laws so difficult for referees to referee and the game is immeasurably worse than it was 12 months ago.

"The referees have not got worse and neither have the players. So what's the one missing? The ELVs (experimental law variations). They (the ELVs) have stuffed the game up and it is very hard to play rugby."

Jones called the laws 'Rafferty Rules' - an Australian saying for an unruly person.

"You have got to have a game where you attack off your ball and off the opposition ball. I'm as frustrated as anyone. I want to play rugby and we can't."

Discuss.

(My own view is that I couldn't agree more.)

Good wishes everybody,
James

I can't help thinking that since the ELVs were introduced, which were supposed to produce a more flowing game of rugby, exactly the opposite has happened.

However, there is nothing in them that I can see that would have this effect particularly. I think it is just a question of players and referees getting used to them. Players in particular just don't seem to know what the rules are anymore, often looking to the referee for guidance in situ to let them know if they can carry on with what they are doing or not!

There was evidence of this in the Wasps v Harlequins game this afternoon where one of the Quins players looked at the ref in a ruck to see if he was alrigt and he still got a yellow card! Then in the interview with Phil Vickery afterwards he said he no longer knows what the laws are at the scrum. I think a lot of this is just the players pushing the boundaries. Union is a very technical game and much of it depends on players treading the line between legal and illegal and even crossing it on accasion when they can get away with it. The trouble comes when they don't know where the line is. I think they will get used to it and we will be back to normal before long.

Actually, much of the trouble is caused by just more stringent application of existing laws such as holding on after the tackle. This has led to a lot more penalties and a frustrating lack of continuity and fluency in attack (England have had particular trouble adapting to this) and a very stop/start pattern to games.

The players and coaches just need to get on with it and stop moaning. Those who adapt more quickly will be more successful.

I thought Serge Betsen played well today for Wasps and had probably his best game for them so far.

Funny, whenever he played for France against England I always thought he was a total rucking flanker!

London Irish again demonstrate the inconsistency that could cost them this season by losing to Sale this evening. I think that between them and Bath they are playing the best rugby at the moment but they can't win dirty.

Wasps are coming!

I feel very proud that a statue to the great Alexander Obolensky is to be unveiled shortly in the town where I grew up, Ipswich (and embarrassed that I didn't know he was buried there, though of course it makes sense as he was KIA as a pilot at RAF Martlesham Heath, where his England rugby colleague Douglas Bader also served for a while...). I look forward to seeing the statue, and finding where his grave is.

What a wonderful story! I really would never have imagined that a town so mired in the filth of association football could pay such an honour. It still doesn't prevent Ipswich from being the hell hole that it is, but I will now have 2 things to look out for in those times when we simply have to go there; Obolensky's statue and the Giles group. (JWM - if you track down his grave please post the details).

I hate myself for saying this, but it would be good news if Wasps (spit spit) were to beat Barf today. Gloucester should walk it over Newcastle to got top, despite their dire rugby this year.

Does this reference mean anything?
Sec. X.H. Grave 423;IPSWICH CEMETERY

The cemetery must be one of

The Old Cemetery, Belvedere Road, Ipswich IP4 4AL
The New Cemetery, Cemetery Road, Ipswich IP4 4AL

Other Ipswich cemeteries are too recent.

It is Ipswich New Cemetery. Click