Awesome afternoon of rugby (day rugby is so much more enjoyable!!), and so good to finally get along to a test again.

With a 7 year old, 2 year old and a wife 30 weeks pregnant we were not keen on the idea of public transport so we drove to the ground at around 1PM so we could park close(ish). By 1.30 all parks within cooee were gone so we were glad we got there nice and early. Had a picnic, let the boys play for a bit, then made a leisurely stroll down the road to the game.

Wife was decked out in her Wallabies gear, standing out in a sea of black, bless her. A tough afternoon for her lads thankfully, and the 7 year old let her know ALL about it haha.

Atmosphere was great, especially when the ABs clicked into gear after 15 or so minutes. That was an improved performance as you would expect, albeit in far better conditions which helped some of our players thrive.

Best moments of the afternoon was when they brought up Eroni Clarke on the big screen a couple of times. The second time was right after Clarke's epic run that set up Ardie's try and he got such a massive cheer he had to acknowledge the crowd. He looked proud as punch.

Some random thoughts on the game, bearing in mind I haven't seen it on TV:

• I thought 20 points flattered us; but for some more clinical finishing from Aus it could have been a damn sight closer.
• Aus picked up where they left off last week and dominated the first 15. It was only individual brilliance from Beauden and then Clarke that kicked us into gear. It does feel like we are still too reliant on that to get into a game, better defensive sides won't allow that to happen so easily.
• On Clarke, fark me what a performance from the 21 year old. He looks made for test footy. It's highly likely Bridge would have got the nod again if not injured, and without Clarke the ABs would have once again lacked the firepower needed to break open the test. The selections are going to be an ongoing concern with Foster at the helm.
• RM is electric in broken play, which is why I like him on the bench coming on against tired legs. In a tight test he doesn't lead the team around the park, and as we found out last week if the conditions are difficult he can be found wanting big time. That said, Beauden is not exactly well suited to the role either, but he has a damn sight more experience trying. Fact of the matter is we don't have a 10 that can really take control of a game when the opposition defense has come to play like we did with DC.
• Beauden was simply superb in the first half, which helped take some pressure off RM who grew into the game and had some fantastic touches to set us away.
• Frizzel is a very solid player but he doesn't seem to possess the power Akira does. I really hope they give Akira a good crack as he has the potential (only that right now) to be our next Kaino.
• Coles made a real difference and is back to his best (which is better than Taylor's ceiling). Great to see after his serious injury concerns a year or so back.
• ALB is a fantastic all round player and solidifies our midfield big time. He needs to be 12 with JG 13. I can only assume they have JG closer in to help defend the channel as RM is a bit of a liability there.

Overall a really enjoyable game in the sun with both teams willing to play attacking footy. Still a lot of question marks over this AB side, and I can see some very squeaky bum times ahead in Sydney and Brissie, but nice to keep the Eden Park fortress in tact with a comfortable win in the end.

The fact that they’ve picked a team that so many on the Fern wanted makes me nervous. As a collective we have a strong proven record of not having a fucking clue what we are talking about.

I missed the game as my wife decided to go into labor - as a Wallabies supporter I guess from her perspective childbirth is less painful than watching them play the ABs so fair enough.

Have caught the highlights - geez we scored some great tries eh? Squire's was a thing of beauty, the angle he ran and the perfectly timed ball from BBBR. Orgasmic. Also loved how Moody lined up a couple of backs on their goalline and just smashed the fuck through them.

Great to see us put Beauden into some space as well, he's a very different player to Carter but fuck we can tear teams apart if we use him like we did last night.

Well, it must have been an incredibly tough week for the players. All things considered that's a really good effort, never looked like losing. Proud of that effort.

All of the concerns about selections and game plan really came to a head in this match. Argentina just watched the RWC semi and replicated what England did in the hope we hadn't learnt anything from that, which was evident in the way we've played this year.

We had no answers and once again just relied on individual brilliance to try and get us out of a hole. That doesn't work against an organised defense these days, you have to actually do some hard work to create a bit of space for the likes of Clarke and Beauden.

I still can't get my head around Foster getting the top job when we have blokes like Rennie and Robertson in the mix. You just cannot tell me Robertson wouldn't get more out of this group of players than Foster. Honestly the mind boggles.

Anyway some further random thoughts:

• the loose trio mix is just so obviously wrong it hurts. Akira, Cane, Sotutu. End of story. Idiot selections.
• as above we actually need to pick players that can match up physically in the early exchanges. And then implement a game plan around that; we are simply not going to win the game in the first 40, we should be setting the foundation with good aggressive forward play to generate space for our backs later in the game. This is just rugby 101 surely.
• Cane is a bloke you would follow into the trenches, but his decision making has left a lot to be desired so far. The quick tap Weber took was a stupid play, but he was getting no direction from the captain. I still think he's the right man for the job but he has a bit to learn.
• Mo'unga again struggled and made errors when under pressure. It's a recurring theme with him unfortunately. A rock star on the front foot or in broken play, but against a well organised and aggressive defense he becomes a possum in the headlights.

There's not actually much more to be said about this game that hasn't been said in the previous weeks. The All Blacks had gone stale under Hansen and we decided to go for continuity with Foster. It's going to be a rough couple of years to say the least.

@Stargazer said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:

Have you guys considered the possibility that the fact that you don't understand why the MoH has advised an extension of 4 days, may have more to do with poor reporting by the media and not so much with there not being good reasons? Or with the fact that only the main point of the MoH advice is communicated but not the details underlying it?

If they need a few more days of contact tracing to get a reasonable level of certainty that they've found all the contacts related to this cluster that they need to find and that no infections related to this cluster will pop up at unexpected places, then there's likely an operational need for that. What's so hard to understand about that?

LOL this made me laugh, talk about defending Jacinda to the hilt. What does the media have to do with this? She had a press conference all to herself, which could go for as long as she wanted, to lay out the reasons for extending the lockdown. Instead she made some vague comments about getting better prepared. All while businesses die. And I'm not talking about big business here; Amazon, Facebook, Foodstuffs etc etc are all absolutely killing it during Covid. Bezos is worth a gazillion dollars now. I'm talking about small and medium businesses, the ones everyday NZers have absolutely slogged their guts out to build from the ground up, watching them go up in flames as politicians with no skin in the game extend lockdowns and tell them they can't open for business due to a virus that has a 99% survival rate.

It's nonsense and people have had enough. The cure is worse than the virus, by some stretch now, and a lot of people are in for a world of hurt over the next two years if we keep locking down every time we get a sniff of the thing.

A few random thoughts:

• it's pretty clear we don't have the depth to rest any of our top players, particularly A Smith and Coles. Fair enough that we did but shit some of the next tier down got exposed.
• TJP's form has gone the same way Cowan's did, right off a fucking cliff and he's become a liability. He's always been inconsistent, showing glimpses of being world class, but has never able to put back to back performances together. It just seems to be consistently bad now. Weber is a fucking liability as well though so we definitely have a gap to fill there.
• we also really need Clarke to fill a gap on the wing, and Sotutu to fill a gap at 8. Both rookies but both specialists and have oodles of class.
• Ardie was really good, but it's so blindingly obvious he isn't an 8 and he's best used from the bench wrecking havoc at the end of the match.
• midfield didn't work and I didn't really think it would. JG, ALB and Rieko are our first choice covering 12 and 13 IMO. Rieko probably still off the bench until he really finds his feet at centre at test level.
• Akira was fucking awesome, we actually lost a lot of shape when he went off. His work rate was high and he was super effective in contact. Wobs must have been extremely pleased to see the back of him after the red.
• both reds were pretty silly. Sure you can tell players to just go low, but then you basically take the dominant tackle out of the game. At the end of the day rugby is a contact sport and you're going to get some accidental contact to the head every now and then. Red carding players for that is completely over the top and ruins the spectacle.
• fucking SB and that dumb as fuck YC. I was calling for a red as it was that fucking idiotic. That's the kind of play that makes you think he can't be trusted in a big test.
• BB was not good, but I'm really not sure how RM would have gone given the pile of shit that was served up. Jury still out but RM/BB 10/15 combo has had the most success so far.

This is the most nervous/excited I've been for a game in around 6 days.

@Crucial said in Coronavirus - New Zealand:

On the flip side to govt errors, I'm not listening to one whinge about lockdown levels unless those making it can confirm that they are also being sensible.
I can't believe the number of people that are walking past requests to sanitise in shops, not using the QR codes, standing in close groups chatting, grouping in aisles of shops to talk, stopping in doorways etc etc.
They will all moan and blame others for failures but can't do the basics themselves FFS.

Fuck we have a bad blame culture in this country.

Sorry Crucial, but get the fuck out of here with that shit. We complied with the most draconian lockdown in the world and completely gave up our rights for ~6 weeks while businesses died and peoples mental health deteriorated. I heard Bloomfield speak recently and he said he was surprised by how compliant the population was (in a good way).

We then didn't only flatten the curve, we smashed the fucking thing. We then heard our government heaping praise on themselves saying we were the envy of the world.

While this was happening there was countless "compassionate" exemptions being granted, including two women WITH Covid that somehow managed to drive the length of the North Island without stopping. Which is of course completely ridiculous, but apparently the government thought we were stupid enough to believe that. We now find out that most staff at the border aren't even being tested? WTF?

People are pissed because it's been obvious for a while that it's been nothing but blind luck stopping another outbreak. I said earlier in the thread that it was inevitable we would get another outbreak, not because the virus simply cannot be contained, but because there was no way we were going to contain it with the incompetence of this current government who were too busy reading their own press to actually plug the many holes at our border.

"Go hard and go early" is the mantra of the government, all while our border leaks like a sieve. It beggars belief.

@Tim LOL I bet she had that tweet saved in her drafts for months

The Pujara LBW led to India winning the test. As good as he had been, he's not the type of player that can just put the foot down. Washington coming out and hitting a breezy 20 odd, which took the pressure off Pant, got them over the line.

@KiwiMurph said in Australia v India:

@barbarian The problem with Starc is he is two different bowlers depending on whether it's a day/night pink ball test or not.

In a day/night pink ball test his record is amazing. His recent record in non-pink ball tests? Not that great.

He and Boult are similar in that they both thrive with the white/pink balls, but with the red don't look nearly as threatening especially when there isn't swing.

Starc's action is also not particularly economical so he's better in short bursts, but will get burnt out pretty quickly.

How the hell did they chase that down. At the GABBA. Against a genuinely world class Aus attack. Missing most of their best players.

That will live a long long time in the memories.

Hahaha one more twist

Aus body language really bad now. Amazing stuff from Pant and Washington

@KiwiMurph said in Australia v India:

Surely you bring the field up?

They simply must bring it up now

Incredible test

@KiwiMurph said in Australia v India:

Surely you bring the field up?

Or bowl wides which aren't wides in tests. They should have been able to stem the flow with no bowling or fielding restrictions.

Overthrows... man Aus are crumbling under the pressure. Extremely un-Australian.