The Silver Fern

Probably been noticed before, but the sponsor on the shorts doesn’t quite look right …

Was there any big surprises? Mack Hansen the biggest surprise for me, I mean he's a decent player, but a Lion? I would have gone Darcy Graham ahead of him, and not just because he's a Scot.

@MiketheSnow - how much can you get behind this squad? I'm not fishing here, I'm genuinely curious. When there's more kiwi's in the squad than Welsh, is it something you can really get your heart and soul behind?

Squad names. British, NZ, South African, Australian, and IRISH Lions.

BBC has decided to pad this out massively. Hour long show, we are 14 minutes in and they've not even yet announced who the Captain is yet ... which is ridiculous given everybody already knows!!

Good to hear from the guy painting a mural though.

Brilliant, we now get to hear a regulation answer (highlight of my career) to a regulation question (what does being the Lions captain mean to you).

Honestly, just read the fucking team for gods sakes, then dissect it.

Speaking of leaks, never understand why things like Itoje is leaked to the media.

Either that or everybody assumed it was a two horse race for the captaincy between Itoje & Doris, and with the latter's injury it became a fait accompli. Personally I think he's hugely over rated as a player (don't think he's shit, but he's not the all time great many make him out to be) and despite having a lot of natural leadership qualities, he rarely shows them during the games.

Should be a good tour. Amazing how quickly the Aussies have turned things around with a load of competitive players to choose from now. As always, if the Lions can gel they should be able to get the tour victory.

Thats a huge if though, as the nation divides seem as wide as they ever have been in my combined 12 years of living this way.

Why on earth is Briatore still allowed to be anywhere near an F1 team? The guys life is a trail of dodgy behaviour, both in and out of F1.

Didn't see too much wrong with Doohan honestly, but it's right that Colapinto has a seat somewhere.

Lots of youngsters around, Lawson needs to work on his discipline otherwise he'll find himself out in the cold with no way back in.

The game was mega.

Yamine Lamal is out of this world.

Shearer summed it up best:

We expected a good game, but this? Thank you Inter Milan, thank you Barcelona for providing us with incredible entertainment and two great football matches.
"What we have witnessed has been something very special. It's been a pleasure to be here."

And he’s retired..

Out front, it’s McLaren and then everybody else

Something clearly wrong with Lawson car.

He’s not THAT shit.

Given all the mistakes and penalties it’s hard to draw the conclusion that Lawson is up to it honestly.

When the Chiefs played well, they really played well. Certainly a whole lot of downsides but an absolutely crazy game. Hard to believe that the Force are a mid table team, given the scoreline.

Echo the comments about Turunui, great addition to the comm's team. Seems a very knowledgeable, yet very humble, bloke.

Great to see Sititi back. Straight back into it.

Nicked off to get a coffee where they were talking about the disallowed try and how the TMO had checked it.

Come back and it's been awarded.

Maybe I'm alone here, but make the call and move on. One view from the TMO showed enough evidence to reinforce the ref's call, so play it and move on FFS.

@Canes4life said in Chiefs v Force:

Is it me or does Samisoni look like he’s been on the pies while injured?

He's always been pretty solidly built, but yeah he almost looks like he's a Springbok - 40 minute player.

What's the wind like there tonight anybody know? Kicks seem to be fairly out of control, lots of height and moving around in the air.

So far Chiefs look like they've been surfing all day and still in relaxed mode. Force look well up for it.

Long way to go tho.

Fail. 10 second penalty.

Seems incredibly harsh. No way in proportion.

First full match I’ve seen in ages.

First half was a mixture of awful and brilliant. Crusaders defense the brilliant, Blues communication the awful. They created space but barely used it.

Second was much higher quality. Blues should have won it if not for brain farts. They were well
On top with excellent plays by Sotutu and Lam. Ioane looks like his brain has left for Leinster already. Barrett shows glimpses of old but then some bang average stuff.

Crusaders are brilliant on defense but seem a bit clueless with the ball. Be glad to get the points, but only some brilliant scrum power got the win for them.

JOC is much better than their starting 10 but really seems to be enjoying himself. The old man in me is really happy for him, I think his ego issues when young were poorly managed and he just looks really settled. Good on him.

@Bovidae said in EPL 2024/2025:

It sounds like Carvajal and Bellingham were being dickheads too.

What did you see?

@mariner4life said in EPL 2024/2025:

@KiwiPie said in EPL 2024/2025:

Very early goal for Semen

my sex life in a short sentence

Missing an “own”

Great win.

Be interesting to see how the rest of the majors go. Bryson aside, LIV seems to drop the cutting edge from the top players. Johnson is a shadow of himself, Koepka looks barely interested and even Cam Smith and Rahm looked elsewhere.

Just one tournament of course, but signs are weak.