@mariner4life said in Aura watch:

to me it feels more like a commercial stage show than the challenge it used to be. It's the microphones, and the "ooh which one will they do" followed by "oh it's the old one, they don't respect you bro" and the legislated allowable responses. It's a sideshow, play the bloody game.

And it's lead by a bloody half back.

Note: the advantage shit is absolute horseshit though.

How the F would you know, you haven;t watched it in ages.

I bugger off for the anthems and come back for the haka. I missed the haka in 1994 vs the French at Eden Park because my mate and I got lost driving to the ground, and the girls we asked for directions were pretty so we dropped them off where they were going first and then went to the game, made our seats just as the haka ended. We lost to the try from the end of the world. I'm not risking missing the haka again.

@chris-b said in Highlanders 2021:

@kirwan said in Highlanders 2021:

@chris said in Highlanders 2021:

@nepia said in Highlanders 2021:

@snowy said in Highlanders 2021:

@nostrildamus said in Highlanders 2021:

@snowy said in Highlanders 2021:

@billy-tell said in Highlanders 2021:

I remain scarred by Michael jones vs Argentina. Each time there is a knee injury I think « career in jeopardy ». Jones came back but he was never as good.

Didn't he play 6 mostly after that? Had a bit of a different role and wasn't quite as visible? Or has my memory failed me - again...

It is shit news about Fakatava. It looks like most of us thought he was going to be in Black this year. Just have to hope it isn't as bad as we fear.

Yes but Jones speed factor set him apart in that era until the injury. Not a bad tackler though. He also played 8 for Auckland if I recall correctly.

Yeah think I saw him at 8. The move to six was due to the loss of speed you mentioned, and in a very rare Fern occurrence we could both / all be right.
He was better as a seven until his knee was fucked, slowed down a bit, played six. Was still very good. How does that sound?

Best 7 we’ve ever had and then 2nd best 6 of the past 30 years.

In this bloke’s opinion anyway.

Nah McCaw IMO Best 7

It's a good problem to have, arguing between two of the greats. McCaw in the professional era, Jones in the amateur. Sorted.

I think you're pretty much right.

Different eras.

MJ would need to pack on nearly 10kgs to play 7 these days - and 10 cm to play 6.

http://stats.allblacks.com/asp/profile.asp?ABID=443

Tall enough for lock at the Canes though, but probably too dynamic.

@Hooroo said in All Blacks v BI Lions Test #3:

So the general feeling about the town is that while it is a pity we didn't win, it was a hell of a series and a really good result for Rugby.

I don't disagree either.

The Lions fans have to be the best travelling fans of any sport?

I'm not too miffed about all that happened. If it was against England or Aussie or South Africa then I would be more gutted.

I'm going to go a little against the grain here of the Fern wisdom - just a personal opinion so pitchforks can stay holstered. As someone who isn't over there soaking up the atmosphere, after the heady early days of the tour I've actually found this tour has broken my spirit for rugby a bit. I'm sure if I was there intermingling with the travelling fans and not just following online on forums and through the media my thoughts might be different.

Firstly the officiating, I know some people think we should rise above the officiating but that's a bullshit cop out, it should be held to account like everything else that happens out on the field - if we can moan about TJs flapping, Cruden existing, SBW being SBW, Fatty being unfairly/fairly picked on, etc etc then we can discuss the ref as well. As I've mentioned earlier in the thread I think the 'spirit' of the reffing switched between the 2nd and 3rd test (and even times within the 3rd test) and it negatively affected the ABs both times. The final test draw was worse than the 2nd test loss for me to take personally because of the bullshit at the end.

The tour also served up a bunch of negative rugby that was at times penalised and other times wasn't. The offside line was at various times policed and not policed. The ABs tries in the first test and the Lions counter attacks in the second should have been the takeaways from the tour but it was the negative play that overshadowed everything else. Both teams dished out a wee bit of dirty and or reckless play (IMHO and with my biases one team got penalised a bit more for it) that probably didn't need to happen. Oh and fuck Connor Murray and his ball rolling and fuck the refs for letting him do it (Smith also did it on occasion as well in the 3rd test).

The Lions management chipping in the media was annoying. As noted above the Lions played right on and over the borderline of the laws throughout the test series yet they spent a bunch of time moaning about the ABs tactics to the media and refs. It's like they don't own a mirror. The moaning about blockers was particularly annoying as they were consistently guilty of the same tactics. Speaking of blocking, in the 2nd test BBBR was penalised, a penalty that gained the Lions 3 points, for an act that happened throughout the 3 test series on both sides.

The media just did my head in on this tour - and that's really only through posters linking to it on here. How come all rugby media is just trolling? From both sides.

Should we have won the series? Yes. Would it have made my thoughts any different? Probably, I guess we'll never know, a few less dropped balls, a couple less injuries, a couple of not dropped on their head French babies and I might be singing a different tune.

@number9 said in 2019 Rugby Championship:

So how does that drop kick Aumua make the ABs when he has played like shit all season.

I guess because Harris is liable to hit me in Australia when throwing into the lineout in Auckland.

@Chris-B said in Hansen:

Of course, they have been - but, that doesn't mean they're right.

Doesn't mean they're wrong either. Being able to say I told you so is the only thing keeping me from slitting my wrists at the moment.

You play that game again with the different players and get to change five plays/decisions - e.g. Cane smashes England players and the ball doesn't reach Daly, Savea has the freedom to run rather than contest rucks on his own, J Barrett doesn't come on and turnover ball when we finally have momentum, and Ioane makes ground in contact and pops a ball to TJ in space - and you could easily get a different result.

FYI - I'm 100% not in the Hansen is shit camp, I'm in the Hansen has been bloody good for a long time but made some errors and got out-coached, and I'm definitely not in the new camp of "England were always going to win", we had the team to win and we didn't.

@frank said in Has Hansen gone stale?:

@billy-tell said in Has Hansen gone stale?:

Rennie is one of the most overrrated coaches. Initial success with the Chiefs then very average.

Overrated mostly by Nepia. Not sure who else is stroking his schlong.

Wheres the yawn emoji? Wins Super rugby twice with long term failures the Chiefs, wins three U20s in a row and lulls us into thinking they're easy until we start loosing a few, takes over a basket case province when their coach quits and makes them way more competitive than they should be. Oh, also won a rare NPC for Wellington when he was a baby coach back in the day.

But yeah, overrated and average.

@chris-b And there you are - thought you'd been abducted by aliens. Following the same reasoning I am impressed with how Foster built the Chiefs so that Rennie could win with them.

It was also impressive how Vance Stewart set up the Crusaders in 1996 so that Wayne Smith could benefit and eventually win in 1998.

The work that Jed Rowlands and Frank Oliver did in setting up the Blues for Sloane/Henry to win in 2003 was impressive too.

Also, it was great how Hammett got rid of Nonu so that he could rebuild the team for four years of mediocrity and this allowed Boyd to bring Nonu back to get the Canes to the finals and set them up for the win the following year.

Shannon Frizell - WTF! Seriously, even setting aside the fact he's a poach, he's the worst selection in the ABs for a long time.

Basically Akira has to move to a South Island team and do some of the mythical graft that @Machpants claims he doesn't do, despite the fact he's week in week out one of the hardest workers going un a bumbling Blues team. What graft has Frizell done in his 34 minutes per game he plays?

So, the Sunday morning thread read isn't nearly as much fun when we win comfortably.

So my random thoughts on the game:

So I think I was correct in thinking we haven't been playing direct this year, however in this must win match we played really direct and smashed them up in the forwards. I think the TWM must be disappointed they had to play direct in this match as I think they were saving it for the cup finals themselves. We also massively tidied up our defence, although TBF last week we just had so little ball that we had to make so many tackles that we were always going to miss a few.

There seems to be a bit of a loss of perspective on the wings. Yes they both played well (Reece especially played better than I thought he would in defence and without the ball, Bridge as I expected) but it's impossible to make a comparison between this week and last week - last week the forwards played like fairies and the backs suffered because of it (and they were down to 14 for 40 minutes) and this week the pack kicked arse and the wings benefited from decent front foot and counter attack ball. I think Ioane would have carved up just like Bridge did last night with that extra space. Can't believe some are genuinely suggesting he'll be dropped.

Coles is getting shit but I thought he played well outside of his yellow and getting a yellow for dumping a mouthy halfback out of a maul which we were dominating isn't too bad in the scheme of things.

The loosies were awesome. Savea spent the first 40 minutes emulating his brother on the wing (the good version, not the fatty version), dare I say it very Fifita like, then spent the second 40 in the middle more making tackles and hitting rucks. I wonder if that was the gameplan. Also, we may as well just give Ardie the number 8 jumper. He's playing 8, Read is playing 6 and Cane is playing his brand of hard tackling 7 for 60 minutes until they bring Todd on. I still don't get Todd, good rugby player, but 3 7's in the team just seems overkill.

Patty T stood up and didn't get himself red carded so that's a bonus. Whitelock had a new haircut, he doesn't quite look like the missing link as much anymore, and that coincided with his best test of the year.

Beaunga is starting to gel I reckon. I was generally worried when Mo'unga came off injured. Not for the game, BB could easily slot into 10, but for the RWC. Thankfully it looks like it's not serious. SBW and ALB were both good. Smith ran the game well, like he used to.

JB still worries the shit out of me, even though I thought he was decent, but he still looks like he's 30 seconds away from doing something stupid. I guess I have to trust he'll come right like DMac did (who copped far worse from some posters than JB does for arguably less stupidity).

White looked shit this week, Genia looked good when he came on. The number 6 who changed his name was awesome last week, he was terrible this week. My non regular rugby watching Aussie mate picked up how bad he was early in the game and then spent the rest of the game shouting at the screen to get him off. Kervei was irrelevant without as much ball as last week and O'Connor was just left to tackle all day. Beale had his worst test in a while.

Best thing about the win (aside from keeping the Aussies scoreless), my Aussie mate who was in Singapore for last weeks match and spammed the shit out of me for two days after the match was sitting right next to me on the couch for this match. I'd like to say I was a magnanimous winner ... but I wasn't, I rubbed that win in his face all through the match and then for the next couple of hours at dinner, where to his credit he still proudly wore his wallabies jumper (which looks like a soccer shirt) all night.

Edit: Must proof better next time and not start three sentences in a row with 'so'.
Second Edit: How could I forget, how awesome was it seeing our 7 man scrum smash the Wallabies! Rugby porn of the highest order.

If we can't complain about player selection and non-selection then the Fern is fucked. No more discussing Jonah from you @Stargazer if that's the case.

@act-crusader said in NRL 2021:

Haha this is hilarious. Watching Manly get done over and the TMO not in their camp is always enjoyable. Just wish it wasn’t the Bunnies doing it.

Manly have been Dr Jekyll, Mr Hyde, and then Dr Jekyll again through these finals.

Pity I’m going to miss the should be grand final tomorrow as it’s on at 2:30pm - don’t they know it’s picnic day???

I hope the Chequebook XV display that sort of form in a few weeks when they come up for the Shield match.

You could hear the anguish in TJs voice in the 2nd half.

@act-crusader said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

Clue for #24 - more notable in previous years, only played in one match in 1981, did captain the ABs

Oliver?

Edit: @Chris-B jinx, buy me a coke.

@higgins There’s no way we’re not huge underdogs. Will we even have a current Canes starting on the weekend?

Go the 0-0 draw!

@bovidae said in Wellington v Hawkes Bay:

Thompson as a loose forward?

He really should just swap teams on the day if he can only make loose forward for the Canes Wellingotn.

@bones said in All Blacks vs Springboks I:

I'm not convinced Marshall and Cowan aren't brothers. Probably another brother in DMac too. Not Mils or Goldie though, think that's obvious.

I would have thought Goldie was closer to Cowan and Marshall than DMac, similar size, chunky rear, all hideously blonde. DMac is skinnier but also has the blonde.

@dogmeat said in Coffee:

Apparently caffeine is a stimulant and readily accessed as such which is where the buzz comes from and teh alertness - and the addiction.

I've never had coffee addictions, I'll just stop for weeks at a time no worries.

But, if I have coffee after 2pm it messes with my sleep.

@act-crusader said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

@nepia just 2001.

And I didn’t start lurking on the Fern until 2003 so I’ll leave to others to describe his ability 😉

Wait, who was posting the Cantablacks teams back then (aside from Bitchell and Deans) if you weren't around?

@act-crusader said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

@bobily2 said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

@nepia said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

@act-crusader said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

@chris-b said in AB Quizzes (Wingers + others):

There's only Holah and McCaw - and maybe Razor as opensides - so that's a possibility for the last.

Think bigger

It's not Broomhall is it? (I've only been speed reading the thread so ignore me if he's already been mentioned).

I think he was in 2002 when almost all the Crusaders made the team.

And so they should’ve. Setting the ABs up for our 2011 run 😎

That's another interesting question, aside from McCaw did any of the Cantablacks (or any of the ABs that year) make it 2011? I'd guess not many, if any.