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.

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

@Kirwan @Duluth

You were asking for feedback from anyone that thinks this is a bad idea. I think it's a great idea, but, the only thing I'd say is that given people are paying I hope you don't feel more responsibility/pressure to keep delivering new features etc. Obviously the improvements you've been making are awesome, but also appreciate that you both have lives so I wouldn't want this to encroach on your personal lives too much.

I think I speak for everyone when I say we are pitching in to keep the site running, and away from the prying eyes of our overlords Google, so we don't expect you to suddenly increase your workload now that members are putting in a couple of dollars.

Really appreciate the effort you guys have put in to give us all a place to rant about our favourite sports (as well as other things).

@MiketheSnow Fall could have avoided the collision by checking his run. The current laws have actually outlawed "only having eyes on the ball". They've mandated that players must be more aware when chasing high balls. And that's what he was doing - chasing, whereas Beauden was fielding the kick. The duty of care is on the chaser.

They did that to stop players clattering into their opposition while staring at the sky and then claiming innocence.

I don't for a second believe Fall intentionally tried to injure Beauden. But as it stands Beauden landed on his head and was concussed.

And you can bet your ass next time Fall is chasing a high ball like that he will check his run and avoid the collision, which is exactly the behaviour WR is trying to encourage with this.

@barbarian if you think we can just move on from the mis-spelling joke then you are grossly underestimating the number of cringe-worthy Dads that post here.

Well shit, that all went extremely pear shaped.

England did to us what we did to Ireland last week, only when we get that dominance up front we score a lot more points. They came out firing and put us on the back foot from the get go then never let up. Massive credit there, that was a huge performance. Have they played their final though?

For us, after the initial onslaught we did somewhat get ourselves back into the game, but just pushed too many 50/50 plays and kept coughing it up at crucial times.

Cane was huge for us last week to nullify the Irish pack in the first 40. He's always been someone that thrives in the tight exchanges early on, so benching him was a pretty baffling deicison TBH. SB was OK but Cane provides a point of difference.

I love me some Jordie but he was only meant to be a squaddie. BFA on the bench would have been smart, especially given how early it is in Mo'unga's career. I would have subbed Richie early in the 2nd 40 and put Beauden back to 10. Experience matters in knock out matches and we needed calm heads after going behind early.

I was also surprised we didn't try and play Rieko into some form given how much of a game breaker he is.

But all of that is really just details when the forwards get smacked around like that. The English pack was amazing and Itoje showed just how good he is on the biggest possible stage.

It's been 12 years since we got knocked out of a RWC. I wasn't super confident we could get up a 3rd time, though the Irish game did give me some hope, but at the end of the day England were too good on the night. If you think back to 2015 we struggled to get up for the semi final against an SA team that had just lost to Japan. This time around we hit a far superior side.

So all in all I blame Ireland for losing to Japan and putting us on the wrong side of the bloody draw.

Rescuers have saved the cows. Locals are now planning a BBQ to celebrate.

So I've seen some right leaning publications stating that the Al-Noor Mosque has ties to extremism, so I did a bit of digging to see if there was any validity to their claims.

Summary: no, not really.

Basically, the claim comes from the fact that two brothers - Daryl and Nathan Jones converted to Islam at this Mosque. Daryl ended up being radicalized and joined Al-Qaeda and was killed in a drone strike. Nathan didn't, and denounced extremism in all forms. It is likely Daryl was radicalized online.

Some more history of the Mosque:

• historically speaking, the Muslim community has been dominated by South Asians that practice a moderate form of Sunni Islam.
• in more recent times, due largely to resettling refugees, there has been an increase in Somali and Arab Muslims - these Muslims are much more conservative.
• the Somali and Arab Muslims place a greater importance on the Mosque in their daily lives and as such have taken control of MAC, who run it. This is largely due to social reasons - they are generally in a lower socio-economic group than the South Asians and do not speak great English, so have found it more difficult to integrate. The Mosque is somewhere they can go and feel like they belong.
• in 2003 controversy broke out within the Muslim community. Basically, to assist the community financially, a major Arab charity called Al-Haramain offered financial assistance.
• this charity is pro-Wahabi with suspected ties to Al-Qaeda. Despite the fact this would have provided substantial financial assistance, the Muslim community rejected this as they did not want any ties to potential extremists. They also did not want to change the Mosque to only ultra-conservative teachings.
• there is also some underlying tensions between the South Asians and the Somali and Arab Muslims as they practice different teachings of Islam.

That's what I came up with in terms of ties to extremist groups. Just wanted to put this out there to provide a bit of nuance as you only ever get one side in our biased media organisations.

@hydro11 said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

@No-Quarter said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

@Cyclops said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

@No-Quarter said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

Nicholls gone and India edge ahead

India could bowl us out without conceding another run and we'd still be ahead. These wickets are damage control and probably a good sign that there's still life in the wicket.

Disagree completely, if you bowl first you need a 100 run lead to be even stevens IMO. Batting last is incredibly difficult, chasing anything over 250 is very tricky to navigate. We need another 100 runs tomorrow minimum.

Basin just flattens out though. I'm not convinced batting 4th is much different to batting 3rd. There might be more mental pressure to chase a target after having a first innings lead. I don't think the conditions will be tough though.

Fair point, bowling first is definitely more justified at the Basin than most grounds, and we made the most of the conditions to put ourselves on the front foot.

But as a traumatised Black Caps fan chasing anything more than 150 will have me hiding behind the couch.

@Cyclops said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

@No-Quarter said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

Nicholls gone and India edge ahead

India could bowl us out without conceding another run and we'd still be ahead. These wickets are damage control and probably a good sign that there's still life in the wicket.

Disagree completely, if you bowl first you need a 100 run lead to be even stevens IMO. Batting last is incredibly difficult, chasing anything over 250 is very tricky to navigate. We need another 100 runs tomorrow minimum.

Nicholls gone and India edge ahead

Game is fairly evenly poised after Kane and Rosco got out. Pitch is getting flatter so India will back themselves to set us a good target, then we have all the pressure that comes with batting last.

@canefan said in Indian Cricket Tour of NZ 2020:

Sky coverage is patchy due to heavy rain at our house. Most frustrating

I ditched decoder Sky and signed up for Sky Sport Now, their streaming service. Working well so far, $40 per month on the 12 month contract. We found we weren't watching any of the other channels at all so couldn't justify paying for it. No more rain fade just have to hope the Internet doesn't go down at a bad time. Fibre is pretty solid though.

I am very much not a fan of bowling first. We'll need to get them for 200 odd. I hope the pitch is seaming like a motherfucker.

@Bones said in Possible All Blacks 2020:

@Duluth said in Possible All Blacks 2020:

@antipodean

Nah lets stick to Frizell being shit and provincialism of those defending him

You mean @Chris-B right?

Frizzel is annoying....he's always just bubbling under, although lack of gametime probably doesn't help. I should be really looking forward to him getting on the park and while he never does a bad job there's just always that spark missing.

And now he's being out performed by the two young fellas. Even Parete is hitting harder than him.

That's a great description of Frizzel. He's solid enough but I don't see him as AB material - not yet anyway.

@mariner4life said in Possible All Blacks 2020:

@antipodean said in Possible All Blacks 2020:

@Duluth I can't be the lone ranger upset that Frizell, despite his obvious athletic gifts, doesn't display the intent to legally commit grievous bodily harm on the field.

I like the ginger from Auckland, but he's going to need to play flanker more than lock to squeeze himself into the squad.

Our national obsession with fit forwards who have skills leads us to these cycles where we run out of guys in NZ rugby who just like to hurt people. Good teams still need old fashioned aggression.

Great observation, and another reason Cane was so badly missed in the semi.

Hard not to think there wasn't a personality clash between Akira and one or more of the coaches. He's shown he can dominate at the highest level. Frizzel getting so mamy chances after doing absolutely nothing at Super level is bizarre. They've made Akira work far harder than anyone else for a proper shot.

@Victor-Meldrew said in British Politics:

@No-Quarter said in British Politics:

Fun fact - from what I understand, according to Gender Theory if you are a man and you don't identify with all of the stereotypical masculine traits, that makes you non-binary. And as being non-binary is a subset of trans, it makes you trans as well.

I like the story of a local Labour Party selecting a woman-only short-list one Wednesday

One bloke applied saying that, in line with Labour policy, he was eligible as he identified as female - but only on Wednesdays...

When you dig into it, it's all just gobbledygook. It does amaze me that anyone buys into it at all, though I'd say pure narcissism is the key driver for people like the bloke in that video.