Sports discussion

Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
Dammit Mayo, you always sneak a post in while I'm writing one. :P

Here's what I originally wrote:

—

Wow. Just wow. I cannot tell you how much I love this tournament.

Italy - Ireland was as one-sided as you can get (Ireland scored nine tries) but Wales - England was just phenomenal. Again. Every match these two teams have played in the last few years has been a cracker.

England were behind by five points with 10 minutes to go but a penalty and a converted try turned it around for them. Once again I was out of my seat and shouting when Elliott Daly went over for the try. Boy is he fast.

That's two matches England have won after being the second-best team on the pitch. Their players have a mental strength now which was completely lacking in the 2015 World Cup. I liked Stuart Lancaster, England's former head coach, but Eddie Jones deserves a lot of credit.

And I'm calling it now: Owen Farrell will be the England captain at some point before he retires. Maybe even next year.

—

And in response to your post, I'd also like to see a two-tier system, but you've hit the nail on the head: the unions that currently make up the 6N are loath to risk giving up their spots in the tournament and all the money that comes with it. Ideally there'd be a playoff between the bottom side in the 6N and the top side in whatever the second-tier tournament is called, perhaps in the autumn, so that relegation isn't always immediate and teams at least have a chance to redeem themselves.
 
Mayo Master

Mayo Master

Pro Adventurer
Flintlock said:
Dammit Mayo, you always sneak a post in while I'm writing one. :P
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As a player I liked to be fast and surprise my opponent :P (and when I first played in Canada, I was surprising my own teammates just as much so I had to change my style a little -_- )

Flintlock said:
Here's what I originally wrote:

—

Wow. Just wow. I cannot tell you how much I love this tournament.

Italy - Ireland was as one-sided as you can get (Ireland scored nine tries) but Wales - England was just phenomenal. Again. Every match these two teams have played in the last few years has been a cracker.

England were behind by five points with 10 minutes to go but a penalty and a converted try turned it around for them. Once again I was out of my seat and shouting when Elliott Daly went over for the try. Boy is he fast.
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I can see why you're loving it: the tournament has very good quality and density (save perhaps for Italy, who only seem a threat to Scotland and us for some reason), Wales vs England was a cracker indeed, and on top of that your team narrowly wins in the last minutes of the games!


Flintlock said:
That's two matches England have won after being the second-best team on the pitch. Their players have a mental strength now which was completely lacking in the 2015 World Cup. I liked Stuart Lancaster, England's former head coach, but Eddie Jones deserves a lot of credit.
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I too find that Stuart Lancaster tried a more pleasant, flamboyant style of rugby, and in contrast Eddie Jones really went "back to the roots" of English rugby, ie. imposing your physicality and build your game with the forwards first, and capitalize on your opponent's mistakes. It reminds me a lot of the style of the English team from the 90s to their world cup win in 2003. It's more sober, simpler, and brutally efficient.
What amazes me with Eddie Jones is that the way he's directing the English team is really at odds with the way he directed the Japanese team (he was insisting on pace and mobility), showing his ability as a coach to adapt his style to the teams' DNA and build on the players' strengths. It really is impressive.

Flintlock said:
And in response to your post, I'd also like to see a two-tier system, but you've hit the nail on the head: the unions that currently make up the 6N are loath to risk giving up their spots in the tournament and all the money that comes with it. Ideally there'd be a playoff between the bottom side in the 6N and the top side in whatever the second-tier tournament is called, perhaps in the autumn, so that relegation isn't always immediate and teams at least have a chance to redeem themselves.
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Having that play-off game might be a way to sweeten the deal for top-tier nations. Still, not sure when this system would get implemented, if it ever gets implemented at all. By the way, Georgia is undefeated for the past two years on the tier-2 tournament.
More info here.
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
Interesting. You inspired me to look up the international rankings. New Zealand first, obviously, England second... Georgia 12th, Italy 15th... but wait, what's this? All the way down at the bottom of the list:

mSmc.png


YEEEEEEEAAAHH

SUCK IT BULGARIA!!!!

:monster:
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
France and Scotland are still playing but I have to post this before I forget: a brass band in the crowd just played "The Kids Aren't Alright" by The Offspring. :lol:
 
Mayo Master

Mayo Master

Pro Adventurer
^ Yeah, no kidding.
What an ugly game of rugby that was! You got to wonder if there were the same teams that almost tied England and defeated Ireland last week.
As a French the only positive aspect of the game was the win. And that's about it. The only decent move we made in the game was the one which gave us a try.
So much for saying that the tournament had quality and density! So many blunders, stupid penalties, handling errors, poor decision making.... France was (especially in the 1st half) was mistaking haste for pace, while Scotland conceded silly penalties and got tons of injured (I feel sorry for Laidlaw). We'll definitely have to get our shit together for the upcoming game vs Ireland.
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
As an England fan it was a good result – every team besides England has now lost a match – but my heart was still pulling for Scotland. They let it slip away from through mistakes which a more experienced team, one that was used to winning, probably wouldn't have made.

You're right about the quality of the game. The best I can say about it is that it was exciting but rubbish. :P The injuries really didn't help – at one point it seemed to take 10 minutes for one minute of game time to pass – but I don't remember the last time I saw a kicking performance so poor, especially Scotland's attempted conversion after their second try (I know the ball slipped off the tee).

I wish there wasn't a two-week gap before the next games. >_>
 
Mage

Mage

She/They
AKA
Mage
I am glad to see you two passing the commentary back and forth because I've managed to miss every fucking match so far. Hmph. I'm going to see if I can catch up on the start of the tournament tomorrow.
 
Ghost X

Ghost X

Moderator
Matt Renshaw leaves cricket field 15 minutes before lunch because he got the runs. There's a joke in there somewhere.
 
Mayo Master

Mayo Master

Pro Adventurer
Few comments after the 2 games of the 6 nations today:

- Actually I couldn't watch Scotland vs Wales (29-13), only saw some highlights. It pretty much confirms the progress made by the Scots over the recent years. And that Stuart Hogg is awesome.

- Just saw Ireland vs France (19-9), and obviously I'm quite disappointed. Very physical game of rugby, where the difference was clearly made by the ability of the Irish to keep the ball. We gave the ball away cheaply far too many times (ball catching after up-and-under was quite disastrous) and conceded too many (more or less obvious and/or silly) penalties, so we ended up defending 80% of the time. We made good defense, but scoring gets a lot harder when you never have the ball in your opponent's half. Ireland was very solid, nothing genius in the way they played, but made very few mistakes, giving France hardly anything to chew on.
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
I enjoyed both games a lot. Now if England can put 50 points past Italy tomorrow it will have been another great weekend of rugby. ;)

For once I wasn't writing a post when you made yours!
 
Mayo Master

Mayo Master

Pro Adventurer
I'm curious of your comments about England's game today (I couldn't watch it). The way I hear it, it hasn't been all that easy, eh?
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
I missed the first 25 minutes of it myself and was surprised to see England only 5-0 up when I tuned in. It got worse before it got better and we were down 5-10 at half-time. The second half was a try-fest – England scored five tries to Italy's one to get the win and bonus point – but it was never particularly comfortable for the home side. It didn't help that Owen Farrell had a rare bad game with the boot.

Italy employed a really interesting tactic throughout the match which caused their opponents a lot of problems. As England ran through their attacking phases, only one Italian player – the tackler – committed to trying to win the ball, which meant no ruck was formed and there was no offside line for the other Italian players. This let them surround the English backs and disrupt their possession. England didn't know how to react and were seemingly unaware of the laws of the game. There was a comical moment towards the end of the first half where James Haskell was asking Romain Poite to explain the laws, to which the Frenchman replied, "I'm the referee, not the coach". One would expect international players to know the game themselves and I hope Eddie Jones gives them a pop quiz after this match. :P

The tournament is reaching an interesting ending as the team in first place still has to play the teams in second and third. As I predicted before the tournament, it could all come down to the Ireland vs. England match on the last day.
 
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Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
Ghost X said:
Love this photo of Serena Williams (on the right, for those living under a rock), who just got a record amount of wins in the open era. Looks like some sort of bad ass samurai. Also oldest woman to win such a title. I don't think she's going away any time soon either.
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She seems like a pretty nice person too:

I always think "that's exactly the kind of thing I'd do if I were a celebrity" before realising that I'm never going to be a celebrity, let alone one of the greatest tennis players of all time. :P
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
Crappidy crap, I totally forgot the first Six Nations game this weekend is being played right now, on a Friday rather than the usual Saturday/Sunday, so I missed most of the first half. Currently Wales 5-6 Ireland.
 
ForceStealer

ForceStealer

Double Growth
Flintlock said:
Ghost X said:
Love this photo of Serena Williams (on the right, for those living under a rock), who just got a record amount of wins in the open era. Looks like some sort of bad ass samurai. Also oldest woman to win such a title. I don't think she's going away any time soon either.
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She seems like a pretty nice person too:

I always think "that's exactly the kind of thing I'd do if I were a celebrity" before realising that I'm never going to be a celebrity, let alone one of the greatest tennis players of all time. :P
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That would be wildly intimidating, haha
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
Keveh Kins said:
Flintlock said:
As I predicted before the tournament, it could all come down to the Ireland vs. England match on the last day.
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Oh ho ho hoooo, now there shall be a battle
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Your boys didn't uphold their end of the bargain. :monster: I'm happy England won the 6N again but I was kinda looking forward to the last-day showdown.

England vs. Scotland was the only full match I saw this weekend. We beat them so hard they decided to call a second independence referendum. ;)
 
Flintlock

Flintlock

Pro Adventurer
Blargh. Can't imagine anyone except Scottish and Irish fans felt too good about today's rugby. Italy were crap, England were crap (except for about 10 minutes in the second half) and the way the France-Wales match ended was an absolute farce. Hopefully that will finally persuade World Rugby to do something about the scrum laws.
 
ForceStealer

ForceStealer

Double Growth
So I'm sure Yop is bursting with excitement over the Netherlands being one of the final four in the World Baseball Classic along with the US, Puerto Rico, and Japan :monster:
 
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