Attisogbe hooked at half time. The French are treating this like a training run.
England XV
Match thread
France XV
And another lengthy water break. England up to 15 after the 20-minute red card. England should run out daily easy winners in the last 20 minutes.
Woki upgraded by The Bunker to a 20-minute Red. That might cost him a place on the NZ tour.
France to have 14 for most of the rest of the game.
The big talking point post-match will be the ref. Not just because of her gender and her youth. Hollie Davison had a lot of decisions to make there.
I thought she did okay. She has not much choice with the first RC. It was at least a YC, then got upgraded on review. The second one was a bit of a captain's challenge by Jamie George after the French try. The TMO spotted it. She took her time and awarded a YC. It then got upgraded to a RC by the bunker.
Both those last two French tries looked fair to me. She was well sighted for both and used the TMO to check.
Unlike some refs, she knows the laws and she is methodical and clear. Well done her.
But would I want her officiating an All Blacks tests or a RWC game? No I'm afraid. She's too slow around the park to officiate a top men's competitive game. She was a long way behind some of the breaks and she ended up in some odd field positions, when the game went side to side quickly.
She's fine for a barbarians or festival game. And a great role model for young female (and male) refs. But please, World Rugby, don't give her a NZ-SA game any time soon.
England fell apart a bit there in the last ten minutes. Partly fatigue and lack of fitness but also they really lacked leadership once Jamie George went off.
England have some nice ball players. But yet again game management in the last ten minutes and getting the job done is the big work on for them.
Whatever the opposite of a bomb squad is then that's what England's bench is.
George Ford's goalkicking was not good again. Time for England to find a different 10.
She’s reffed a load of URC matches this season
I rate her
I’d have her in the top 8 in the world already and be happy for her to ref a Wales match
Screeching in the commentary box on the other hand, get fucked
That’s a pretty good summary there. Our bench was not very effective at all and to me it seemed a bit of a strange selection. We had no real second row cover, a position that we were already relatively weak. Our No8 cover, whilst being a good player is very different to our starter and to be effective really needs to have a change in game plan. Whatever positives Dombrandt brought, they were outweighed by the lack of go forward when Willis went off. You’re bang on re George’s leadership, I don’t see much from Ford in that area. As to his kicking, well we had Slade there who’s is probably a more reliable kicker anyway and double that from the right hand side of the field.
On the (sort of) plus side, I felt Ford’s in play kicking from hand was well executed but somewhat overdone I felt.
Well done to Les Bleus. Some very nice pieces of play considering such a cobbled together side and very well managed at the end to nick it.
@MiketheSnow said in England XV Vs France XV:
She’s reffed a load of URC matches this season
I rate her
I’d have her in the top 8 in the world already and be happy for her to ref a Wales match
Screeching in the commentary box on the other hand, get fucked
You get Marshy up your way?
@sparky said in England XV Vs France XV:
The big talking point post-match will be the ref. Not just because of her gender and her youth. Hollie Davison had a lot of decisions to make there.
I thought she did okay. She has not much choice with the first RC. It was at least a YC, then got upgraded on review. The second one was a bit of a captain's challenge by Jamie George after the French try. The TMO spotted it. She took her time and awarded a YC. It then got upgraded to a RC by the bunker.
Both those last two French tries looked fair to me. She was well sighted for both and used the TMO to check.
Unlike some refs, she knows the laws and she is methodical and clear. Well done her.
But would I want her officiating an All Blacks tests or a RWC game? No I'm afraid. She's too slow around the park to officiate a top men's competitive game. She was a long way behind some of the breaks and she ended up in some odd field positions, when the game went side to side quickly.
She's fine for a barbarians or festival game. And a great role model for young female (and male) refs. But please, World Rugby, don't give her a NZ-SA game any time soon.
Totally agree, was amazed when I noticed her but thought she did OK. (Was there a Female touch judge in the Argintina/Lios game also?)
Sparky you said everything I noticed and was going to say, specialy that She was a long way behind some of the breaks, and in the wrong place on some of plays, but I've seen worse, she'll get better with experiance and most importantly did seem to demaind the lime light like some refs do. A year doing super-rugby would probably round her out nicely. Just a thought.