Should be spicy!
Lions going for the sweep, Aussies going for “high road” series victory ….
Think result depends on Carlton Draught consumption this week by the tourists.
Wallabies
Match thread
Lions III
With the Aussie media awarding their boys the moral victory after yesterday's game in Melbourne, I assume they will declare the Wallabies series victors if they win in Sydney.
There'll be no sentimentality IMHO
Farrell Sr will be going for the whitewash and his name in the record books
Outside of injury I can't see many changes
Possibly Ringrose in at outside centre and Hansen on the wing
Will be interesting if the Lions rotate a lot. Would be surprised (and disappointed) if the Wallabies don't take this one.
@Tordah for me it will come down to the fitness of Skelton and Valentini, with the admission of Schmidt he needs Salakaia-Loto on the bench.
That alone will determine if the Wallabies can compete for 80mins.
The biggest concern is if Farrell Snr is smart enough to let the better players in the squad have an opportunity. As I see it a fit Wallaby squad can take this Irish Invitational - if Farrell mistakenly selects on form, then they're destined to win 3-0.
@antipodean said in Wallabies vs Lions III:
@Tordah for me it will come down to the fitness of Skelton and Valentini, with the admission of Schmidt he needs Salakaia-Loto on the bench.
That alone will determine if the Wallabies can compete for 80mins.
The biggest concern is if Farrell Snr is smart enough to let the better players in the squad have an opportunity. As I see it a fit Wallaby squad can take this Irish Invitational - if Farrell mistakenly selects on form, then they're destined to win 3-0.
Who would you bring in on form?
Morgan, Pollock are probably the two obvious ones. Go back to Tuipulotu in the midfield maybe? Freeman wasn't great on Saturday but has been in good form, Lowe is a little bit of the reverse.
Don't think any of the above changes would make a big difference though.
@antipodean said in Wallabies vs Lions III:
@Mr-Fish I'd remove Lowe who is shithouse. JGP isn't playing as well as Mitchell has on the tour. Aki is a shadow of his former self and clearly second rate compared to Sione Tuipulotu. I think Porter and Conan are bang average.
Agree re Lowe and I'd like to see Kinghorn there. JGP was pretty damn good for 40 minutes in the first test and IMO has done enough to keep his starting spot. Aki - agree. The benching of Genge baffled me in the last test. Yes he is a good impact player but he is currently superior to Porter in most facets and you'd think you would want your best player having the most minutes in the game. Conan does the grunt work well without getting much of a highlights reel and he is the only genuine 8 in the squad, so I guess he stays and I'd be happy with that.
After two pathetically amateur and frankly boring test 23 naming pressers it would be great if Farrell did this for the 3rd Test
@brodean said in Wallabies vs Lions III:
Would have thought Porter had been penalised out of the game by now. Genge is also dodgy af at scrum time
Porter is always on the angle and i don't know how he gets away with it, feels weird him playing for my team and me having to pretend not to see it, or at least, not scream at the screen that the cheating fuck is boring in.
As for Genge, I think he's a better scrummager, and whilst I would probably have given a couple of pens against him for hinging, you could argue that the Aussie wasn't chasing his feet and was dropping it (I would only argue that because I'm a Lions fan though I suspect)
Weather looks like shit across Sydney for Saturday BTW. No club rugby for me so might head west of the mountains and go camping 
@NTA said in Wallabies vs Lions III:
Weather looks like shit across Sydney for Saturday.
Scottish, Irish, Welsh and the boys from the North of England will feel right at home then.
Difficult to see really whether that collapse was caused by hinging or the Aussie prop losing his footing.
An interesting aside, something someone posted prior to the last test was that this Italian ref likes to re-set and gives very few scrum penalties. If that is well known then of course ALL props are going to push things.
If it works out, well... why not?
Apparently these guys have the sauce
Can’t see it myself
I’m thinking
Genge, Sheehan, Furlong
Itoje, McCarthy (if fit) / Chessum
Beirne, Curry, Conan
JGP, Russell
Tuipolotu, Ringrose
Lowe, Keenan, Freeman
Replacements
LCD, Porter, Stuart
Chessum/Ryan, Morgan
Mitchell, Farrell, Kinghorn
His focus now that he’s won the series is to include as many Irish in the match day 23 and if they get the whitewash Ireland have momentum going into the Autumn tests
Tough schedule
01 Nov v NZ in Chicago
08 Nov v Japan in Dublin
15 Nov v Australia in Dublin
22 Nov v S Africa in Dublin
If Pollock isn’t in the 23 then he shouldn’t have been on the tour.
Lads made every appearance a winner
