England v All Blacks

It is about 99.999% unlikely there will be any experimenting or positional changes, so I reckon that team above is a long way off...

It doesn't make sense bringing on one of your best players into the backline for the last 20 or 30 minutes. BS.

Twickenham is an awful stadium too.

@BerniesCorner said in England Vs All Blacks:

Twickenham is an awful stadium too.

82,000 people can make a lot of noise if they want to, but as a spectator it's a less enjoyable experience than Wembley, the Emirates or the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium. Only the London Stadium (West Ham's ground) is worse of the major London stadiums.

Eventually it will need to be demolished and totally rebuilt or sold off.

I’d like to see full Irish bench.

Same starters except QT at 12 and Billy P at 13.

My Backline for England: 9. Roigard 10. DMac 11. LF 12. Tupaea 13. Proctor 14. Jordan 15. Love

Carter has been a bit average the last two tests so might be worthwhile giving him a spell. Beaudy to covere 10 and 15 from the bench where I think he's the most impactful these days.

Clarke out. I think I’d prefer Rieko to get a start there, rather than start monkeying around with other things.

@pakman said in England Vs All Blacks:

Clarke out. I think I’d prefer Rieko to get a start there, rather than start monkeying around with other things.

Yep, Proctor who has been underwhelming all year isn't going to scare England like QT and LF could well do. Ioane in as a straight swap as the only change ( I won't even bother suggesting McKenzie over BB, won't happen )

So now we are getting into the three tests in a row theory. They were starting to look pretty tired some of them. The bench made a difference. Is a bit of rotation a possibility?

@Canes4life said in England Vs All Blacks:

My Backline for England: 9. Roigard 10. DMac 11. LF 12. Tupaea 13. Proctor 14. Jordan 15. Love

Carter has been a bit average the last two tests so might be worthwhile giving him a spell. Beaudy to covere 10 and 15 from the bench where I think he's the most impactful these days.

Gotta get Proctor in somehow eh.

@brodean yeah Razor doesnt seem to subscribe to that theory, given this match was always likely to be the toughest he does like to play 'his best' side each week.

I’m worried about this one. England have genuine depth in most positions and overwhelmingly so at the loose forward position so the breakdown maybe a long night.

Their strength – kicking and chasing contestable kicks is our weakness. In the Aussie game they created a semicircle of 3 player around the kick contest to cleanup the intentional tap-backs or get a jackal if it goes the other way. (A decent strategy I’d like us to do.)

We know what they’re going to do all night - I’d select our team with this in mind.

@Frank said in England Vs All Blacks:

@Canes4life said in England Vs All Blacks:

My Backline for England: 9. Roigard 10. DMac 11. LF 12. Tupaea 13. Proctor 14. Jordan 15. Love

Carter has been a bit average the last two tests so might be worthwhile giving him a spell. Beaudy to covere 10 and 15 from the bench where I think he's the most impactful these days.

Gotta get Proctor in somehow eh.

Yeah any excuse to shoehorn him in.

He'll get a run vs Wales if he's lucky. No chance in a huge game like this.

I doubt we'll see many changes. Other than a couple of players out with and back from injury, the only points of interest will be whether or not Carter is punished for his foot trip (I doubt he will be) and if they go back to a bigger blindside and confirm they were only prepared to play the weekend's loose forward combo against that particular opposition.

@ShaquilleOatmeal said in England Vs All Blacks:

I doubt we'll see many changes. Other than a couple of players out with and back from injury, the only points of interest will be whether or not Carter is punished for his foot trip (I doubt he will be) and if they go back to a bigger blindside and confirm they were only prepared to play the weekend's loose forward combo against that particular opposition.

I suspect there is less chance to punish Carter given Clarke is out.

UK bookies currently make England the slight favourites for this one. A rare test where the ABs go into the contest as underdogs.

@jimmyb said in England Vs All Blacks:

Is there anyone in Nz rugby who can catch a high ? Who ever it is, they can’t start

60% of restarts won. That’s fucking awful

3 out of 5. Lakai dropped one, can’t recall who dropped the other. Lord?

Last year at Twickers we scraped by with Sititi/ Cane/ Savea and Finau on the bench.

Ardie is a guaranteed starter. So who plays at 6 and 8.

I would actually select Finau and tell him to rip in. Does his form warrant it? Probably not. Do we need some size at 6? Yep. Why not Parker? I think for a player in his first season he’s done some good things but still has areas of improvement and very much a work in progress.

I’d keep Lakai at 8 and Sititi in the bench impact/cover role.

Same tight 5 starters and bench.

I think they should keep the same midfield for this one. Ioane to left wing.

The replacement for Clarke will tell us the pecking order for centre and left wing. If they stick with the same midfield then Ioane over Reece is the better option in the no.11 jersey. But if LF is moved to be the power winger then their choice at centre becomes much more interesting.

@Bovidae from a pragmatic perspective they’d have to go with the starting midfield again. It’s not like we have many combinations to call upon with our number 1 2nd 5 out.

A case of they’ll be better for the run!

Ioane was our left wing to start the season when Clark was out of the team, go back to the well I say. A bit like my call to bring Finau back.

Ok maybe unpopular thought, but with Clarke out, I wouldn't mind seeing LF move out to wing, and maybe play RI at 13 . I worry we will need pretty good defence in midfield, as perhaps the Pommy pack may cause us problems.

England will really want this having not beaten us since 2019

@ACT-Crusader said in England Vs All Blacks:

Biggest match of the tour. I think one Beauden John Barrett is due…..

The last 10 tests
2024 - W by 2 points (A)
2024 - W by 7 points (H)
2024 - W by 1 point (H)
2022 - Draw (A)
2019 - L by 12 points (RWC)
2018 - W by 1 point (A)
2014 - W by 3 points (A)
2014 - W by 23 points (H)
2014 - W by 1 point (H)
2014 - W by 5 points (H)

I think we used to lose to England once a decade with regularity - I'm pretty sure we lost in 1983, 1993, 2003 and December 2012. Not sure we lost in between.

Losing in 2019 is an abomination - but, hopefully we can restore the pattern by not losing to them this decade.

Only real question mark for me is what they do at left wing and centre. And the bench loose forward. Most likely IMO....

De Groot, Taylor, Newell, Holland, Barrett (if fit), Sititi, Savea, Lakai, Roigard, Beauden, Fainga'anuku, Tupaea, Proctor, Carter, Jordan

Williams, Samisoni, Tosi, Lord, probably Kirifi, but maybe Parker, Ratima, Dmac, Ioane

@Chris-B

1973, 1983, 1993, 2002, 2003, 2012 and 2019 in more recent history. Plus of course Prince Obolenski's match in 1936 - see, we were poaching even back then.

Kirifi is not big enough for a game like this. Parker is too slow against the likes of Earl, Pepper and Pollock. Finau's workrate is not good enough and tends to disappear completely at times. I would bring someone from the ABs XV who has size, genuine speed and good workrate (Papali'i, Flanders or Howden).

I think Lakai has been really solid since coming in at eight - but I pose this. Has he been any better than Lio-Willie was at the start of the year, and given size is not an issue, should CLW be in the squad?

@cgrant said in England Vs All Blacks:

Kirifi is not big enough for a game like this. Parker is too slow against the likes of Earl, Pepper and Pollock. Finau's workrate is not good enough and tends to disappear completely at times. I would bring someone from the ABs XV who has size, genuine speed and good workrate (Papali'i, Flanders or Howden).

All three are smaller than Savea, Lakai and Sititi...

Where are all the doom mongers pre Scotland that insisted the heights of Savea, Lakai and Sititi was a major issue. The issues we had were all about lack of composure, handling errors and loss of focus.
Savea, Lakai and Sititi... will be fine against England. All three have X factor and we saw that on Saturday.

We need to focus on box kick defence.

If you think about some of the props, locks and loosies we haven't had over the past 5 years, at the moment everyday is a good day.

genuinely don't know where England stand at the moment, we have some v strong positions and some decidedly average ones, our style of play definitely isn't established and picking horses for courses and then playing the same way anyway seems like a fools exercise.

I worry about the lack of grunt in our second row without George Martin around, I worry about our lack of a proper full back, I worry about the inconsistency of our front row selections, I think we have a back row full of talent, none of whom are a natural 8.

If i were to do the same with the All Blacks, I suspect I'd find similar lack of certainty about the best options and best style of play. Who knows what might happen on Saturday, could be one big cripple fight or a game of rugby may break out.

I'd roll out the same team as last week. Have to replace Clarke with RI
I think this game is too important to be making any changes.
I would definitely replace Kirifi with Parker or Finau, we have coverage at 7 already, we need coverage for 6.
Leave 12 and 13 alone, we finally have some punch and offloading, it is worth the defensive risk. I don't think they are that bad defensively anyway.
I see the bookies have England slight favourites, which is a fair call.

Chessum and Freeman a doubt for Saturday. Foot injury and hamstring respectively. Both are pretty much nailed on starters so quite a loss, although I would counter that with the fact that Alex Coles really stepped up last week and we should have Roebuck back as well.

Full back is the one area where I feel Borthwick has yet to make up his mind. M Smith will be chasing and probably dropping high balls all over the place as NZ will target him. Steward is unlikely to have another howler under the high ball as he did v Aus, but is ponderous in defence and not a lot quicker in attack. I'm guessing Borthwick will roll the dice and play Daly there.

Robertson did a press conference about an hour ago in London.

Nothing particularly interesting. The ABs are staying at the Lemsbury in Teddington rather than in the centre of Town. Scott Barrett should be available for selection this Saturday. Caleb Clarke is out but will be back for the Wales came. Catching the high ball will be a big focus of training this week. He talks in glowing terms at the end about Cam Roigard and Fabian Holland. Biggest surprise for me was 48 hours later he hasn't sat down to watch the whole of England - Fiji.

@sparky said in England Vs All Blacks:

Robertson did a press conference about an hour ago in London.

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Nothing particularly interesting. The ABs are staying at the Lemsbury in Teddington rather than in the centre of Town. Scott Barrett should be available for selection this Saturday. Caleb Clarke is out but will be back for the Wales came. Catching the high ball will be a big focus of training this week. He talks in glowing terms at the end about Cam Roigard and Fabian Holland. Biggest surprise for me was 48 hours later he hasn't sat down to watch the whole of England - Fiji.

You don’t have to watch the full game of that match to see the pattern England were running in attack and how their defence was set up.

@Mr-Fish said in England Vs All Blacks:

@cgrant said in England Vs All Blacks:

Kirifi is not big enough for a game like this. Parker is too slow against the likes of Earl, Pepper and Pollock. Finau's workrate is not good enough and tends to disappear completely at times. I would bring someone from the ABs XV who has size, genuine speed and good workrate (Papali'i, Flanders or Howden).

All three are smaller than Savea, Lakai and Sititi...

But bigger than Kirifi.

@ACT-Crusader He said he'd seen clips not the whole match. But it was obvious from his comments that he's very aware of England's recent pattern and style.

@ACT-Crusader said in England Vs All Blacks:

@sparky said in England Vs All Blacks:

Robertson did a press conference about an hour ago in London.

View embedded content

Nothing particularly interesting. The ABs are staying at the Lemsbury in Teddington rather than in the centre of Town. Scott Barrett should be available for selection this Saturday. Caleb Clarke is out but will be back for the Wales came. Catching the high ball will be a big focus of training this week. He talks in glowing terms at the end about Cam Roigard and Fabian Holland. Biggest surprise for me was 48 hours later he hasn't sat down to watch the whole of England - Fiji.

You don’t have to watch the full game of that match to see the pattern England were running in attack and how their defence was set up.

See I reckon you kinda do need to watch it - if it's your job to and you're playing them in a few days.

Both Ted and Shag used to say people thought Friday and Saturday were their busy days, nope it was Sunday. Watch the whole of their performance prepare clips for review. Watch the whole of the opposition performance. Then plan the whole week around what they could see.