Test Rugby Wallabies Rugby World Cup discussion

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LukeParkerno1 said:
Relying on Fardy at the breakdown....I can see SA laughing so hard. Why don't we just pick the best number 7 at the breakdown, I know such a novel idea, but how about lets try it. Hooper spends half the time in the centres, how much good is that when we are struggling to get the ball back?
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Hm, honestly I don't think it'll matter that much. I get your point, but I think it's completely invalid. If we're struggling to get the ball back, it'll be because the entire forward pack is getting dominated.

In any case, Hooper plays a very important role for the Waratahs, far different to the more traditional role Pocock plays for the Brumbies. Hooper's job is effectively to rush up on the opposition and try isolate them. A lot of the Tahs recent success can be attributed to Hooper IMO. Pocock almost plays the opposite role in that he waits for players to get isolated before pouncing.
 
LukeParkerno1 said:
South Africa are dead set laughing to the bank...

Horwill..FMD I would almost rather Dennis and that is saying something
Hooper starting...this will be fun, when exactly are we planning to win a turnover?
Horne over Mitchell...laughable.

South Africa 1-12, could easily be 13+
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Seeing as you wanted the last coach sacrificed for his selections, I await you calling for Cheika's head as of right now, otherwise your posts are just double standards.
 
robbieando said:
Seeing as you wanted the last coach sacrificed for his selections, I await you calling for Cheika's head as of right now, otherwise your posts are just double standards.
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I'm not that thrilled with Chieka as Wallabies coach but he is better than McKensie and his ridiculous selections. That said if he is still making awful decisions after the WC he needs to go. Simple as that.
 

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One thing you might consider is that you're not at training every day, and that you know less about rugby than Michael Cheika, Stephen Larkham, Nathan Grey and Mario Ledesma. You also don't know what their selection motivations are for these pre world cup games. It would be silly not to give significant playing time to all the guys likely to be in the world cup squad. Otherwise you'd have guys who've hardly played for months having to potentially step up for a world cup quarter final.

On Hooper vs Pocock, we will see who performs best for the Wallabies over the Rugby Championship. I would like whoever has more impact to start in the world cup, and I'm not arrogant enough to suggest I know who that will be. Pocock is clearly more valuable in defence, Hooper clearly more valuable in attack. Pocock will often make a couple of turnovers in a game, while Hooper will often make a linebreak or beat a lot of defenders. I do believe that it's more possible for top teams to nullify Pocock tactically - as the Hurricanes did in the Super Rugby semis, than teams can nullify Hooper's threat. What the Hurricanes did was run at Pocock as often as possible. If he's the tackler he can get taken out of play much more easily, and so he barely had any impact on the game. Referee interpretation also matters a lot when it comes to Pocock's effectiveness. If you have a referee like Rolland or Poite - who either favour the defensive team a bit at the breakdown (Rolland) or allow more of a free for all at the breakdown (Poite) then Pocock will be extremely effective. With a ref like Nigel Owens, who generally favours the attacking team in his interpretations, I think Hooper could be more valuable. And Owens is the referee on Saturday night.
 
LukeParkerno1 said:
See what happens when you replace a past it hack in Genia...

Pocock has to start next test ffs
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Yeah, agreed on both points. I reckon Genia is past it.

Skelton performed poorly and Horwill had his best game in ages. Opens the door for a Pocock and Hooper backrow.
 
Great stuff by the Aussie boys to go for the win instead of the tying penalty goal and then pull it off with the clock into red time.....
 
Lions1024 said:
Yeah, agreed on both points. I reckon Genia is past it.

Skelton performed poorly and Horwill had his best game in ages. Opens the door for a Pocock and Hooper backrow.
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Higginbotham was pathetic as well fair dinkum can we not pick him. Mitchell is our best winger.
 
Watched the recording of the game when I got home from seeing the Swans capitulate (ugh) to the Hawks and I must say, I'm very surprised we ended up snatching that win. We looked pretty shoddy for all of 70 minutes just about. We stretched pretty long sequences of play together but turned a lot of ball over at the breakdown after becoming stilted by the Boks' swarming defence.

Fair play to James Horwill, he played a ripping 30 minutes after being brought on for Skelton. I rip on him often but he really impressed me tonight. Skelton was OK with the ball but he's as inconsistent and unreliable as ever when it comes to scrum time. We cannot afford to have him folding up like an umbrella every time pressure hits in the scrum. Rob Simmons played a good game.

Holmes and Sio both scrummaged well against the Boks' B front row, would really like to see Holmes start next weekend in place of Kepu.

Phipps really played a good game after coming on for Genia and I thought the Cooper/Giteau partnership showed signs of being valuable but Toomua straightened the ship immensely when he came on to me. AAC and Folau were both very good and Horne/Kuridrani quiet.

Hooper was huge over the course of the game and Pocock was great as soon as he came on. Higginbotham, I'm unsurprised to say, was MIA once again. I just cannot trust him at Test level. Never have and I doubt I ever will. I'd be starting McCalman at 8 or just going full throttle and starting Pocock there.
 
S120 said:
I'd be starting McCalman at 8 or just going full throttle and starting Pocock there.
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Just start Pocock if that is your alternative...one bloke is world class...the other is an okay bench player!
 

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S120 said:
Hooper was very good tonight.
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He was good, Pocock was even better in my view. We would have been rooted if that spud Higginbotham stayed on a minute longer.

I swear if I see Will Genia's name at halfback next test I'll go off! Useless, old, past it...absolute HACK! Played like half the Swans played tonight!
 
Well I think the answer to the Pocock / Hooper dilemma is to start both. They're arguably our two best players and they make the biggest difference to the team. If Horwill can keep up the form he had tonight then he starts with Simmons, and we have 3 good lineout options. We would lack a real line bending forward but I think the benefits would outweigh that, especially given the fast and very wide game plan that Cheika favours.

Giteau did okay for his first test back - that pass to Folau aside, but Toomua looked very classy when he came on.

I actually think we played pretty well. There's too much negativity from Australian rugby fans. Sometimes it seems like anything less than 80 minutes of perfection is terrible. The team in general needs to work on supporting the ball player better and clearing out better, but I think we definitely created the better chances against a very good South African team. We're not going to come up against a better pack of forwards than theirs and I thought their defence was excellent. What was most pleasing to me was our bench impact. Every guy that came on made a positive difference. Last season it was the opposite. And in this game it was the difference as South Africa got worse with pretty much every change.
 
Maester said:
Well I think the answer to the Pocock / Hooper dilemma is to start both. They're arguably our two best players and they make the biggest difference to the team. If Horwill can keep up the form he had tonight then he starts with Simmons, and we have 3 good lineout options. We would lack a real line bending forward but I think the benefits would outweigh that, especially given the fast and very wide game plan that Cheika favours.

Giteau did okay for his first test back - that pass to Folau aside, but Toomua looked very classy when he came on.

I actually think we played pretty well. There's too much negativity from Australian rugby fans. Sometimes it seems like anything less than 80 minutes of perfection is terrible. The team in general needs to work on supporting the ball player better and clearing out better, but I think we definitely created the better chances against a very good South African team. We're not going to come up against a better pack of forwards than theirs and I thought their defence was excellent. What was most pleasing to me was our bench impact. Every guy that came on made a positive difference. Last season it was the opposite. And in this game it was the difference as South Africa got worse with pretty much every change.
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Good points, I still think we were relatively poor but balancing the assessment with the fact that these guys were playing their first test together, they did OK. The bench definitely out-played the Boks' bench. Sio, Holmes, Horwill, Pocock, Phipps, Toomua were all great off the bench and Mitchell was decent.

On Mitchell, he looked a bit slow but I'd like to see him get a start next week. I'd start him over Horne to see what happens. AAC can keep his spot, he was very good.
 
I think it's pretty harsh to say we played relatively poorly. You usually get a lot of dropped ball and miscommunication in the Wallabies first test and there wasn't much of that at all. Our tight 5 was getting overpowered most of the match and they were stronger at the breakdown all game, but at the same time we never folded and I think Owens was pretty lenient on guys not rolling away and pilfering without supporting their body weight. That surprised me actually. But we were up against the 2nd best team in the world and they played well. In those circumstances you can't win by playing poorly. I thought it was a good test match with more positives than negatives for both teams.
 
Yeh fair enough, watching some of the replay they strung together some great series of phases.

Backline has some good depth to choose from atm. Toomua and Giteau are two good 12's to pick from, Toomua was great in his time on the field.
 
I think the backline performed better on second watching. We realistically should have scored 3-4 more tries if it wasn't for sloppy work at the breakdown and poor ball handling. If Kuridrani latched on to that ridiculous pass on the verge of half-time that would have been a try aswell - the pass wasn't as ridiculous as I first thought. I would stick with the backline (minus the inured Genia) and swap in Toomua for Cooper - just to see how he performs at flyhalf and his combination with Giteau.

I'm really not sure what to think of Skelton. He's just so poor running around the ground. I doubt it's fitness, considering his performances for the Waratahs. But Cheika needs to sort him ASAP, as we desperately need him. Horwill had a good 30+ minute hitout but I don't have any confidence in him repeating that type of performance over the year. It would really be good if we could get Douglas back in time for the RWC.

Higginbotham is a test level dud. No point persisting. I would drop him and give Ita Vaea a shot. No doubts in my mind that Pocock and Hooper should be played as a tandem. There's no way Hooper can be dropped - defensively he's the only player that makes impact tackles (i.e. that tackle on Burger...)

Slipper needs a rest. Overworked and fatigued, he needs to be managed up until the RWC. It isn't as if we have a dud as a replacement - give Sio much needed gametime at test level.
 
A Kane Douglas - Rob Simmons lock partnership would put us in a very good position in terms of the lineout and scrum. I really hope he comes back.

It'd also make playing Hooper and Pocock more viable as we'd have three legit jumpers with Fardy. Can't really play Skelton, Pocock and Hooper at the same time for that reason.

I'd love to see Sio and Holmes start next week to test them against the Pumas.
 
And I'm glad I'm not alone on Higginbotham, been saying it for years and he still gets picked on the hope he will finally become some athletic ball running game changer and finally nail those stupid ******* kicks he attempts every game.
 
S120 said:
It'd also make playing Hooper and Pocock more viable as we'd have three legit jumpers with Fardy. Can't really play Skelton, Pocock and Hooper at the same time for that reason.
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Other than in the lineout Fardy was pretty ineffective last night. Wouldn't mind trying 6. Pocock 7. Hooper 8. McCalman as well as 6. Fardy 7. Hooper 8. Pocock.

Douglas fit and in form would be great. Apparently he hasn't played well for Leinster though and had a number of injury problems. Hard to see how it will happen with Leinster apparently seeking a €250k release fee.
 
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