final

[wycombewasp]

what an inept display from England once there power was more than matched no ideas how to cope and no one with any spark ,daly as full back a joke.
well done SA 

[Chunky24]

The physicality SA have is different level and just stops you playing, Wales found it last week, England today.

[backdoc]

Spaff de Klerk v Youngs - no contest.

[welsh wasp]

England let S Africa play the same way they did against Wales - but with less kicking.
No need to just get at Daly.

[Shugs]

If you can't scrummage you lose. Some huge positives for England especially 6 and 7 coming out of the tournament. We were outplayed, out muscled and out thought today. Eddie has a problem at FB as Daly just cannot catch or defend to the level required internationally. The tournament has put us back on the map though.

[Rifleman Harris]

I think that SA and the Estate Agents are showing the template for the future; power, defence speed and not being ambitious until the opposition have been written down.

I'm not sure how much it was England playing badly and how much it was the incessant pressure from SA. They didn't play well, but I think that was because SA didn't let them.


Sent from my LYA-L29 using Tapatalk

[mike909]

England were always going to be a difficult side to beat, if...they could play at their best (as demonstrated in sections vs other sides in the last 15 months or so) for 80, and they did vs NZ. But their record in the same period, showed that if you could stay in a game with England, they might "do a vs. Scotland" and fail in the top two inches for a period and relinquish control.

England were out fought and relinquished control at set piece. They were out thought today, and have been so, a little too often to be a top team....yet. This is the backbone of a very good England side, the task in hand will be to introduce some variety and thinking so that when physical dominance isn't enough (by itself) they can be clever.

Changes in selection? I'll leave that in the main to the experts, but I think Watson to fullback might be a good idea.....

Key irony, SA scored through small fast wingers......

[BG]

The writing on the wall came very early on.. I don't think Sinckler going off made any difference (how did the ref not see he was sparked out?? It took other players to tell him).. and the old adage still stands.. forwards win games and the backs by how much.

I did think about stopping watching after the 2nd try but I thought that would be a disservice to the SA performance.. and that I should keep watching as a rugby fan and not a fair weather fan.

SA put pressure on scrums and lineouts and Youngs and Ford were on the back foot all the time. We were simply beaten by the better team.

Onto technical points - no team had put Daly under pressure at 15.. but SA did that perfectly.. Faf kicked between him and the wingers and Pollard and WLR occasionally pinged it into the 22 where Daly wasn't.

His positional play is horrendous in defence. He was way too deep for the 1st try in no-mans land. 

What annoys me is that he just jogs around not trying to cover.. expecting someone else to do it.

But.. SA fully deserved the win.. so hats off to them.

NZ must be kicking themselves not to have taken England seriously because I think they could have easily beaten SA.

[Rossm]

So, despite Jones' sly dig in response, Warren was right all along.

"Skrum, skrum, skrum" worked in NZ in 1937 and still worked in Japan in 2019 when there are far fewer scrums. You know what you're going to get from the Bokke and it's not pretty. Ultimately Eddie's obstinacy and poor selections failed. Once again the question must be asked; why when you are having to chase and need a game changer, you have to bring on Slade and take off Ford, moving Farrell to 10. Cips saved Eddie's bacon in SA and since then has been ignored. Also, IMO, in a game of this magnitude and physicality, playing two 7s is a luxury you cannot afford. Simply too lightweight.

[wasps]

I think that SA and the Estate Agents are showing the template for the future; power, defence speed and not being ambitious until the opposition have been written down.

Hasn't that always been the case?



Sinkler going off will be talked about a lot, and while he would have made a difference at scrum time, I think SA should still have had the advantage.
It would have made little or no difference to the breakdown which is what I feel was the defining part of the game.

We couldn't build any consistency because of the South African power at the breakdown, and we struggled to disrupt them as we have done to other teams.
But it wasn't just power from SA, they did good ground work, and vermulaen has at least one crucial turnover maybe more.



Curry and Underhill are highlights from the tournament for us, but we need to find a way to compete against the extra power that South Africa can bring

The poor showing at the scrum and breakdown ultimately meant that everyone appeared to have a poor game.


Well done South Africa

[welsh wasp]

S Africa play with a big but mobile pack. I agree that Underwood & Curry have had a good RWC but we didn't see much of them this morning. Billy V has not been too conspicuous either.
Excellent play from SA for the first try. My son asked me how Kolbe scored his try - the answers are - small, very quick and can change direction very quickly. I watched the Saints game last evening - its a pity that wings are as big as Naiyaravoro who just use brute force.

[westwaleswasp]

I expected a defeat today more than I thought we might bloody the AB nose last week. Wales SA was an arm wrestle, and Wales have won them twice in Cardiff this year against us. We are not good in an arm wrestle. Until we can blow the arm wrestling teams away there is always going to be danger.

We all know that England are not good with plan B, whatever that is for the match in question. We also know that we have a difficulty with strong favourites tag. Post Ire this yearthe adulation was heaped, but we couldn't score in Cardiff in the second half.  The England lads must have left a lot on the pitch last week. To be fair SA have beaten Wales, England and Japan, and lost to NZ- but those are the breaks.
England had to do the entire RC back to back almost. Had England won we would have papered over the cracks and hailed EJ as a master tactician. Truth is you cannot judge on WC alone, the whole record needs looking at, and the trophy cabinet. Youngs is Youngs, Daly isn't a 15, Mako is suspect at the scrum, and the game plan is powerful forwards and backs  handling to create space for the electric back three, but the only player outside of the back three who can really unlock teams is Ford, and he has a nasty habit of not playing remotely well on the back foot. Behind Sinkler the TH cupboard is a bit barren.

Daly was eventually going to be exposed again at some point as he was to an extent this year. Shame it was today.  Some teams- the ABs, Wales notably- get stronger in the last twenty. England only do that when winning comfortably. As Scotland at HQ and SA in SA showed, when you get momentum against England we fall apart. If England don't let you get that momentum- Ire in Dublin and NZ last week- you are in trouble. We almost got some today after half time, but once that was snuffed the game went there and then.

[mike909]

Having reflected - its too easy to make too big-a-calls off the back of the game, anyone can lose a knock out game

Beating the ABs has never meant the winners suddenly become the "best team in the world" nor make the ABs a poor team. Remember 2012, we were all delighted with beating the ABs at Twickenham, but we didn't (like many commentators across the rugby world recently) suggest England were the team, nor the ABs (2015 RWC winners...) a poor team

The RWC doesn't really help judge England. Three easy group games, more like full contact practice for two, a routine, for these days win over the Aussies who helped on the day....and an irregular win over the ABs. Then, when matched, seemed to run out of ideas

Looking over the last two years....the performance in the final was not out of character or something new. Anyone who has listened to Squidge Rugby's video on England will know what my views are (i.e. much the same) but England have played out of their skins only to let teams back into games. Even when winning games, that tendency has been there.

For me, anyway...., this is linked to perhaps the rather late changes to the squad post 2918 6Ns, needed after losing three of five games and looking poor, but 15 months out from a RWC high risk. And so it seemed. Performances hitting highs when allowed to play a little and lows when made to think (think first SA Tour Test for both) and perhaps too little experience of playing at "Glaws on a wet friday night in January"?

So - the key now is not to throw the baby out with the bath water, but it will require very clear thinking in moving on towards 2023 and France.

[Silent Bob]

For me this is classic England under EJ. If plan A works then they can be devastating and dominant. When plan A doesn’t work though then they struggle to adapt and find a foothold.

There has been so much written and broadcast this week about Farrell leadership but once again I’m not sure I saw much evidence of it today. The pressure fromSA put the fundamentals under intense scrutiny and the mistakes were ugly to watch.

This is a very good England team. Just not as good as perhaps it thought it was.

When Slade came on I was thinking surely Daly was going off as he did not have a good game. There were quite a few subdued performances today.
Someobody asked me who I would take in a match between this squad and the 2003 RWC winners. After the NZ game it seemed like a relevant question.........now? No contest!

Some good young players got a lot of experience and I’ve got to say the much maligned You gs played well throughout the tourney for me.