On more pleasant matters. Rugby WC Fra v NZ

[westwaleswasp]

Da iawn, France.
Great, measured rugby allied with a desire to play that was evident throughout. They suffocated NZ in the last 20, but always looked dangerous.
Grats to the Waspies involved. Allez.

[wycombewasp]

Yes very entertaining game, bit to much ping pong but first game so lots of nerves, saw a picture of George Ford in the paper today and guess what, yes , he was kicking a ball, a lot to look forward to, NOT.

[Rossm]

Enjoyed it. After a nervy start, understandable in the circumstances, France made NZ look ordinary the longer the game went on. Has the AB bubble burst?

[wycombewasp]

Yes, have Wasps fans lost all interest in Rugby, why so few comments, I won't watch the prem, but I still enjoy a good game.

[Nrgee]

Lost interest in premiership however will be watching as much of the world cup as possible. Look forward to seeing some good games.

[NellyWellyWaspy]

It was a good game. It was for France to show how to contain the All Blacks, and then, if they could, build a lead, and win.

They did just that. I don't think any team takes the pitch against the All Blacks without having a defensive mindset of some sort. You can only beat the All Blacks if they fail to beat your defense, and your open play is better than theirs. For France, it was. That last try was a good summary of the game. All open play, every player pushing hard, taking every chance, never giving up, even though they must have been exhausted in that heat, in the last minutes of the game.

With France taking the risk and not playing with 60 minute, meat factories, where you see a prop running like that so far in to his game.

[Shugs]

Very enjoyable game. The French will be difficult to beat on home soil. The draw means there are going to be some huge group stage games and some less so in the later stages. As an aside what a player Flament has become.

[WonkyWasp]

I managed 5 minutes of England/Argentina ....the first 5 minutes of it, and the most exciting 5 minutes of it all,  really.  I did flip back to it occasionally, but have never been fond of football (prefer rugby) so didn't linger.  The Proms were much more enjoyable.

[Trevs Big Tackle]

So far England are the only team not to score a try. Even Romania managed to get one against Ireland.

Poor old Argentina. They're used to battling against brilliant teams like South Africa, NZ and Australia but we managed to bore them to death!

[Rossm]

Well that was unexpected - apart from the red card of course. England found a way to win easily with much assistance from Argentina who were dire. Didn't they know that it was odds on that they would be playing against 14 men?

[westwaleswasp]

Strange match.
Argentina just didn't, well, didn't anything. Keystone cops at times.
England did not look like scoring a try.

[Shugs]

You?ve got to give credit for the defensive intensity of England and Fords kicking. Argentina were just terrible. But it was such a dull game.

[NellyWellyWaspy]

You?ve got to give credit for the defensive intensity of England and Fords kicking. Argentina were just terrible. But it was such a dull game.

Agreed. I thought, Argentina must surely wake up at some point and actually start playing rugby. Instead, they seemed content to leave the extra player sleeping, play the game England were playing, but play it worse. A very strange and surreal game. I am not sure at what point I though, England could pull this off.

No wonder Borthers was laughing, it was just so weird.

[Nrgee]

Good job Argentina forgot they had an extra player and played into Englands hands.
Ford was a positive for me good descion making taking the drop goal option.
However generally still cannot see any style of play other than lets try and grind the opposition down.

[Bloke in North Dorset]

I only saw bits due to the atrocious German 4G networks, but from what I saw Ford played a lot of smart rugby, his first DG showed he?d thought about how to win the game. That?s the sort of smarts we want to see.

At least OF will be back soon to make sure we stick to the game plan no matter what happens.