Always a Wasp

This won’t happen but it is a delightful thought: Premiership rugby decide to proceed with the plan to reduce the Premiership to 10 teams so have to decide who to jettison into the Championship, they obviously ask Saracens, they-who-can-do-no-wrong, the perennial property developers and rugby cheats as they are the golden boys of English rugby and their opinion is vitally important. Remembering how vocal Baxter and Rowe were in their criticism, the EAs suggest the simple solution of relegating whoever was last to acquire Premiership shares- a “last in, first out” scenario. I believe the last club to acquire shares was Exeter.

Wouldn’t you just love to see Baxter’s reaction?

Great game, thought she might have passed to Ellie Kildunne, also a former wasp, who was really matching her for speed, but she backed herself and was a great try.

Firstly, that was a simply superb try and was genuinely a team effort even if Claudia McDonald and Abby got the lions share of the credit. The defensive shift from the forwards to counter-ruck and turn over possession in what was a dangerous attack from Canada, then the vision and sheer nerve to spin the ball wide behind our goal line, Claudia's astonishing, jinking run and Abby's pace and delightful hand-off was one of the best moves I've seen on a rugby pitch for some time.

Must admit that I was screaming for Abby to pass to Kildunne when it looked like the defence was closing her down but then her pace got her clear. Kildunne really should have cut inside a little more to keep the defence guessing but academic really.

Finally, as many, many people have said, restart should have been a penalty to England for the needless, petulant and dangerous way the Canadian winger went knee first into Abby after she had grounded the ball. You see it a lot and it doesn't get penalised often enough for my liking, really cowardly.

Quote from: Peej on June 22, 2022, 10:24:19 AM

Odendaal can also play 13, can't he?

Yes, and no. 12 and 13 are not interchangeable, unless your name is Eddie, and he does not play anywhere near as well at 13.

This is the key issue. It's not that we have a shortage of cover at 13, it's the lack of vision in our coaches who can't see the potential of other squad members at outside centre. If Eddie Jones was our DoR he would happily pick Brad Shields, Biyi Alo, Tom Cruse or Pudsey the kit man at 13.

Not that I'd know it since if EJ became head coach I wouldn't be watching the club any longer....

I think for this type of injury I would steer clear of the Fortius type self-promoters and go with a big centre trauma surgeon. Nottingham, Leeds, Bristol. Coventry has some good guys [maybe gals as well].

Thanks for the expert insight Backdoc, I was at the match and the injury looked horrendous. Without any announcement there was lots of speculation; someone saw that they had removed her boot and sock so assumed an ankle injury, when the second spinal stretcher was brought on we thought a bad back problem. Whilst horrible and clearly from Abby's screams very painful, a break does give here a slim chance of being fit for the World Cup in October whilst an ACL or ankle reconstruction would make it impossible. She really deserves to be there, fantastic player. Fingers crossed she gets some expert care and is back on a rugby pitch making those fabulous arcing runs and fending off defenders for fun as soon as possible.

This years Six Nations was pretty dire as a contest. France and Ireland are playing rugby on another level to the other 4 teams so there's was only one meaningful match which was France v Ireland to determine who would be Grand Slam Champion. The rest were fighting it out to decide who was least worst and the final table is a pretty fair reflection of the pecking order.

England, Scotland and Wales served up some utter dross for much of the tournament. Wales had the most shocking drop in form; Champions last year to 5th place losing at home to Italy is going to make for a grim post tournament review. They seem to suffer when their talisman Wyn Jones isn't fit and Bigger is a dreadful skipper. Scotland need to get over their obsession with beating England, they celebrate a victory like they've won the World Cup and then completely fail to raise their motivation to beat anyone else! Guys, you're far from the only country who hates England but everyone else manages to be a little more professional and treat every match as one they want to win.

As every one has said, both professional media pundits and us armchair experts, England are suffering at the hands of Eddie Jones. He quotes utter guff about "building for the world cup" then picks a seemingly random team that he thinks have the game to beat that weekends opposition. As the team haven't actually played together before they inevitably lose. If you pick a consistent team and combinations get used to playing together you should be looking to impose your game on your opponents and should be good enough to adapt to defend against their strengths. That is precisely what France and Ireland have done. They're also building for the World Cup and I know who is more likely to win it and it isn't England.

England show in brief glimpses that there is quality there, with the right coaching they could genuinely mount a challenge but they need players playing in their regular positions, an identity and game plan with a back-up strategy when plan A isn't working. None of that is going to happen with Jones at the helm.

Congratulations France on a thoroughly deserved victory playing some sublime rugby. Player of the tournament is obviously Josh Adams for the wonderful gesture handing his man of the match medal to Ange Capuozzo. That speaks volumes about why rugby is such a fantastic sport that we love so much even when our own teams are playing like muppets.

The scrum is a way to restart the game with contested possession with the non offending team given the advantage of put in and head.

To avoid teams milking penalties the answer is very simple. Instead of giving a massive advantage penalty from a scrum, just give possession to the team who would have got a penalty by means of a free kick with no option of another scrum.  That way, a dominant scrum could either win clean possession from the scrum or the free kick. Same result. If that were the case I bet scrums would be mostly completed first time.

Should a team constantly give away free kicks because their scrum can't compete legally the yellow card option still exists. It's the scrum penalty that's the problem.

Could not agree more. It's a simple case of looking at the principals of the game. If you have a dominant scrum, you win possession, NOT the chance to kick 3 points or go to the corner potentially to gain 7. A Free Kick awarded would solve a multitude of problems and I definitely agree that the vast majority of scrums would be completed.

How many more before he has played for the entire Premiership?

He's now level with Goody having played for six Premiership clubs although Goody had two stints at Tigers. Both also spent time with a French club (Ashton at Toulon and Goode at Brive)

Believe it or not both are outdone by Andy Gomarsall who played for 7 clubs albeit only two appearances for Bath