This sums up Eddie Jones very nicely…

[mike909]

I just thought England were poor. Shouldn’t confuse crowd noise for quality. Message to Jones - have a look how the scrum went with Lawes playing where he should. Marchant was excellent as was Itoje. At full back am I alone in thinking Steward catches well but offers zero elsewhere? Great to see Launch back in the mix but ultimately Ireland lost their heads and made England look a bit better than they are.

Good post Shugs - all over other parts of the comment world, people are writing as if that was the performance we were waiting for from England....ffs. Last year Ireland won with 14 for the last quarter....England emptied the tank, did well at scrum - if a little lucky with the ref, I'd have been proud to have got away with what Genge did - but created little. I did think Maro got away with the hand in the ruck and ought to have been considered for a yellow.

The Gleeson article suggested that "attack" means "getting better value" from the kick chase....a tactic that is as one dimensional as it sounds and once countered means "what next"? Running around frantically doesn't mean playing well. That's three 6Ns games vs Scotland, Wales and Ireland and 2 tries, one a gift.

In the end, Ireland played well for about 10 of 80 minutes and if they had been a little cooler, that could have been a riot. Ireland will grow from the experience. Winning away is hard and you learn as a team from winning the hard way. As for England, they might think they did well....but all we found out was that a team with power who gets to win scrum time and lineout can stay in a game, regardless of how little they do otherwise. But England have always been able to do that.

Going to be a hard game next week if France click even slightly.....

[Rossm]

What has wunderkind Smith done that Farrell wouldn't have done? They both kick goals. Has Jones already coached the sparkle out of him? Can he really only play with Care and Esterhuizen either side of him? Is it impossible for Jones to find another dump truck other than Manu?

Randall is not the answer for England at scrum half.

BTW: I'm not asking for the return of OF, god forbid.

[Bloke in North Dorset]

Giving Wales 5 points against Italy next week. If Scotland Nick a point off Ireland England Ned a minor miracle in Paris next week to avoid being 5th.

Not even Alistair Campbell at his peak could spin that as being a nothing but a true reflection of the state of England’s performances in the past few years.

[Andywasp50]

The most pointed comment for me after the game was by SCW who said two or three times that Lawes looked so much better - as did our scrum - with the simple fact he was playing in the right position. It’s not rocket science. What is EJ trying to achieve playing top quality players out of position?

I thought England looked galvanised and full of energy after the red card - they made a game of it for 70 mins. I would have been thoroughly p****d off if I’d spent £100 plus to go to a game that was over after 82 seconds.

I don’t know why Ewels is in the England set up anyway, especially with Launchbury available.

This may be controversial, but I thought England did everything they could to unsettle Ireland and did an amazing job of keeping a lid on it for much of the game. Why did the ref allow the Irish scrum half to take a quick tap and go for their second try when Sinckler was flat out with a head injury that saw him taken off and fail an HIA?

Nowell was outstanding, as was Lawes and Marchant. But Marchant is one of the first players dropped, whilst players like Malins, who does everything he can to hide and skive out of contact is an automatic selection now? Malins does nothing going forward, does nothing to challenge a high ball, falls off tackles like he’s got greased hands and hides away from contact - the wayward pass he threw at the start of the second half was a good example.

The bizarre decision to bring on Daly (who must have taught Malins everything he knows about flapping instead of tackling) very quickly resulted in a fake ‘slight over running’ of the correct defensive position, resulting in an arm flap as the attacking Irish player simply stepped inside and set up a match changing try. They may have been out of puff, but it was glaring how suddenly the floodgates opened once Daly replaced Marchant at 13.

If EJ was any good, he’d know who the pre-Madonnas were by now and not play them even if they do play for Saracens.

[JonnyD]

I wish Ewells has not been sent off so we didn’t have to gloss over the defeat, zero invention in attack and many more Eddie-isms with the narrative from the RFU about pride, the quality of our scrum (but how the ref never allowed us advantage here) and our galvanised team…
Very strange narrative out there today.

Is anyone not just saying it wasn’t good enough? I’ll wait for columns by Andy Goode and Austin Healy.
We had no answer to them when they really turned it on, their metres gained was huge and I don’t think that was all due to being a man down and finding an edge as many breaks came through missed tackles in the middle. We also had no questions for them in attack off our dominant scrum, first phase ball or counter attack when being down a man didn’t matter.

France were rattled  against Wales but I can’t see us getting anything from Paris next week

[wasps]

I think the theory of a lock in the back row is about dominating the break down with power, rather than ground skills.

Eddie has said on numerous occasions that he doesn't feel England have any good 7's.
And he may feel that current law interpretations don't favour jackling anyway.


So, he feels that an extra lock in the back row allows us to dominate the breakdown.


I think all the "in game" evidence proves that it's bullshit

[Trevs Big Tackle]

It occurred to me in the second half, when the game was still close, that our best attacking option was for the scrum half to fumble the ball at a ruck and knock on a little. Scrum, penalty, 3 points.

[westwaleswasp]

Not sure England's backs are the issue. You can highlight Malins but he is a sublime player. Smith too. Merchant was great, but his last appearance was terrible.
The issue lies in new combinations every match and the bullshit vision of players without numbers.
Malins et al needed to come into a generally winning team slowly, but that is not how things are with Eddie.
Look at the Billy and Mako treatment. He just dumps players forever.


 Some of Eddie's selections are spot on, but just too late. As in 2018, selections caught up with him and wheels needed changing, and  his whole approach- revolution not evolution- both in terms of selection and tactics- is simply not condusive to our fixture list.
Bottom line is, he is a very good short term coach.

[Rugbyintheblood]

Look I don’t think anybody expected the terrific spirited defiance that England showed, but I couldn’t stand watching the euphoric back slapping and beaming smiles from George, Genge and their mates whenever we won a scrum penalty. We lost the damn game 4 tries to none. Not a cause for celebration. 

Also just another observation - every time the TV showed a glimpse of EJ, I couldn’t help noticing Martin Gleeson’s body language because he looked terrified. How long will he be there?

[Rossm]

Look I don’t think anybody expected the terrific spirited defiance that England showed, but I couldn’t stand watching the euphoric back slapping and beaming smiles from George, Genge and their mates whenever we won a scrum penalty. We lost the damn game 4 tries to none. Not a cause for celebration.

I agree. I thought their hysterical celebrations quite nauseating. I really don't care one jot about the spirited defiance. It's results that count. Excluding the Italian game, England have scored 2 tries (1 dubious) and have conceded 9 this 6 nations. World Cup? My arse.

[Shugs]

We read all this stuff about total rugby, backs creating havoc with speed of ball etc etc. The reality is throughout this 6N we’ve tried to stuff it up the jumper and rumble around - and we’ve not done that very well. We don’t have a 12. Randall is not a test 9 and Youngs just kicks. Smith plays 10, Slade plays 13 and Malins plays 15. Build around that. But we must get them some quick ball. That means playing back rowers in the back row. In essence we need to move away from mystical, revolutionary solutions to just doing the simple things.

[wasps]

Some of England's greatest victories have involved significant periods of amazing defence.

To win top tier games at international level, it will be necessary to soak up pressure for long periods of time.


However, the key is to be on the winning side at the end of that.
We weren't. It therefore counts for nothing

[mike909]

Having had the chance to look at the stats for the game, and the ones I find most revealing are the individual attacking stats as it shows where teams are generating opportunities. Whilst Ireland were sloppy in execution too often, their backs and selected forwards had good numbers for defenders beaten and offloads compared to an England side that barely troubled the "scorer" and their backs just didn't provide opportunities - with few positive contributions across the team.

Ireland made 8 clean breaks, 26 defenders beaten and made 11 offloads. England 1,7,4 respectively......and England put in a massive tackling effort - still missing 26 (16%) compared to Ireland missing 9%

It's fine to put in a brave performance - but there really are v few positives - especially when taking account of Nigel Owen's view of the scrum suggesting England were rather lucky with the award of penalties......

But just like vs Wales, Scotland and most of the Italy game - England failed to use their possession and England have played well and won mainly (like vs France in 2021) when Billy or Manu or Mako have got go forwards and offloads that facilitated the backs. What the new approach is supposed to be really is a mystery....

[Bloke in North Dorset]

Look I don’t think anybody expected the terrific spirited defiance that England showed, but I couldn’t stand watching the euphoric back slapping and beaming smiles from George, Genge and their mates whenever we won a scrum penalty. We lost the damn game 4 tries to none. Not a cause for celebration.

I agree. I thought their hysterical celebrations quite nauseating. I really don't care one jot about the spirited defiance. It's results that count. Excluding the Italian game, England have scored 2 tries (1 dubious) and have conceded 9 this 6 nations. World Cup? My arse.

Those celebrations are why I stopped watching the EAs long before they became the cheats. I don't see it as being in the spirit of the game and referees should start clamping down. Celebrations are for after the game, not during it, especially when you come out losers.

I'm happy to praise the guys for individual gutsy performances and digging deep in to their reserves, that doesn't mean that we should ignore the generally poor performance these past few years.

[JonnyD]

Look I don’t think anybody expected the terrific spirited defiance that England showed, but I couldn’t stand watching the euphoric back slapping and beaming smiles from George, Genge and their mates whenever we won a scrum penalty. We lost the damn game 4 tries to none. Not a cause for celebration.

I agree. I thought their hysterical celebrations quite nauseating. I really don't care one jot about the spirited defiance. It's results that count. Excluding the Italian game, England have scored 2 tries (1 dubious) and have conceded 9 this 6 nations. World Cup? My arse.

Those celebrations are why I stopped watching the EAs long before they became the cheats. I don't see it as being in the spirit of the game and referees should start clamping down. Celebrations are for after the game, not during it, especially when you come out losers.

I'm happy to praise the guys for individual gutsy performances and digging deep in to their reserves, that doesn't mean that we should ignore the generally poor performance these past few years.

Absolutely couldn’t stand this during the game, been in this situation before when playing and was very confused, a simple ‘check the score board lads’ soon shut things up.
All the focus post game on how good Genge was against Furlong and how strong the scrum was is just irrelevant when looking at the wider stats of the game as Mike has highlighted.