Scottish rugby

[Mikey1874]

And not really sure that gives any confidence going forward. 

 

Being unable to score from 10 metres will remain a problem no matter how your line out and defence goes. 

[Fozzyonthefence]

20 minutes ago, merrymac said:

So predictable we miss 3 they score 2/2

its why they are where they are in world rankings 

4/4 - they scored 4/4, we were 0/4 with our two tries being a penalty try and interception try.  Probably the most dominant performance we’ve ever had against them and one of the worst performances from them and still we can’t beat them!

[merrymac]

1 minute ago, Dusk_Till_Dawn said:

Apart from whinging about independence and tinpot shite like curling, is there anything Scotchland is good at?

Recognising a w**ker when we see one?😂

[Australis]

49 minutes ago, Dusk_Till_Dawn said:

Should win this, All blacks look pish

Usual Scotland.

Pish all blacks, turn the game.

[merrymac]

3 minutes ago, Fozzyonthefence said:

4/4 - they scored 4/4, we were 0/4 with our two tries being a penalty try and interception try.  Probably the most dominant performance we’ve ever had against them and one of the worst performances from them and still we can’t beat them!

Shows how big the gap is 

[Luckies1874]

Within a fortnight we throw away wins against Australia and New Zealand. That’s not hyperbole it’s fact. We simply can never get out of our own way. I’m not clued up enough but as a casual rugby watcher (but someone who always watches the internationals) it feels like Groundhog Day. We seem to throw away so many matches against the elite teams year after year. Wales in Cardiff last year springs to mind as another recent example. 

[FWJ]

32 minutes ago, Fozzyonthefence said:

This.  Don’t think we’ll face a worse All Blacks performance again.  But they’ve been on our 5 metre line 4 times and scored 4 times.  We were inches from their try line 4 times and didn’t score any of them.  If NZ had the territory and possession we had they would have thrashed us. 

This.

Very disappointing.

[Roxy Hearts]

44 minutes ago, Dusk_Till_Dawn said:

Apart from whinging about independence and tinpot shite like curling, is there anything Scotchland is good at?

Athletics, boxing, darts, golf and football(both at times). We are good at many sports( always do well at Commonwealth Games). Not too bad for a country our size.

[Captain Sausage]

So we’ve lost marginal games to Australia and New Zealand. 
 

What is scary is that our World Cup group includes two teams much better than either we have just lost to.

 

Russell was brilliant today. Our forwards let us down inside the 22, but I thought Dempsey’s yellow was a little harsh - didn’t look like a deliberate knock on to me. And that’s what got us in the end. 
 

The Stuart Hogg knock on call by the way. It must have gone 2-3 metres backwards. Instead of a platform for attack, we ended up conceding the winning points from that possession turnover. Frustrating afternoon. 

[PortyJambo]

3 minutes ago, Captain Sausage said:

Russell was brilliant today. Our forwards let us down inside the 22, but I thought Dempsey’s yellow was a little harsh - didn’t look like a deliberate knock on to me. And that’s what got us in the end.  

I can't remember if it was Barclay or Cotter commentating that said it, but I agree with them that it's harsh to give a yellow to a player because he goes to tackle a player and happens to knock the ball on. As they said, some players will get cute and "accidently" do it, but seems like referees always go for the card there as a first resort rather than giving any benefit of the doubt.

Edited November 13, 2022 by PortyJambo

[I P Knightley]

13 minutes ago, PortyJambo said:

I can't remember if it was Barclay or Cotter commentating that said it, but I agree with them that it's harsh to give a yellow to a player because he goes to tackle a player and happens to knock the ball on. As they said, some players will get cute and "accidently" do it, but seems like referees always go for the card there as a first resort rather than giving any benefit of the doubt.

One angle showed Dempsey face on and you could follow his eyes. He was clearly going for the tackle, his target shipped the ball as Dempsey was mid-attack. There was no way he could have planned for the ball to be there or stopped himself from touching it.

 

The fact that TMO discussed it with the ref and they agreed the deliberate knock on would suggest I haven't got a clue about the laws of the game.

 

Likewise, with the "knock on" from Hogg. It clearly went backwards - crossed the half way line, FFS!

 

I think some match winning bonuses were on the line.

[Malinga the Swinga]

Sick to death of hearing how we could have won game 

No one to blame bar ourselves. Just not good enough and unless we get rid of Townsend, then nothing will change.

Game was there to be won and we gave it away without a fight.

We are heading for beating from Ireland and SA in world cup unless they have red card early on.

 

[Tom Hardy’s Dug]

I watched NZ beat England 17-16 at Twickenham 3 years back or so. They had the ball for 10 minutes at the end of each half. 

 

Probably never have a better opportunity to beat them but we played well.

 

Shit happens. The All Blacks don’t need to dominate the game to win it.

Edited November 13, 2022 by Tom Hardy’s Dug

[Malinga the Swinga]

5 minutes ago, Tom Hardy’s Dug said:

I watched NZ beat England 17-16 at Twickenham 3 years back or so. They had the ball for 10 minutes at the end of each half. 

 

Probably never have a better opportunity to beat them but we played well.

 

Shit happens. The All Blacks don’t need to dominate the game to win it.

We didn't play well or we would have won. We choked, bottled it, threw it away with shit decisions and no idea or plan what to do if we were ahead.

Inability to concert possession of ball on opponents line to points isn't bad luck, it is shit decision making. Giving away penalties in promising positions isn't bad luck, it's shit discipline.

Same mistakes we made against Australia repeated today against NZ.

Coach doesn't learn lessons = players don't learn lessons.

[Tom Hardy’s Dug]

Townsend - rugby’s Robbie Neilson.

[Tom Hardy’s Dug]

Just now, Malinga the Swinga said:

We didn't play well or we would have won. We choked, bottled it, threw it away with shit decisions and no idea or plan what to do if we were ahead.

Inability to concert possession of ball on opponents line to points isn't bad luck, it is shit decision making. Giving away penalties in promising positions isn't bad luck, it's shit discipline.

Same mistakes we made against Australia repeated today against NZ.

Coach doesn't learn lessons = players don't learn lessons.

We dominated them for 60 mins out of 80. We played well , if you know your rugby.

[Mikey1874]

1 minute ago, Tom Hardy’s Dug said:

Townsend - rugby’s Robbie Neilson.

 

We re going to the World Cup final?

[Mikey1874]

2 minutes ago, Tom Hardy’s Dug said:

We dominated them for 60 mins out of 80. We played well , if you know your rugby.

 

But...its losing rugby.

 

You don't always get tries like chip ahead and defensive mistake and interception.

 

You do get pressure on the line and that's when you need to score.

 

If you don't you lose to the better teams. 

Edited November 13, 2022 by Mikey1874

[Fozzyonthefence]

1 hour ago, Malinga the Swinga said:

We didn't play well or we would have won. We choked, bottled it, threw it away with shit decisions and no idea or plan what to do if we were ahead.

Inability to concert possession of ball on opponents line to points isn't bad luck, it is shit decision making. Giving away penalties in promising positions isn't bad luck, it's shit discipline.

Same mistakes we made against Australia repeated today against NZ.

Coach doesn't learn lessons = players don't learn lessons.

You don’t always win when you play well (look at Hearts v Celtic game a few weeks ago) just like sometimes you can play badly and win.  The All Blacks played badly and won today, Scotland played well and dominated the majority of the game.  Should have won but blew it due to poor decision making and player errors.  
 

Not Townsend’s fault the players can’t get over the line from inches out just like not Robbie’s fault that Shankland or whoever misses an open goal.  It is a recurring theme though with Scotland, losing games they should win. 

[Mikey1874]

3 minutes ago, Fozzyonthefence said:

You don’t always win when you play well (look at Hearts v Celtic game a few weeks ago) just like sometimes you can play badly and win.  The All Blacks played badly and won today, Scotland played well and dominated the majority of the game.  Should have won but blew it due to poor decision making and player errors.  
 

Not Townsend’s fault the players can’t get over the line from inches out just like not Robbie’s fault that Shankland or whoever misses an open goal.  It is a recurring theme though with Scotland, losing games they should win. 

 

So it's a recurrent theme that the coaches cannot solve.

 

Need new coaches then.

[Fozzyonthefence]

13 minutes ago, Mikey1874 said:

 

So it's a recurrent theme that the coaches cannot solve.

 

Need new coaches then.

Or new players.  The coaches came up with a game plan that resulted in Scotland dominating a much better team than us, currently the 3rd best team in the world who are 2nd favourites to win the World Cup. 

I guess you must think it’s Robbie’s fault that he can’t coach McKay, Devlin, Shankland etc into not missing sitters every week which is also a recurring theme? Or does that only apply to rugby?

[leginten]

20 minutes ago, Fozzyonthefence said:

You don’t always win when you play well (look at Hearts v Celtic game a few weeks ago) just like sometimes you can play badly and win.  The All Blacks played badly and won today, Scotland played well and dominated the majority of the game.  Should have won but blew it due to poor decision making and player errors.  
 

Not Townsend’s fault the players can’t get over the line from inches out just like not Robbie’s fault that Shankland or whoever misses an open goal.  It is a recurring theme though with Scotland, losing games they should win. 

No, but it has been happening for too long. Panic, loss of patience, knock-ons, ball-carrier isolated and pinged for not releasing, support players off their feet, Ritchie’s wee extra roll today - take your pick. Other countries get this right and rack up the tries. You can guarantee that when Ireland are five metres from your line, they’re leaving with points. This is something that needs to be coached into Scotland’s forwards. At the moment we have a combination of poor technique, lack of composure and poor discipline. Not converting these chances is the main factor behind our relative lack of success, and it’s something that needs to be addressed urgently by coaching staff.

[Malinga the Swinga]

With the rule changes that came in, you cannot bash away at line and hope forwards get over. 

Being held up over line means defence gets ball to drop ball from behind posts. You need to trust backs eventually but nope, we just make same mistakes that we have done for last few seasons.

As for those who say we played well and dominated game, it's points that count and NZ came away with points almost every time they had chance whilst Scotland failed to convert numerous chances.

That doesn't mean we dominated game, it means we were careless, ill disciplined and wasteful.

We got what we deserved, another beating.

[Fozzyonthefence]

17 minutes ago, leginten said:

No, but it has been happening for too long. Panic, loss of patience, knock-ons, ball-carrier isolated and pinged for not releasing, support players off their feet, Ritchie’s wee extra roll today - take your pick. Other countries get this right and rack up the tries. You can guarantee that when Ireland are five metres from your line, they’re leaving with points. This is something that needs to be coached into Scotland’s forwards. At the moment we have a combination of poor technique, lack of composure and poor discipline. Not converting these chances is the main factor behind our relative lack of success, and it’s something that needs to be addressed urgently by coaching staff.

Probably is a combination of a lot of things, including bad luck (like Graham’s foot on the line spoiling a brilliant finish) or the harsh yellow card for the knock on (still think we were losing without the yellow anyway).  The double movement on the line, for example, was just poor decision making.  You also have to credit the All  Blacks with some excellent defence. 
 

I do wonder though, when we get so close to the line, the unwillingness to go out wide - is that down to coaching or bad decision making?  The forwards invariably try to bulldozer their way over the line and usually fail. The likes of Ireland, NZ, South Africa will almost always score in these positions although to be fair it’s probably normally their forwards that will score the tries too.

[Fozzyonthefence]

24 minutes ago, Malinga the Swinga said:

With the rule changes that came in, you cannot bash away at line and hope forwards get over. 

Being held up over line means defence gets ball to drop ball from behind posts. You need to trust backs eventually but nope, we just make same mistakes that we have done for last few seasons.

As for those who say we played well and dominated game, it's points that count and NZ came away with points almost every time they had chance whilst Scotland failed to convert numerous chances.

That doesn't mean we dominated game, it means we were careless, ill disciplined and wasteful.

We got what we deserved, another beating.

We did dominate the game though, that’s not really up for debate.  Dominated both territory and possession for the vast majority of the game.  However NZ were clinical, converting 4 out 4 visits to our 5 metre line into tries whereas we converted 0 out of 4 where we were only feet or even inches from their line.  Perhaps not that surprising since they have better players than us but we should be scoring more tries in these positions.

 

 Careless, ill disciplined and careless from Scotland  - yes definitely but saying that, that must be the most ill disciplined and error strewn performance I’ve ever seen from the All Blacks against Scotland and one that should have been punished. 

[leginten]

8 minutes ago, Fozzyonthefence said:

Probably is a combination of a lot of things, including bad luck (like Graham’s foot on the line spoiling a brilliant finish) or the harsh yellow card for the knock on (still think we were losing without the yellow anyway).  The double movement on the line, for example, was just poor decision making.  You also have to credit the All  Blacks with some excellent defence. 
 

I do wonder though, when we get so close to the line, the unwillingness to go out wide - is that down to coaching or bad decision making?  The forwards invariably try to bulldozer their way over the line and usually fail. The likes of Ireland, NZ, South Africa will almost always score in these positions although to be fair it’s probably normally their forwards that will score the tries too.

Actually I often think we go wide too early in these situations (though probably not today) before we have drawn the penalty or tied in the opposition. 
 

Obviously there are individual errors and poor decisions involved in the failure to convert chances, but I think it’s been bad enough for long enough to call it a systemic forward problem. It’s a whole area of the game which the coaches need to take apart and rebuild. We’re currently playing at a disadvantage to the other nations because of it.

[Jambo in Japan]

International Test match rugby is a game of fine margins and sadly Scotland were again on the wrong side of them. It's no coincidence, either. For years now they've been a very good team with some fine international standard players, but been lacking the leadership/experience/coaching, or who knows what, to get them over the line when the game's on a knife edge.

 

Thought the wingers were fantastic. Van der Merwe rattled them and Graham looks like a real world class finisher. Very unlucky not to have had a second try before half time, but if Hogg gives it just a second earlier I think he scores. Think Hogg generally had a good game and does really well for the penalty try, but sometimes his decision making at a clinical moment frustrates. Think there were a few more situations where if he'd given the ball a little earlier, Scotland could have scored.

 

Think Dempsey's card was harsh. It's one of those where he's committed to the tackle, and then in a flash gone to 90% tackle, 10% attempted interception. Another millisecond, and if he could have completely committed to an interception there'd have been nothing deliberate about the knock on

 

Otherwise the only real howler from the officials was Hogg's "knock on" that went about 2 yards backwards. I think he let a lot go, but to his credit made for a very open, free-flowing game.

[Mikey1874]

15 hours ago, Fozzyonthefence said:

Or new players.  The coaches came up with a game plan that resulted in Scotland dominating a much better team than us, currently the 3rd best team in the world who are 2nd favourites to win the World Cup. 

I guess you must think it’s Robbie’s fault that he can’t coach McKay, Devlin, Shankland etc into not missing sitters every week which is also a recurring theme? Or does that only apply to rugby?

 

Hearts are winning enough games though. More than Scotland Rugby. 

 

To be fair Warren Gatland on Prime didn't fault the line failures. He said the difference was the New Zealand bench so someone improving that could be the answer. 

 

 

[i8hibsh]

I think we will almost win v England, Wales, Ireland and France in the Six Nations.

[i8hibsh]

Is there a more uninspiring soft figure in World Rugby than the sight of:

 

[Dawnrazor]

I'm not looking forward to the Italy game in the six nations.

[Dawnrazor]

Wins for Argentina and New Zealand I recon?

[Roxy Hearts]

3 minutes ago, Dawnrazor said:

Wins for Argentina and New Zealand I recon?

I think Scotland will win. Should've won in Argentina but as usual threw it away. I think, as we are at home and have better players, we'll win. NZ should win as England are crap. 

 

Watching Wales and they're dreadful as they normally are. 

[Mikey1874]

Good discussion on Boffelli there and how Edinburgh Rugby is developing him including favouring him over Blair Kinghorn. 

[Roxy Hearts]

Well done Georgia. Deserved that.

[Mikey1874]

Georgia beat Wales 13-12.

[Tazio]

46 minutes ago, Roxy Hearts said:

I think Scotland will win. Should've won in Argentina but as usual threw it away. I think, as we are at home and have better players, we'll win. NZ should win as England are crap. 

 

Watching Wales and they're dreadful as they normally are. 

Argentina are no mugs and managed something this year that we’ve never managed and beat the All Blacks. 
The England - NZ match is evens for me, could easily go either way. 

[Mikey1874]

Brilliant by Finn Russell 

[Dawnrazor]

It's early I know but Dvm and Darcy Graham have got to be contenders for the Lions next tour.

[Roxy Hearts]

Cheating Argy sod!

[Mikey1874]

Unfortunate for the game. 

[Mikey1874]

Well done Scotland taking immediate advantage.

[Roxy Hearts]

1 minute ago, Mikey1874 said:

Unfortunate for the game. 

Not really. Scotland has deserved luck over games! Should win but prior to the sending off I don't know why we kept on kicking the ball.

[Mikey1874]

Outstanding 

[Roxy Hearts]

Yessssss. Finn Russell mom already!

[Mikey1874]

Looks like the New Zealand game has given them a bit more confidence. 

 

Not everything is working but playing positive rugby. 

[Roxy Hearts]

We make the usual mistakes! Graham needs to pick and choose when to run especially when there's no support!

[Mikey1874]

Russell again. Amazing. Hogg did well too. 

Edited November 19, 2022 by Mikey1874

[Mikey1874]

12 men 

[AlimOzturk]

Argentina down to 12 players