Hello and welcome to a hastily-created blog to serve former followers of AoD and any other random rugby union fanatics as well.
Now that rugby season is upon us, it seemed intolerable not to have somewhere to share our pain, our hopes and our squabbles.
Please pile in BTL! There will no doubt be much tinkering with the site. Suggestions for improvements are welcome but may be discarded out of hand. We do not possess Sag-like wizardry.
thaumaturge
Ovally Balls 
Hi everybody
Thanks to Brookter who tipped me and thanks to Thaum for setting up this place.
Hope Sag’s fine but I’m really worried for him.
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Thanks to Ticht for saving me from the choppy waters on the mothership. Hope all is well with everybody!
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I usually post as FBC btw, not sure I can change my username on here
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Nice one Thaum
Evening, all.
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As for today’s game, thought Wales looked underpowered up front and Tipuric was completely anonymous. Wales back three and JDII look good, but England seemed to be able to exploit Biggar’s lack of pace to pressurise our passing.
England looked pretty good. The power game from Vunipola can be irresistible and backed up with Ford and Joseph making line breaks was v formidable. The Ford-Farrell debate will rage on.
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@Dowen91 – If you’re logged in via WordPress, click the icon between the ‘write’ and the bell, at the top-right. You can change your screen name there.
No idea if you aren’t using WordPress.
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@refit Thanks!
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I thought that England had a shed load to be pleased with, especially considering there are plenty to come back in. Ford is a fine player when he gets front foot ball like that. He can really shift the point of attack so much better than Faz can. Our 10/12 defence usually holds up pretty well, but he was finding all kinds of gaps in and around them.
As for Wales, well, our weaknesses haven’t changed nor are they likely to any time soon. The lineout isn’t always reliable and they really got at us in the scrum. Gareth Davies – splendid try aside – was absolutely horrorshow bad, ditto Moriarty. 11-15 all looked good with the ball, so that was a bit of something to cheer me up. Wainwright did go pretty well, however, and will only get better. Generally, the whole show was pretty messy.
I am pretty worried about our 8/9/10 mix when we don’t have Faletau and Rhys Webb (who may or may not be going well down in France) to pick. The 10s are a mix of styles that if you had the technology to merge them into one player would be great, but we don’t and so are pretty limited by them all. Anscombe’s injury could be huge, even if he isn’t a top level 10.
Still, these matches don’t count and I’m glad to see that we’ve held on to the world number 1 spot in the rankings.
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Yosoy – mostly agree, but I think a replacement for North is urgently needed. If you can point him directly at the line, he may score – even if he needs to run over a couple of people on the way – but he’s got no fancy footwork, and his ball-handling is terrible.
He’s a bull-in-a-china-shop type of player, and I think Wales needs another Shane.
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Hope everyone’s Ok and thoughts with Sag and you all. S
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A replacement for North? Catch yerself on. He’d get into every side in the world.
It’ll be a long wait for another Shane. For rugby, not just Wales.
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@thaum
Thanks for setting the place up! I’ve been needing something to eat up my work time and get me through the RWC.
North was good with the ball today, better than he has been for some time. He’s had a few years that have been very mixed, but he’s a proper lump that can shift and we don’t have many of those – Owen Lane is the only similar player, stylistically, and he’s uncapped. The other wingers are not close to North’s best level. The cupboard is mostly bare with back three players. We’ll have to wait for that kid at Gloucester or someone else to come through. Or a Lazarusesque return to form by the Horse.
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Man, I love Horse.
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My pleasure, Yosoy – like the rest of you, I was missing it! I thought North made a couple of bad errors today, as well as some good bits.
Meades is right that we’ll all wait a long time for another Shane, but it’s not a style that Gatland is encouraging; he likes the big boshy players. I think a couple of Ireland’s wingers are more Shane-like.
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Groovy. Felt lost outside time and space.
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There are still some very good Shane type players about, e.g. Kolbe, D’Arcy Graham, Dave Kearney etc.
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So nice to see all these old names and avatars. We had a good day out at Twickenham today. No idea what, if anything to read into it, but twas a good day out.
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Dave Kearney?!! Really????
I was thinking more of some Ulster wingers. Stockdale’s a big lad, but he’s got those silky skillz.
I’m having an early night, having woken up at stupid o’clock, thanks all for stopping by.
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Nice work thaum. You da Man! :-)
Hello all – nice to see everyone is alive and well. The blog arises just in time to witness the All Blacks descent to second tier status.
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My AoD refresh button is nearly broken so this is very timely, thanks Thaum.
Agreed Avs – what a performance huh?
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The worrying thing is, they’re just looking clueless. Even taking in to account being down to 14, that was a right rogering they submitted to. Poor on attack, poor on defence, several key players, including Read, both Smuths, the front row, looking like they are a season too far down the road. Not to mention, no blindside. We have no clue what our best centre combo is, but I doubt it involves SBW.
My expert armchair opinion is that Hansen and Co are over thinking things. Just play our best players in their best positions, and let them settle and do their job.
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Hi everyone!
Thaum, you absolute hero legend. This is most, most good.
It’s nice to be back in the company of friends.
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Thaum! Thanks for this! I’ve been bereft since the end of May (AoD goes down just before we lose the final – I’d no-one to rant to!). I’ve even had to join Facebook….
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Did everyone see Christian Wade’s first touch in NFL?
https://mobile.twitter.com/NFL/status/1159647320905932800?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1159654386148270080&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.rugbypass.com%2Fnews%2Fhow-america-reacted-to-christian-wades-touchdown%2F
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Morning… and nice to see the old band back together.
I’ve just used the old AodTwatter account to tweet out an invitation, so hopefully that will entice a few more into Thaum’s enchanted web…
Again, if you know any who may not have heard yet, let them know…
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Morning all!
Great work on setting up the new notablog.
Been missing you all.
JOC was pretty decent on Saturday, non?
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Like the Boks and this blog, I’ve risen from the underground. Partly as I got so frustrated with rugby last few years. Too many TMOs, too many high-ball, high-shot, high-tackle etc stoppages. But being RWC year I slowly found myself getting sucked it. Being set up for a fall I think when the Boks bundle out in quarter final.
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Disaster! New website is blocked by work filters! I’ll have to lurk on my phone when I can.
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Random vaguely connected thoughts on form based on what I’ve seen:
Japan: Looking worryingly good, spammed everyone else in the PNC with fast and cohesive rugby. Going to be a big hurdle
Boks: Bif bof bosh. Coming into some form
QWs: Suddenly awesome. Or were the ABs totally poop?
Ireland: Didn’t see any of this, but sure they were their usual efficient selves
Italy: Ditto. Without the efficiency
ABs: Poop? Cunning planning and psychology? Who knows
Argentina: Usually turn up well for world cups but not looking great currently
Wales: Classic slow start.
England: Fast start. But is it classic, and going to lead to some sort of implosion.
Tried watching Fiji vs Samoa. Yikes that was not interesting.
USA! USA! Distinctly second best to Japan.
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I made a post earlier but in must have been lost in the pre-mod system as it was a link to a tweet showing Christian Wade’s first touch in NFL where he runs in a touchdown from his own half, leaving several opponents for dead.
It’s worth looking up if you haven’t seen it.
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@Chimpie, I watched the first half of Ireland v Italy, the Irish scrum went well and eeked out a good few penalties.
It wasn’t a great game tbh and I was happy enough to bleed the radiators for a large chunkck of the second half because we had air in the boiler and had no hot water as a result.
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@ticht
Well, if bleeding the radiators was more fun….
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Yeah, blocked on my work too, contributing by phone will have to suffice.
Goodness knows what to think about the Wales England game. Wales looked tired and rusty. Too much hard work? Gatland testing them on purpose? England showing they could put out 6 different XVs and they’d all try to throw away a commanding lead.
Looks like South Africa and Australia are peaking at the right time, the second half of the bledisloe will be fascinating, let’s see if it’s more than a 2 game blip…
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@Chek – don’t worry buddy. We’re all here for you to get through this difficult time.
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@tichtheid
Was indeed a great run by Wade.
However, he will still be 4th string RB once the season starts. It’s a competitive position in Buffalo.
A guy who will be ahead of Wade in Buffalo, Frank Gore, is in his 16th season and is 36.
Average career length for a RB is less than 4 years, The man must be made of titanium,
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Seems to be working on my work connection.
Thinking about Wade going well down in upstate NY makes me wonder about how well Dave Kearney would go in the NFL.
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@Chimpie
Japan were indeed better than the US.
Having said that, the USA thrashed Canada and beat Samoa in their previous PNC games, so they are pretty happy with progress. I have never known the US have so much depth in selection, especially in the back row and midfield.
They also did not field their first choice front and back rows for the duration of the tournament. The premiership lads Lamositele and Taufeete’e are being wrapped in cotton wool until the RWC, I think. The team was very experimental, with 3 of the 7s guys getting game time. Those guys looked pretty good, despite not having played XVs for years. Madison Hughes is such a good rugby player.
Japan also experimented a little with their selections, to be fair.
I thought Japan were absolutely clinical and electric in their destruction of Tonga the week before. That game is definitely worth a look at.
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Agree with yosoy. It was a typical Wales effort when the collective fitness, organisation and work ethic were not enough were not up to scratch, and we were left with some very average individual performances.
Anscombe was going ok and it was plain daft to leave him out there without treatment to make it worse. Gareth Davies just doesn’t learn and improve. Same shortcomings glossed over by a burst of individual brilliance.
At least England have more squad selection headaches after the weekend, there are going to be some very disappointed lads today. E.g. I don’t think Joe Cok is good enough to make the 31.
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Duncan Taylor is apparently showing up well in training after two terrible seasons with injury, he came through a bounce game against Edinburgh and is very much in contention for the world cup.
Sam Johnson managed to tweek his ankle by stepping on Adam Hastings’ foot, but he isn’t in doubt beyond Saturday’s outing against France.
As things stand, he says touching wood (karl), we are playing with a full deck.
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Apparently Wales haven’t done a lot of tactical work so far, mostly fitness. Didn’t see the game, but England have a lot of power, and will be scary if they can put it in the right places
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@Ticht
I’d like to see Johnson and Taylor given a run out an centre, could be a useful partnership.
For the France game, let’s cap Hutchinson and Blade.
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@Chek, I was surprised that Wales’ defence wasn’t near its suffocating best, ok they have been doing a lot of fitness but it was largely the same personnel and the same systems.
Tom Curry was excellent until he had to go off and Anscombe showed a fair bit of toe in a couple of runs. Genge is going to do himself and his team a great deal of harm unless he gets his temper under control, the penalty he gave away at the first scrum was idiotic
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Chek, yeah, I definitely think we’ll see those two get their debut caps in one of games v France.
It’s shaping up so as we can have a centre pairing debate of our own. Huw Jones has been doing a lot of work on his defence apparently – extras after training too.
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@Ticht
Good that Jones is doing defensive homework. He’s a frustrating player, can be so good and yet so anonymous
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Oh and George Ford was pretty good yesterday too, he found a lot of gaps for his runners and kicked very well from hand
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Wales should be very concerned about their defence.
England didn’t do THAT much with the ball – guys running unders off Ford or the ball out the back.
I wonder if Wales are knackered from days of beastings at altitude in Switzerland?
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@’pro
Not seen that much of the USA or know that much about their selections TBH, will have to raise their game a bit to trouble England, France & Argentina.
Been watching a bit of Japan as I have a some of interest, and they’ve been very good. Pack look well drilled & not short of power; while they’ve been pushed about in the scrum a bit they’ve also scored some lineout maul tries. Backs look electric & have scored some cracking tries.
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Probably wouldn’t read too much into Wales’ current form. Imagine they’ll peak come the pool stages.
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I’m not concerned about the defence. It was awful yesterday but it’s usually the one area where I have very few concerns. If it’s that passive in the remainder of the warm ups, then I’ll be a bit concerned. If it’s still that passive by the time we get to the pool match with Australia I’ll really start worrying.
I’m more concerned about Anscombe and Tomos Williams having scans today.
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And to think we missed an entire cricket world cup to dominate discussions just to wind up Ticht. Never mind.
Morning all.
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