Something resembling first-choice teams have been named. Let’s hope they all survive the weekend.
International rugby on the telly this weekend
Friday 6th September
| Scotland v Georgia | 19:30 | Premier Sports 1 |
| England v Italy | 19:45 | Sky Sports Action / Sky Sports Main Event |
Saturday 7th September
| New Zealand v Tonga | 3:35 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Australia v Samoa | 10:30 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Ireland v Wales | 14:00 | Channel 4 / RTÉ Two |
Ovally Balls 
Yos, he failed his HIA
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Glasgow’s academy lads are taking a bit of a bashing, 36-19
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Cheers, ticht. That’s not good with history.
I love Wainwright. He’s improving at an incredible rate. Amazing to think that he’s only been playing rugby for about 4 or 5 years.
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Not sure they said anything specific on Patchouli? If they did, I missed it.
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I missed it.
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I read that any kind of win for Ireland and they go to Japan as the number 1 team in the world
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Great match, no matter who wins.
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Pleased with JvdF today. He is our least replaceable player atm.
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“Amazing to think that he’s only been playing rugby for about 4 or 5 years.”
Jesus, really? He’s very good even without knowing that.
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This is hideous.
Scrum penalty -> kick to corner – > repeated scrums – > one out crash ball until score
It’s like watching a ruthlessly efficient and more skilled version of Georgia.
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The ref is letting the crowd do his job for him too.
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World no. 1 team.
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I might have said I didn’t want to be No. 1 … but I lied, as it turns out. So proud of the lads!
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Bit weird to get #1 at this stage given this year had some major flubs compared with 2018 and, moreover, these are the RWC warm ups which are of dubious merit on their own standing. Still, fuck it. ‘Topes rule!
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I don’t think we have the firepower up front to deal with Ireland.
Our main ploy will be to kick for touch and rely on Best’s darts
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Isotopes?
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Isotopes so, too
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Ha, it really was Isotopes! Not the ones I was thinking of, perhaps.
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The most conservative, risk averse and anti-creative by design team in T1 are now the world number 1.
I hope to Dog a team whose wingers actually get the ball once in a while win the tournament.
Larmour and Ringrose are so wasted under Schmidt’s gamplan.
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@Enzo
He was in Cardiff City’s academy until he was 16. Got cut by coach Simpson, turned his hand to rugby and happened to take to it pretty well.
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Main takeaways:
Oz laughing up their sleeves.
Fiji fancying it.
Georgia encouraged.
Gats ashamed for given Ireland the perfect leg-up for the Big Cup.
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That was a horrible second half. It was like watching the Legends play away in Ireland.
Hopefully this is all part of some master plan that I’m not party to.
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Pretty dominating second half that.
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Ah, he’s one of those *talented* lads then. Fuck that guy!
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Expro – do me a favour and turn down your hatred of all things Irish.
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I dislike unimaginative rugby tactics, and love all things Irish apart from those – which are actually the product of a New Zealander.
They deliberately don’t move the ball wide. I don’t recall a winger being passed a ball once. Easy to see why Zebo got bored.
They rack up an incredible number of phases and dominate possession by one out passes to big men (They do this more than any team in the world by a significant margin)
The whole plan to score points is based on getting penalties and kicking to the corner – everything is based on that
The ‘attacking’ lines they run are designed to force opposition to keep tackling and enable constant recycling, there is no interest in looking at gaps. No guile or cunning whatsoever. Run right at the man – faces not spaces.
It works, but i find it dull, cynical and a waste of the talent that some of their wider players have.
Please do me a favour and remember that not liking ultra-conservative attritional rugby is not the same as disliking the country of the team playing that rugby.
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Ireland is a tiny country where rugby is not even in the top three sports played. They go number one in the world in the world and you turn up and pour a bucket of cold sick on it.
We all know you don’t like the way they play.
It would be nice if you could give us five minutes to enjoy it, never mind offer congratulations even if it’s through gritted teeth.
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Sounds like my dating profile.
Dislikes choke tackles, DBWR blazers and Jim Cline.
Likes the craic, taytos and peak Paul McGrath.
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Anyway, this cheered me up*
*Made me very sad
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Thauma,
I really don’t mean any offence: concepts of national teams mean very little to me – they certainly are not what they used to be. The world has changed so much that I think that national teams are approaching their sell by date. Most teams are coached by foreigners, have a number of project and imported players and many have a significant number of players who live and work outside the country they represent. There are plenty of guys playing for countries of which they do not have a passport.
This means I struggle to remember that for others the national team is a far more vivid representation of the country and its people, and the former means much more to them than it might do for me.
I guess as a citizen of nowhere I am very different to most folk. I don’t have a country and I don’t want one either.
When it comes to rugby I like seeing backs running in space. That’s really what I watch the game for. Not much of that going on in Ireland games.
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Expro – you must have enjoyed Stockdale’s tries last week then?
You’re actually putting some people off from posting here, so I will ask you again to dial it back.
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I think Expro that you’ve banged that same drum about Irish rugby for christ knows how long now and I get it, as I am sure most of us do.
Your criticism of Irish rugby just grinds on and on. It gets on my nerves and I’m not Irish. There’s no humour or playfulness in what you say, just a nagging, repetitive criticism about the same thing ad nauseam.
I would enjoy reading your comments insights on specific matches, but I am tired of you just repeating the same old diatribes.
Ireland took Wales to the cleaners today, I’m not happy about it but they played some good rugby, and some poor rugby. I really can’t see why you persist in hitting the same nail on the head year after year after year.
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My comment has nothing to do with your comments Thauma, which I had not read before typing it. I’m not ganging up.
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Iks – thanks for your comments though!
I don’t want any ganging up, but I also don’t want other people being deterred from participating.
Now let’s carry on….
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Well done to Ireland on the win and the number one spot.
Didn’t see the game. Hope the Patch is ok.
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Thanks, TomP! :-)
Also hope Patchell is okay – he didn’t look too bad, and I’m hoping it was mostly precautionary keeping him off.
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For those who follow the sport – Antonio Brown has fallen out with the Raiders and been released without even playing a single snap for them.
Didn’t show up for a few practices, objected to mandatory fines, had a tantrum, posted ‘release me’ on Instagram, got released.
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I much preferred watching Scotland Ireland matches in the 1990s
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_rugby_union_matches_between_Ireland_and_Scotland
Whilst the end of this month sees the serious wheat from chaff sorting, outside of that, as the cliché goes, you can only beat what is put in front of you so any team that gets to the top of the log deserves recognition.
Well Done Ireland, oh and Wales recently too.
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would any of our Welsh supporters know if S4C is showing the Os v Edinburgh preseason match next week?
I haven’t heard of anyone in Scotland showing it, and Edinburgh didn’t show their last game.
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@yosoy
And Mrs Brown’s Boys. We can now blame Expro for Mrs Brown’s Boys.
Mrs Brown’s Boys is all Expro’s fault.
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Ticht – I’ve had a look at the S4C website, and all I can see is Merthyr v Pontypridd next Saturday.
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It’s worth pointing out that there are two rival Taytos. One is south of the border, and the other north. Obviously, the northern ones are better.
Article
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Ah well, thanks for looking Thaum.
Annoyingly, I was supposed to be in Scotland by now, stoopid house selling falling through rubbish
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Argh, that sounds like a nightmare, Ticht.
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Highly unlikely but I’ll check closer to the time. Ospreys did stream some non televised small cup games last year so I’ll keep an eye on it.
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I didn’t know of the north/south taytos divide. I can get the southern ones when I visit my mam down in West Wales (as she lives near the ferry and they can entice customers into Tesco with crisps).
The cheese and onion are really nice.
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The northern cheese & onion are sublime. It’s disappointing when you accidentally buy the other ones. It is quite hard to tell the difference from the packaging!
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There was a Canadian songwriter called Stan Rogers (where is LADOAB, btw?), perhaps his most well-known song is called North West Passage which is sung in folky acapella-style
A friend, who is a big time folky, came across this, I’m not sure it works but it sort of does, a Canadian metal version of the song. I like her vocals, they remind me so much of Dio – I think the metal heads will either love this or vehemently hate it
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The Republic lads have got taytopark.ie .
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