Week Two made Irish eyes very sad. But Welsh eyes leeked with joy, when the Wallabies didn’t quite manage to hop into the lead in the second half. Uruguay failed to repeat their magic from Week One. Otherwise, the results were more or less as expected.
Week Three’s biggest clash is looking like England v Argentina, although no doubt there will be some surprises in the other fixtures.
We’ve also got some Pro14 and that English Premiership Cup thingy to look forward to.
Exciting (?) rugby on the telly this week
Friday 4th October
| S Africa 49 – 3 Italy | 10:45 | ITV4 |
| Glasgow 21 – 25 Scarlets | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 |
| Leinster 53 – 5 Ospreys | 19:35 | Premiers Sports 2 / TG4 |
| Worcester 19 – 34 Exeter | 19:45 | BT Sport 1 |
Saturday 5th October
| Australia 45 – 10 Uruguay | 06:15 | ITV |
| England 39 – 10 Argentina | 09:05 | ITV |
| Japan 38 – 19 Samoa | 11:30 | ITV |
| Kings 20 – 31 Munster | 15:00 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Zebre 28 – 52 Dragons | 17:00 | Freesports |
| Cheetahs 63 – 26 Ulster | 17:15 | Premier Sports 2 |
| Cardiff 11 – 19 Edinburgh | 17:15 | Premier Sports 1 / S4C |
| Connacht 41 – 5 Treviso | 19:35 | Premier Sports 1 / TG4 |
Sunday 6th October
| New Zealand 71 – 9 Namibia | 05:45 | ITV |
| France 23 – 21 Tonga | 08:45 | ITV |
| Northampton 28 – 54 Saracens | 15:00 | BT Sport 1 |
Tuesday 8th October
| South Africa 66 – 7 Canada | 11:15 | ITV4 |
Wednesday 9th October
| Argentina 47 – 17 USA | 05:45 | ITV4 |
| Scotland 61 – 0 Russia | 08:15 | ITV |
| Wales v Fiji | 10:45 | ITV/S4C |
Ovally Balls 
“I’d be very concerned if Farrell was concussed and decided to play on. Surely every team has a strict procedure in place? And are the officials also not supposed to monitor this?”
Short answer is yes. The impact looked horrible and I was surprised he wasn’t sent for an HIA but if he doesn’t show any signs then there’s no need to take him off.
Click to access 180326%20HIA%20Protocol%20and%20Procedures.pdf
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I’m amazed Farrell wasn’t taken off for HIA.
Still, only changes to ratings after that are to downgrade Argentina. Who were/are shit.
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Been looking forward to this one.
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That was a poor match to watch: so stopstarty. Must have been awful for a neutral. A comfortable win but anything but clinical. If they carry on playing with this many mistakes, a quarterfinal exit won’t be surprising.
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Don’t know what I want to happen in this one.
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Not as entertaining than Japan vs Ireland but not that bad either.
France may lose to Tonga, but assuming they won’t , I don’t think they’ll send a B team vs England. They need game time together and as the threat of Wales is not greater than that of Oz, I see no reason why they’d do it.
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Well lots of kicking of penalties is what is happening regardless of what I might or might not want.
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Why did the ref stop play there? So annoying. Bit of a harsh YC, given Hooper got nothing for a worse one.
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Interesting at the end of that half with the Samoa player coming off for an HIA, which seemed to have been decided from the sidelines. Haven’t seen the hit on Farrell, but if he was suffering any form of concussion would that not have been picked up on the sidelines? I think there was something similar during one of the games yesterday.
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Mon Samoa
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P45 for whoever stuck the numbers on the Samoan shirts
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I don’t know much about Art but I know what I like:
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/D3WPnU9XsAAMH0l?format=jpg&name=small
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Japanese 8 is a likeable chap.
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Penalising a squint feed is hilarious
Well, we know what we have to do now, five points v Russia and beat Japan and deny them a bp of any kind
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Fabulous from Japan. Ticht, I hope you do exactly that.
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Well done, Japan.
Difficult choice… wanting them to get through for the feed-goodz, or home-nation support for Scotland.
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BP for Japan.
If I am correct this means that Scotland need a BP against Russia and beat Japan, while also denying the hosts a losing bonus point.
Nothing against the Scotland team or fans, but it would be might cruel if Japan are eliminated after winning three games, including against the eventual group winner.
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It wouldn’t exactly be a kindness if Scotland were to beat Japan and still go out of the competition whilst they go through.
I’m fairly confident that good Scotland can beat good Japan, it’s whether we can do it by more than seven points.
There are a gew selection headaches for Toonie for the Russia game, we have to rest Hoggy and Finn, but Hastings and Kinghorn are good replacements. Hastings is the embodiment of Scotland atm, brilliant broken field runner, prone to awful decision making at times
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Scotland in some ways are lucky to have their worst performance out of their system, then building some form up thereafter. A match against Russia is a perfect stepping stone because they cannot fail to get the necessary done against a willing but weak team (and coach).
So a big match against Japan coming at the perfect time. Scotland will get better, so can Japan go up another level to counter a Scottish team with their tails up? It might depend on them keeping their talismanic individuals god-like and not screwing up the set-piece. Quite a challenge.
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Scotland by 9, Japan through.
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Munster get the BP away at Kings.
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Shite, Embra have lost Matt Scott in the warm up, that makes a very difficult task even more difficult
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Bloody Cheetahs have scored. It was a nice one.
And now I see why: bastards have got Ruan Pienaar.
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Oh dear. Cheetah winger has just straight through us to score from around our 22.
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Two fatties combine to score a running try for Ulster!
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Cheetahs respond by running right through us again. These buggers are so quick and nimble.
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Cheetahs have scored a couple of rippers. Ours wasn’t bad either. We’re down by 14 points but in a match of this sort that might not be as worrying as it is normally.
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This is a bit flash:
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It would help if we didn’t keep losing our line-outs.
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Cheetahs have the BP try.
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HT: 28 – 7
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Ugh, that’s torn it.
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We are getting hammered. They’re just scoring tries for fun now.
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Second half embarrassing.
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At this rate, they’re going to put 70 or 80 points on us.
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So we got a player binned for two pens in quick succession from the same guy, Cardiff do it and get a warning
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The ref in this game has been good, but he’s made mistake, mainly inconsistencies which are annoying
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Hooray, we got another try! There’s still 20 minutes….
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Larry: I missed the start of the second half. What happened to Cooney? Hope he’s not injured.
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Cheetah binned and we get our third try. Hoping for try BP, although LBP looks out of reach.
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@Thaum – we took off the key players as soon as the game was irretrievably gone. No issue, I think.
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Scotland in some ways are lucky to have their worst performance out of their system
Oh iks!!!! Why would you jinx them like that?
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Cheers, that’s good to know!
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REf calls “no ruck” but Embra get penalised for picking up the ball
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Sign of things to come. A very limp and brain dead showing. I’ll be surprised if the Legends finish higher than 6th in this pool.
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That is a terrific smash and grab raid from us, we don’t often beat Cardiff.
Great try from Bennett, good game from Taylor standing in for Matt Scott
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Wahey! We get the try bonus point.
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Final score: 63-26.
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I’ve discovered I really like white Rioja
Who knew there was such a thing?
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