The briefest of all possible previews.
Georgia v Fiji
Fiji are a very good side, but have not played a test match due to their Covid problems. Georgia were much improved last week. Georgia by 5.
Ireland v Scotland
Both sides looking rather pedestrian at the moment. With the inexplicable void where Hamish McFuckface should be, as well as the return of Sexton and Ireland’s home advantage (and despite the dropping of McCloskey), Ireland by 10.
Wales v Italy
Wales by 25. You know why.
England v France
With France putting out a C side, there is not much doubt: England by 15. Although I suspect France will throw some surprises England’s way.
Onna telly this week
Friday 4th December
| Bristol 18 – 17 Saints | ||
| Connacht 31 – 14 Treviso |
Saturday 5th December
| Australia v Argentina | 08:45 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Georgia v Fiji | 12:00 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Ireland v Scotland | 14:15 | Amazon Prime |
| Bulls v Cheetahs | 14:30 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Leicester v Exeter | 15:00 | BT Sport Extra |
| Wasps v Newcastle | 15:00 | BT Sport Extra |
| Worcester v Bath | 15:00 | BT Sport Extra |
| Wales v Italy | 16:45 | S4C / Amazon Prime |
| Golden Lions v Western Province | 17:00 | Sky Sports Arena |
| Glasgow v Dragons | 19:15 | Premier Sports 1 |
Sunday 6th December
| England v France | 14:00 | Amazon Prime |
| London Irish v Sale | 14:30 | BT Sport Extra |
| Gloucester v Harlequins | 16:15 | BT Sport 1 |
Ovally Balls 
Indeed, it almost seemed harder not to score there.
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Second chance Daly has horlixed. Out of 2. First one was a 1/2 chance for May, that one should have been finished by any half decent club team.
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SBT, someone was trying to tell me last night that they’d have Daly ahead of Hogg in the Scottish side.
No thanks
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I thought beforehand that England would win this fairly comfortably
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I’d have gone for the corner there, worst case is that England have to score from their own goal line
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Well, I was right about the surprises.
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Nice penalty kick though
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Maybe I should do a Dominic Cummings and go back and edit the ATL.
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A South African green one in your jumper drawer is a crime indeed
Oi! ***Takes back likes from the last week.***
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:-)
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Merde
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England barely deserve that. They’ll probably go on and win it now.
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Who man of the match ? Dulin ?
Well played France, unlucky to get hauled in at the line. Pretty much the better team across the park I thought really tight game tho.
Ooh golden kick. Didn’t now that.
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Breathless stuff now. Great match!
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Flair, how many kickers are there amongst the babies if it goes to a penalty shoot-out?
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Dulin isn’t losing any ground here, absolutely rock solid at the back.
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England really missing a decent ball carrier now Billy V is a shadow of his former self. What wouldn’t we give for a Jamie Roberts!
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Oooh, that line break by LCD.
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Bravo les Anglais. France was on borrowed money since the beginning of the 2nd half.
Yet very pleased.
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aaawwh. Shame. Should be golden try.
Still, that was fun. Again, well played France.
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Flair, were there a few from that terrific Under 20s side of a year or so ago playing today?
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Shit France are going to be awesome in the coming years aren’t they?
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Strength in depth indeed Flair.
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Rather pleasingly and rather randomly I came top of the AoD Superbru table, thrashing Piperboy by a massive 0.17 points.
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Wow, great game France. Why didn’t Faz let Ford take the kicks?
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Ticht, yes, lots of ex WC U-20.
Carbonnel, Woki, Kolingar, Barassi, Geraci, Tolofua, OOMH.
I don’t think that others like Jalibert (22) Couilloud (SH, 23), Macalou (25), Moefana(20), Villière (24) , Bourgarit 24) etc were in that U20 team.
Average age: 23,5 with Dulin and Atonio 30 yo or close to.
Average caps: 4.
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Some of those WC-U20s are already with the A team, such as Ntamack, Dupont, Bamba or Vincent.
Next 6N should be fun.
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I am seriously worried about France in the next 6N. You should be proud of those boys.
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To be honest, I’m not sure France A would’ve done better than the kids. The main point is motivation. They were written off, called a farce etc… As England’s game plan is simple – I almost wrote simplistic- it’s easy to defend if you match them up front (it was done rather easily) and if you catch the aerial bombs that drop on you with the predictability and regularity of taxes. Dulin and Villière were on fire, so that was it.
A bit of luck as Farrell wasn’t as reliable as usual, a bit of bad luck as the ref made a couple of contentious decisions just before and during extra time et voilà. It does not really matter, what matters, to me at least, is that the game was far more disputed and therefore more enjoyable than I had expected.
All in all, England were the better team.
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England seem to find it so difficult to meet the challenge of an underdog – does their club team’sform have anything to do with it?:
Genge – Tigers (crap)
George – Saracens (not playing/2nd division)
Sinkler – re-located to Bristol (sensitive soul)
Itoje – see George
The Launch – Wasps – were v.good last season
Underhill – Bath – poor
Curry – Sale – above average but not scintillating
Billy V. – see George
Youngs – Tigers (crap)
Ford – Tigers (crap)
Farrell – see George
Slade – Exeter – need I say more
Watson – Bath (poor) – recently back from injury but not a thinker
Daly – see George – odd player with a good boot off the tee – wing or nothing and not a thinker
LC-D – see Slade
Marler – a lumpy rock – Quins (ave)
Stuart – Bath (poor)
Hill – see Slade
him – Sarries/now Bristol – nexperienced/over-hyped
reserve 9 – good player but causes chaos for his own rigid team
etc etc
the chemistry does not look good amongst that lot – and there are others who would/would have killed to be in the team.
International sport is a game of wit, experience, motivation and skill, plus my hobby-horse of playing players in their club position, please.
Apols. for the moan and WELL DONE to the French lads, who really rose to it.
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Flair – better team overall maybe – but they looked bemused.
Many of those French lads performed as expected e.g. Dulin, Woki etc – English players should know their opposition – or is it beneath them?
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………………………..Dog knows what EJ is trying to achieve
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Thought England were going to be the bestest team ever. Still a fair bit to go on that display.
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Slade – apparently it was the first time under Eddie that we overturned a half time deficit. Tbh we looked rattled against a French team who had nothing to lose.
Agree with you that we seem to be picking players from teams who are shit in the prem.
BTW – I really liked the French no20. He was great.
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On a normal day we would have had an extra 9-12 points from Faz so it’s worth keeping that in mind.
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Craigs – fair enough but we shouldn’t have the habit of relying on him to rescue the scoreboard – it can be counter-productive – as shown today. Perhaps it is good learn that Farrell is not infallible off the tee (but look out the next international team he plays against – he won’t miss a thing!).
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………………..and our famed/ lauded back row was made to look a bit ordinary today
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Billy V put in some bit hits (although one seemed a tad borderline), but most of his runs (from what I can remember) were stopped dead.
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yup!
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Not sure, Craigs. Didn’t he miss a couple last week ? He isn’t offering much anywhere else at the moment either.
Maybe time to call on Marcus Smith, who just guided 14 man Quins to a good win over a kamikazi Gloucester.
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Hesitate to bring the Lions up, but on the displays this wekend, Faletau played far better at number 8 than Billy did, especially in carrying the ball. Doris also played better than Billy. AT THE MOMENT I’d be choosing between those two for my number 8. All on the strength of a couple of games over 6 months before the tour…..
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“SBT, someone was trying to tell me last night that they’d have Daly ahead of Hogg in the Scottish side.”
Good grief.
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BB, if you want a winning Lions, just open up the selection to France. You know it makes sense.😇
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Flair – I’d open it up further and have Poledri at 8.
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I would too. Greatly missed this autumn by Italy.
France should launch a Latin Lions team.
Arg, Italy+ France.
As an example from next week on,, Matera, Kremer, Macalou will be the Stade Francais back row
Craigs, I think Macalou was #20.
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SBT
Smith was outplayed by Simmonds when Exeter* visited Quins a couple of weeks ago and disappeared in Exeter’s BP win. Jones was watching.
*Exeter minus their internationals
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I remain mystified by EJ’s persistence with Daly. His butchering of that try today was woeful. He offers no counter-attacking running from deep and defensively he is weak. I’d love to see Faz dropped – he is neither England’s best 10 nor best 12, and therefore has no business being in the side. Especially when he misses his kicks. The fact that Youngs has over 100 caps is testament to our cruel lack of resources in that area. It was a sobering day for England today.
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As a Quins supporter the ANC final and our game against Gloucester were two rather weird but eXciting games. Well don3 the French, in the first half they thoroughly outplayed through spirit the hyped orcs of England. They then hung on for the second half but were clearly dead in extra time. They should be awesome for the next World Cup. England need to remember how to play with ball.
How any team can nudge ahead 10-17 half time, then lose a player to a red card then a yellow but still move the score to 10-31 beggars belief. Or at least misbelief as to what Gloucester were doing. Marcus Smith and Dombrandt had excellent games and the sheer effort whilst down to 13 was quite remarkable.
Overall two remarkable games
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Just watched on a delay as we were out visiting. France’s defence was quite excellent. Shaun Edwards earned his Euros today in the 80 minutes (there was a bit of tiredness after that) but the players did a fine job.
England should’ve won that game easily even from 13-6 down at half-time. France offered nothing on attack in the second half. What was particularly disappointing was that poor old Raka got one pass in the game I think and that was around his ankles.
In extra time England took a big step back to stop the offside being called but their defence was still pretty good.
Very good line in exasperation from the French back rowers when the close ups were on.
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Also, what are the mask rules in the grounds? Support staff running on to the pitch seemed to have to wear but head coaches not?.
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