You wait bloody ages for an ATL, and then two turn up at once….
No prizes for guessing which is the work of Craigsman, and which of Deebee7.
The Glorious Series Continues
Pre/Ramble
So it’s a bit weird that, with a Lionz series in south Africa being poised with one game each, rugby fans seems quite deflated about the last match in this series. No fans, empty stadiums, accusations of biting, of slowing down the game, of racism, of influencing the referee have all played a part. But really it’s the fact that the rugby hasn’t set the world alight that’s the problem (Springbok tries aside) in this Craigsman’s opinion. Both sides seem to be playing low risk stuff seeing who breaks first. Kick, kick, kick. The Kiwis would lap this up. Form-wise, apart from the last half of the second game (and a bit in the first half of the first game) the Lions forwards have been able to get the dominance needed to win but they have been blunt in attack. Here’s hoping that rugby* wins and we get a game on Saturday. Let’s have a look at the teams innit.
LionzTM
So this makes me wonder what the feck Gats is playing at with his selection for the third test. I am but a simple accountant, unused to the complexities of rugby coaching, but I’m trying to work out some of the choices made at 9 and 10 and 21 and 22. Starting with a live wire scrum half and a … solid fly half and then ending with a … solid scrum half and a live wire fly half seems to be negating the strengths of each player. Either start with the live wire options and when the Springbok defence proves too miserly to score tries against or a nice healthy lead has been built, end with the … wise old heads who like to kick and do the game management stuff. Or, do the opposite to chase the game. What do I know? Everything else in the team seems reasonable. Courtney Lawes has done well to ignore the instructions from Dan Biggar and the rest of the pack looks solid. I would probably have Tadhg MK II in the finishers but hey ho. The back 3 look like they could negate a dastardly kicking game and we have two lumps in the centre to negate the Boks and the “amazing” Elliot Daly to come in against the tired legs at the end. So, I’m sanguine there.
Springboks
The Springboks look rubbish and will get hammered whatever happens look like a settled unit right now with the only changes have come from injury and OH MY GOD IT’S MORNE FECKING STEYNE!!!!!!!!!! Maybe it’s just more trolling from Rassie and we’ll see a last minute ‘injury’ and a proper player like Wynand Olivier will replace him. Just ignorant speculation on my part. Other than that, I can’t see anything to pick at. It’s a formidable side and Lionz supporters everywhere will have breathed a sigh of relief that Duane Vermeulen hasn’t yet come back from injury. I think they will rinse and repeat what worked in the second game. And why not? I hope that their fantastic wingers see some more ball in this game though. If only for them to be bundled into touch at the last second.
Prediction
Whoever gets the forward grunt and manages the ref will win. I really hope it doesn’t come down to the ref or some bs unseen citing or time wasting or whatever. Hopefully the ref will keep the game flowing and we’ll have a classic* on our hands. So who do I think will win?
Erm… hopefully Gats will put me in my place and Finn will catch a perfect box kick to sling an amazing pass to Sam Simmonds for his record breaking hat trick and the Lions win by a point or more.
Or… the Springboks grind the plucky tourists into the dirt and they will win by 18 points. Morne Steyne kicking the final penalty from the Springboks 22.
Or… the test never bloody ends.
Ok, ok Lions 24** – 21 Springboks. There, come at me you bastards.
Final ‘thoughts’
The real question on everyone’s lips is ‘what will this mean for England’? I’ll be btl to give my thoughts on this shortly.
* Which means the Lions win. Anything else is one for the purists.
** Have I mentioned that Siya Kolisi has a special place in my heart? I’ll have another poster to put on my bedroom wall after this series so all is not lost if the Lionz lose.
My Way, Or How I Stopped Worrying and Learned to Love the Bomb Squad
Gats and Rassie loom into view through the smoke-filled karaoke bar, each picking up a mike and ignoring the other, before launching into their tuneless non mea culpa est:
And now, the end is near, and so I face the final curtain
My friends, we’ll kick it clear, we’ll force the pace of which we’re certain
We’ve kicked a ball out full, we’ve launched the oval skyway
But more, much more than this, we did it our way
Attacks, we’ve had a few, but then again, too few to mention
We kicked what we had to kick, and soar it through without invention
I planned each scrumming force, each sideways step and passes astray
But more, much more than this, the blame is his way
The lights dim, the mikes clatter emptily to the floor, clunking soullessly as they slink to the exits, grim, with regret etched on their faces. But enough of my whisky and chocolate addled dreams last night.
The third Test. The series is alive, if not exactly kicking, if you ask many followers. The changes have been wrung, the die is cast and now we’re 80 minutes (or up to 120 depending on how things pan out) from anointing the victors with bragging rights for the next 12 years. Enough has been written about the quality (or absence thereof) of the first two Tests and the series in general, much of it accurate, much of it bilge, so let’s focus on the match to come, shall we?
Six changes in the Lions camp and 3 (one positional) in the Boks. The Lions have been roaring all week about speeding up the game, gaining tempo, running the Boks ragged and raiding the trophy cabinet in the process. In come Price at 9 to speed up delivery from the base – but to Biggar at 10 who hasn’t set the world light in ether teste thus far. Outside him, Bundee Aki, a poor man’s Damian de Allende, comes in to allow Henshaw to move to 13 in an attempt to create more space in midfield, whilst at the back, the Welsh duo of Williams for Hogg and Adams for Watson on the right wing aims to get more incisiveness in attack. On the bench, Connor Murray and Finn Russell are paired, a conservative slower 9 with a heads-up 10, seems strange, to say the least and suggests that Gatland remains conservative and not trusting of an all-out assault on the Bok defence.
Up front the Welsh duo of Jones and Owens are slotted into a front row that struggled last week, despite the Lions leading at oranges, the second and back row is unchanged, slightly surprising given the backseat they took and enormous energy expended seven days ago. AWJ, warrior that he is, must be feeling the effects, whilst Lawes was fairly anonymous last week.
The bench looks strong, but not overly stellar and there must be some concerns in the Lions camp that six new players who’ve spend much of the last month carrying tackle bags will be disruptive – if it is early one, the Lions will be playing catch up.
The Boks have two enforced injury changes, with talismanic 9 Faf de Klerk and indispensable blindside PS du Toit both out. These are huge blows, however much Bok fans will try to sugar-coat things. De Klerk is without peer at the box kicking game and all-round nuisance value, whilst du Toit is an 80 minute machine across the park. It’s resulted in considerable rejigging in the Bok side, with Lood de Jager back in the second row to partner Eben Etzebeth and Franco Mostert moving to blindside in du Toit’s place. Big moves. De Jager back is great news, adding considerably to the scrumming department and lineout, as well as carrying in heavy traffic, but is more limited out wide. Mostert has played flank, but with limited success. That said, du Toit only played 20 minutes last week, half of them knackered, and the Boks coped just fine without him. The rest of the pack is as is for the starters, and that’s good news.
The bench forwards are the same front row, which is formidable and duffed their opponents last week, whilst Mostert will slot back into the second row later on, with Kwagga – far better on the flank replacing du Toit than playing at 8 as in the first Test – and Marco van Staden coming on later to pinch ball, slow things down and add some vim to the forwards.
The backs have Cobus Reinach at 9, a different player to Faf, without the pinpoint kick accuracy, but absolutely electric around the fringes and in open play. If he brings his ‘A’ game (assuming he’s given licence) he presents an entirely different headache for the Lions – and possibly his own side. The rest of the backs are the same as the first two Tests and pick themselves. Perhaps Reinach can offer some space for Kolbe and Mapimpi to snipe down the blindside every now and then? However, an inaccurate display by Reinach could set the tone for the Lions to dictate the pace and shape of the match. It’s a critical piece of the jigsaw.
Key areas to watch, then, are:
- Whether the Lions can maintain parity up front for the full 80 (or near enough) to dictate what happens behind the scrum;
- Will six new players be too disruptive to the Lions, despite much of it revolving around national combinations – some of the guys are pretty rusty;
- How Gats introduces his bench – do Murray and Russell join the fray together, and if so, what’s the point?
- Will the Boks be able put down a marker from the get-go and dominate the Lions up front to dictate the pace (and crucially the scoreboard) to negate the threats out wide;
- Will Faf’s absence prove too disruptive to a Bok plan that has been well honed for a couple of years now and will allow the Lions to move the ball wide to their very good back three;
- Will the Boks surprise and give it a bit of width themselves earlier in the piece; they’re certainly more than capable of scoring tries whilst maintaining a mean defence;
- Will the refereeing quartet come out unscathed? In many respects, I think the last point is maybe the most important.
Prediction? I’ve gone Boks by 2 on Superbru, which portends, unfortunately, a Lions win based on the last two matches…
South Africa
15 Willie le Roux, 14 Cheslin Kolbe, 13 Lukhanyo Am, 12 Damian de Allende, 11 Makazole Mapimpi, 10 Handre Pollard, 9 Cobus Reinach, 8 Jasper Wiese, 7 Franco Mostert, 6 Siya Kolisi (captain), 5 Lood de Jager, 4 Eben Etzebeth, 3 Frans Malherbe, 2 Bongi Mbonambi, 1 Steven Kitshoff
Substitutes: 16 Malcolm Marx, 17 Trevor Nyakane, 18 Vincent Koch, 19 Marco van Staden, 20 Kwagga Smith, 21 Herschel Jantjies, 22 Morne Steyn, 23 Damian Willemse
British & Irish Lions
15 Liam Williams (Wales), 14 Josh Adams (Wales), 13 Robbie Henshaw (Ireland), 12 Bundee Aki (Ireland), 11 Duhan van der Merwe (Scotland), 10 Dan Biggar (Wales), 9 Ali Price (Scotland), 8 Jack Conan (Ireland), 7 Tom Curry (England), 6 Courtney Lawes (England), 5 Alun Wyn Jones (captain, Wales), 4 Maro Itoje (England), 3 Tadhg Furlong (Ireland), 2 Ken Owens (Wales), 1 Wyn Jones (Wales) Substitutes: 16. Luke Cowan-Dickie (England), 17 Mako Vunipola (Saracens, England), 18 Kyle Sinckler (England), 19 Adam Beard (Wales), 20 Sam Simmonds (England), 21 Conor Murray (Ireland), 22 Finn Russell (Scotland), 23 Elliot Daly (England)
Ovally Balls 
Finn’s video- as good a display of hot takes as you’ll ever see from one player
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Slade, I think Callum Sheedy, Marcus Smith, Matthieu Jalibert, Romain Ntamck, one of the two brothers at Leinster whose names escape me for the moment, these guys can light up rugby again
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…….you missed out Farrell
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Ross and Harry Byrne. Harry being the younger and more dynamic.
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Thanks Trisk, yeah Harry Byrne looks the business
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Still get goosebumps when I see THAT pass against England.
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Rugby’s been ok this year. I thought the 6 Nations was pretty decent, 3 or 4 pretty good games. SA v the Lions was tight and hard-fought. Aus-France was all right and close on the scoreboard, Fiji gave it a rattle v the Blacks for a while.
Some more names for you – Garbisi,, Sacha Mngomezulu, Kade Wolhuter, Ruben Love,Noah Lolesio, Liam Koen..
It may well be Quade v Richie on Sunday morning. That should get you tingling.
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players we have loved, cont’d……………..
Ben Moon’s testimonial at Exeter this weekend, proceeds to charity.
Starring for the opposition – Delon Armitage……………………………
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Del saw the croissant, you saw the whole of the moon!
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surely it was brother Steffon who ate all the croissants…………….
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Good luck to your boys too, Ticht. Doc Rob seems pretty content at the Drags. Moriarty and Hibbardy Hib too. Hopefully having characters like that in team will be good for getting the fans back.
We can all get behind Finn now that he’s a Lion. I’ll want him to go well against everyone except ickle ol’ Wales.
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Morning MrIks! Good to see you visiting this parish!
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Weather in South London today? And ‘Yes’ is not an appropriate answer. I need to know if I should find a mundane stats thing to do this afternoon whilst watching cricket or do real work.
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Big high pressure over the North Sea causing lots of cloud but little rain. Jimmy-friendly conditions.
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Morning Deebs. Lurking not deserting.
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Good to hear, MrIks! If I’d known I’d have been far more strident in my bashing of Gatland and the Welsh contingent on the Lions tour.
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England have started well today, with both Indian openers gone and only 30-odd on the board. Kohli walking across his stumps is gonna get pinged soon.
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Kohli continues to shuffle in front of his stumps and has moved to 45. What do I know? India 96/4 and one rash shot or shuffle from exposing the last batsman before the tail. England could roll them over for 150 here. Or if Kohli gets decent support from the other end, India could make 300+
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Edinburgh Rugby asked for applications for teams in the area to come and train with them for a session. My team applied but were unsuccessful this time, but they were given a couple of dozen tickets for an upcoming preseason game v Newcastle.
One of the sides that did get chosen is CJ’s team, Edinburgh Northern, I wonder if CJ is still around the club.
There was another notablogger who played with them, though I can’t remember his name just now, he knew and liked his whisky.
https://www.edinburghrugby.org/the-clubhouse/edinburgh-northern-rfc-train-like-the-pros!
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Utility Forward or HBH? (though I always mixed up UF and ‘Blindside Flanker’) – I think I accused one or other of having a job he deemed unacceptable as it was the other who did the “unacceptable job” (you know, estate agent, solicitor, quantity surveyor, IT consultant)
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IT Consultant?!!! *glares at Trisk*
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On the up side, three cheers for the Dublin-based Data Protection Commission.
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2021/sep/02/ireland-watchdog-fines-whatsapp-record-sum-for-flouting-eu-privacy-rules
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Well remembered, Trisk, it was Utility Forward, Hair Bair Hero played with Watsonians.
I thought Blindside Flanker was Irish, he was a right laugh, I remember him and I debating the correct translation of La Marseillaise whilst Flair looked on amused.
Thaum, I do have a WatsApp account, but it’s against my better judgement, I don’t like them at all
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“IT Consultant?!!!”
I think you were let off because of having to live in Coventry.
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The latest wheeze:
Now, I am not an expert (nor indeed do I stand to make a fortune off contracts for CO2 monitors), but it seems to me that the only wildly plausible help a CO2 monitor might be for Covid is to detect whether a room’s ventilation is so poor that the souls inside it are breathing in dangerous levels. In which case they might not live long enough to suffer from Covid anyway.
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ticht, there was a flanker and a blindside flanker, no? One was the aul hun lad and the other was a lawyer. Both were refs I think. Or maybe only the aul hun lad was the ref.
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The lawyer flanker went to my wife’s school. As did Sara Pascoe.
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I think Flanker was the Irish one.
Sara Pascoe is not who I thought she was. Thought she was the funny one on Bangers & Cash.
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Ah, aye, I remember them now, Flanker was the aul han one, the one I thought was funny.
Norn Irish iirc, Thaum.
Blindside Flanker was definitely a ref, Tam, I think he reffed in the US
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I don’t think I can bring myself to watch yet more ineptitude in that tweet, but if we had a prime minister who was even within a hundred miles of being up to the job, then we might have some kind of chance of a decent cabinet, no matter how vehemently you disagree with their politics and policies, you need them to be up to the job.
This is the worst government in my memory, by a long long way.
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They’re back! OK, the songs might not match their heyday, but still better than a lot of the crap out there today.
No, not Iron Maiden. Their new album is out tomorrow.
It’s ABBA of course!
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BB, I saw on the news tonight that ABBA have recorded performances using CGI tech, they are going to do shows with them portrayed performing the new music with them looking like they did in the 70s.
So they won’t actually be there in person
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Yeah, Agnetha won’t fly apparently so they won’t be doing concerts in person. The other video introduced today has a clip of the CGIABBA near the end. As these things go, it looked OK.
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The horror.
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The Joy!
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Sounds like an SOS.
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I’m a member of a Facebook group called Crap Wildlife Photography, mostly it’s blurred shots of dog knows what, but there are some genuinely funny ones too.
Today’s offering was neither, really, but it did show the hind quarters of some beast getting over a fallen tree and its bollock were very much on display.
Someone commented, “Did you know wolves balls only look like that during breeding season? And they shrink down to the size of peas the rest of the year.”
To which the reply was, “did you know that wolves’ balls actually never look like that, bc this is a photo of a deer?”
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I would argue that ABBA were not a disco group as such. Yes they did some disco music but then so did the Rolling Stones. And Rod Stewart. And the Beach Boys did this monstrosity, although it is redeemed a bit by the shot of a not-quite-sober Brian Wilson with a fag in his gob while sat at the piano
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I’m just waiting to chat to my sister about the new ABBA album so I can toss in the old “they were a bit before my time, but you’d remember them well” line. They actually straddled my pre-music years and early teens, so not really, but it’s nice to pretend. My greatest wish for this new album is that Cher leaves it the fuck alone. I have a neighbour (in his 20s!) who is a massive fan of Cher covers of ABBA which makes me want to strangle the poor sod.
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England in tatters at 62/5 early on Day 2. One of those is the night watchman though, so not quite as dramatic as it looks, but YJB and the Pope will need to say a little prayer to get to lunchtime unscathed.
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That anti-disco thing is very dodgy.
Among many great disco songs this may be the best:
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Much love for this:
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The Donna Summer is a stone cold classic, TomP!
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https://daily.jstor.org/the-night-they-drove-disco-down/
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And today is the 30th anniversary of the release of Metallica’s Black album – another stone cold classic.
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2021/sep/03/drugs-divorce-and-incessant-drum-takes-metallica-on-making-metals-biggest-ever-black-album
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This would’ve got the dance floor busy in SA back in the day:
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Thanks everyone – so, now I remember…. Flanker was in IT (IIRC… I recall we swapped stories about Oracle), Blindside was a lawyer/solicitor and UF took umbrage when I suggested he was a lawyer (mixing hm up with BF) or maybe just at me mixing him up with BF
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