Problems with the new Word cup ball?

Have to say the standard of kicking so far in the world cup has been awful, with world class kickers suck as Carter, Wilkinson and Patterson missing numerous kicks that they would normally get.

Reckon the new ball is causing this? Will be interesting to hear some of the kickers comments on it.

There has been a lot of misses,

Is it the climate? Lots of wind? (though Carter should be used to it, although he does sometimes have off days)

The Namibians and Fijians didnt have a problem with it. Neither did the French of Japs. The England v Argie game though. Never seen anything like it. Was dreadful. Something to do with air pressure pockets in the indoor stadium maybe?

i feel sorry for the argentine kickers, they were hard kicks but if they had got them they would have got the win they deserved.

is the ball designed to discourage kicking and play a more adventurous after all this is new zealand?

Jonny was talking about the stadium being particularly difficult to kick in due to the roof & the air in the enclosed stadium earlier in the week. That the lack of wind etc was something most players were not used to.

Also given that most of Jonny's attempts were all at the edge of his range in the corners he would have normally missed half of those anyhow.

The ball is the same ball used used in test rugby so I don't think there is any issues there.

Carter,one miss and a poster plus 4 goals not so dusty,all the goal kickers are missing.Weather conditions in places like Invercargill and Wellington can be tricky.
Maybe teams should`nt just rely on winning penalties and kicking goals,the classic RWC formula.
What has been so far a lot of teams getting wake up calls,minnows not just here to make up the numbers.

Can see a conspiracy theory coming up, poor kicking negates teams who score three points, so tries will be the decider.

welshy824 wrote:i feel sorry for the argentine kickers, they were hard kicks but if they had got them they would have got the win they deserved.

If both sides had made their kicks it wouldn't have altered the result, Argentina missed 6 penalties, England 5.


I think the kicking problems in the Arg v Eng match were more likely stadium or player related.

i thought argentina lost more?
but surely the stadium would only be like playing in the MS, and i unfortunately remember wilkinson getting a fair few kicks other there

Have no fear Biltong,Suzy is on stand by and NZ is doing the catering.Revenge is a dish best served cold Listeria pies already for the Boks!![relax moderators not wumming just an idle jest]

emack2 wrote:Have no fear Biltong,Suzy is on stand by and NZ is doing the catering.Revenge is a dish best served cold Listeria pies already for the Boks!![relax moderators not wumming just an idle jest]

That's funny, I could have used her (no sexual inuendo there) a few times in the past.

We live in Africa alan, food poisoning isn't the answer. Ous stmachs are lined with scorpion poison.

Way ahead of u emack, Boks travelled with enough biltong pap and boerewors to last 10 weeks

Nerves thats all it is.... You can blame one miss for air pressure or whatever else you want but on your next attempt you compensate for that.

Cymroglan wrote:Nerves thats all it is.... You can blame one miss for air pressure or whatever else you want but on your next attempt you compensate for that.

But it impacted kickers on both teams today. Thats highly unusual. Especially at this level, don't you think? I even thought there were some poor kicks from hand as well, but that is harder to assess. I think there is certainly something different, whether the pitch or the ball. Otherwise I can think of no good reason for such poor performances.

Maybe there actually is a conspiracy? Maybe even, dare I say, a vigilante in the mix?

The main problem seems to be that no fecker can kick it between the posts