England Have Broken Into The Top Four

First topic message reminder :

Congratulations to England who, on the back of a gritty and tense away win in France have broken into the top 4 IRB ranked teams.

Under the short tenure of Stuart Lancaster England have beaten Scotland away for the first time since 2004, returned to the top flight of elite rugby teams and won all 3 away 6N games for the first time.

Surely, now, the RFU must hand the man a contract, pat him on the back and admit he has performed a minor miracle, unthinkable at the start of this championship.

the thing is as an england fan i actually feel happier this time around, it feels more honest, the england 'set up' seems to be making sense to me, something wasnt right about it last year, we were holding on to players going for a good world cup, using aged players yet the rfu was making statments that we were only looking at 2015!!

what the heck was the point in using 'aged' players then

maestegmafia wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:I'd laugh myself to the grave if England won this 6 nations. It isn't impossible, just improbable.

Yes that would be pretty funny. Do you think England can beat Ireland? They look very good.

Nah, I think both home teams might lose for some reason. But if you look at the times England have beaten Ireland at Twickenham:

England 50 – 18 Ireland
England 45 – 11 Ireland
England 33 – 10 Ireland

Well, Wales had better not do anything silly...

P.S. I've got my "England 2012 Champs" t-shirt ready

Rankings are pants. Never looked at them until this joining this forum

+1 to all for having a reasonable debate without the temptation to fall into tribal warfare

maestegmafia wrote:

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:



Wales only ever beat sides who are out of the top 4.

They beat England and England are top four?

Not when they beat them

I'm sure Wales beat Australia once. I was there.

They beat us once too.

I meant recently you pedants :P

EnglishReign wrote:

maestegmafia wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:I'd laugh myself to the grave if England won this 6 nations. It isn't impossible, just improbable.

Yes that would be pretty funny. Do you think England can beat Ireland? They look very good.

Nah, I think both home teams might lose for some reason. But if you look at the times England have beaten Ireland at Twickenham:

England 50 – 18 Ireland
England 45 – 11 Ireland
England 33 – 10 Ireland

Well, Wales had better not do anything silly...

P.S. I've got my "England 2012 Champs" t-shirt ready

You are Glaws so you are nearly Welsh.I respect you.Was at school in Newnham,Glos.Nice place,nice people.

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:

maestegmafia wrote:

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:



Wales only ever beat sides who are out of the top 4.

They beat England and England are top four?

Not when they beat them

England were fourth when we beat them 19-9 on August the 13th 2011 in Cardiff.

maestegmafia wrote:

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:

maestegmafia wrote:

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:



Wales only ever beat sides who are out of the top 4.

They beat England and England are top four?

Not when they beat them

England were fourth when we beat them 19-9 on August the 13th 2011 in Cardiff.

Yeah, but it had to be in a proper test match.

That was a test.

Ill let you have that one Maes, good catch.

Lies, damned lies and statistics. Best 4 teams in the world at the moment are SH3 plus Wales, with (in alphabetical order) England/France/Ireland a bit behind in 5th to 7th: choose your own order. Any variant on that is just a statistical glitsch.

think your right surrey!

Which if you take the ratings points and gaps is pretty much what the rankings show. England Wales France Irleand can all beat each other home and away "on their day". Also shown by the results over the last year.

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:I meant recently you pedants :P

Yeah...I know, it was tongue in cheeck, but there is no emoticon for tongue in cheeck, so I'll use this one instead.

the rankings have their uses, its the only decent way to seed the world cup and they are usually a pretty fair reflection.

I think its fair to say that wales are slightly ahead of the competition in the NH and that the rankings dont truly reflect this as their results at the world cup didnt really match their performances.

oh and wales might be ahead now but if they lose to france at the weekend then the insignificant difference between the teams indicated by the rankings would be proven accurate IMO.

If wales want to be considered the best of the NH a slam would be a good way to prove it. But eh only way to open a gap in the rankings would be to go down to the SH and beat those guys on their own turf.

Spot on HQ.
Am I right in thinking that the IRB points are also related to home and away fixtures. i.e. more points for an away win rather than a home.
England have played away 3 times and won 3 (1 away vivtory against a higher ranked team) = more points.

To really climbe the tables any of the N.Hemi teams need to beat the big 3 when touring. i.e. Scotland beat Argentina twice on tour when they were highly ranked and jumped nearly 4 places in the rankings.

yes you are right

also there is decay and how much you win or lose by