6 Nations Round 4 - England v Ireland

First topic message reminder :

England v Ireland

Twickers, London
Saturday 12th March 2022
Kick Off - 1645hrs

England team


Ireland team

And carrying. And in the tight. And in the scrum. Just difference in opinion but I suppose that that discussion is done now as Lawes is pushed out to blindside. I would prefer that head to head have continued and have others for 6 though.

Launchbury is nowhere near Lawes as a carrier these days. It's not even close.

Probably just an agree to disagree as you say.

Yup. Cos I think the exact opposite! (Unless we're counting while Launchbury has been on one leg!).
Lawes has stopped knocking on and being stripped by backs though. Huge improvements.

Rewind about 6 years ago and Launchbury was the better carrier. Lawes has improved out of sight there though whilst Launchbury has slowed down in the loose IMO. Both are different players to their younger days.

Lawes used to get stripped of the ball once every game back in the day. That has certainly improved

On the BBC rugby podcast, Andy Nicol and Shane Horgan were mocking Eddie Jones for suggesting England would be underdogs, saying England should never consider themselves underdogs at Twickenham. Meanwhile, when Sonja MacLaughan asked who would win, both said "Ireland".

Former Women's Welsh international, Philippa Tuttiett, also favoured Ireland, and it would have been a full house on the panel if Matt Dawson hadn't suddenly switched to England, after talking up the Irish team. He also plumped for Italy to beat Scotland, so clearly had decided to play contrarian.

By and large, Jones seems to be right that ex-players and pundits are mostly leaning towards Ireland. Those who think England should win mention some combination of these factors:

1. It's at Twickenham
2. England have good players, and they might finally click
3. Jones has often come up with a plan to counter favoured opponents

On the strength of what we've seen so far, it's hard to come up with too many other reasons.

You often hear fans of all stripes say something like "I don't mind if we lose, so long as we play well". Nah, A win please. Of any kind (though perhaps not one helped along by a red card).

Rugby Fan wrote:On the BBC rugby podcast, Andy Nicol and Shane Horgan were mocking Eddie Jones for suggesting England would be underdogs, saying England should never consider themselves underdogs at Twickenham. Meanwhile, when Sonja MacLaughan asked who would win, both said "Ireland".

Former Women's Welsh international, Philippa Tuttiett, also favoured Ireland, and it would have been a full house on the panel if Matt Dawson hadn't suddenly switched to England, after talking up the Irish team. He also plumped for Italy to beat Scotland, so clearly had decided to play contrarian.

By and large, Jones seems to be right that ex-players and pundits are mostly leaning towards Ireland. Those who think England should win mention some combination of these factors:

1. It's at Twickenham
2. England have good players, and they might finally click
3. Jones has often come up with a plan to counter favoured opponents

On the strength of what we've seen so far, it's hard to come up with too many other reasons.

You often hear fans of all stripes say something like "I don't mind if we lose, so long as we play well". Nah, A win please. Of any kind (though perhaps not one helped along by a red card).

England's record at Twickenham is pretty good and I think there have been green shoots even if they haven't put it all together.

On the other hand I really rate this Ireland team as a unit and I think they are notably stronger than England in key areas. Obviously centre where Henshaw on their bench would walk into the England team at 12. I also fear that their second rows could cause some damage unless Itoje is indeed fully fit and Ewels really steps up.

Curry and Sinckler being fit is huge. Itoje recovering is now equally vital. His performances were back to his very best on the Lions tour and have stayed there since.

Ireland although away ARE favourites and rightly so given respective performances and how settled a side they have(barring Porter and Kelleher now).
England haven't clicked at all apart from v Italy and that was far from perfect. Couple in poor game last time by centres and wings then Ire rightly favourites.
Doesn't necessarily mean they will win though.

The loss of Porter and Kelleher and replacing Conan removes three ball carriers and reduces their attacking format and will drag Ireland into more of an arm wrestle. That's good news for England.
I wouldn't select any of the irish forwards on the bench over their English counter parts, again good news for England.
The English backs will needs to defend well but the midfield and back three all have solid defensive reputations, they just won't dominate. That will be key.

Recwatcher16 wrote: I wouldn't select any of the irish forwards on the bench over their English counter parts, again good news for England.

That may be so, but from numbers 16-20 I'd only take Marler onto Ireland's bench ahead of Kilcoyne. I'd take Herring over Blamire, I confess I know nothing about the latter but Herring showed last year he's quite capable of starting at this level. Bealham is perhaps not quite an international TH but again I don't know much about Stuart.
Big call to say you'd select Launchbury over Henderson, and again Dombrandt looks a very good player but you've snubbed the Lions starting 8 in Conan.
So possibly aside from the scrum I'm not too worried about the English bench either.

Ireland also have Henshaw wearing 23 who is up there with the outstanding backs in Europe in my opinion.

theslosty wrote:

Recwatcher16 wrote: I wouldn't select any of the irish forwards on the bench over their English counter parts, again good news for England.

That may be so, but from numbers 16-20 I'd only take Marler onto Ireland's bench ahead of Kilcoyne. I'd take Herring over Blamire, I confess I know nothing about the latter but Herring showed last year he's quite capable of starting at this level. Bealham is perhaps not quite an international TH but again I don't know much about Stuart.
Big call to say you'd select Launchbury over Henderson, and again Dombrandt looks a very good player but you've snubbed the Lions starting 8 in Conan.
So possibly aside from the scrum I'm not too worried about the English bench either.

Ireland also have Henshaw wearing 23 who is up there with the outstanding backs in Europe in my opinion.

Dombrandt has huge potential but is still feeling his way. Blamire is still very raw. Big, powerful and a very good carrier (Scored in every game in his first 4 internationals?) but line out throwing not quite so great. Stuart is huge and generally competent but overall a bit meh. Launchbury its hard to tell because he's not played much over the last couple of seasons but has been an absolutely terrific player for England in the past, although again he's not known for his line out skills.

As ever it will be interesting to see the ref's view of the set piece. It seems that feeding in the scrums is normal these days and I am not so sure that lineouts are much of a contest unless the thrower really messes up.

Recwatcher16 wrote:The loss of Porter and Kelleher and replacing Conan removes three ball carriers and reduces their attacking format and will drag Ireland into more of an arm wrestle. That's good news for England.
I wouldn't select any of the irish forwards on the bench over their English counter parts, again good news for England.
The English backs will needs to defend well but the midfield and back three all have solid defensive reputations, they just won't dominate. That will be key.

Give me Bealham over Stuart any day. That's on both current ability and potential too.

Hurts to say but I'd take Henderson easily over Launchbury these days too. Prime Launchbury I'd rate them fairly evenly with different strengths. These days I do think Launchbury has slowed a touch in the loose and he's only just back from injuries. I'd still 100% pick Launchbury given England's lock stocks are weaker now, his tight work is still very good, but Henderson is the better all round lock now for me.

Marler over Kilcoyne, though the latter is a good player who would probably be better recognised if not for Healy and now Porter.

Dombrandt/Conan and Blamire/Herring are close battles of players with different strengths.

Fairly evenly matched benches if you ask me.

No 7&1/2 wrote:ENGLAND XV

15. Freddie Steward

14. Max Malins

13. Joe Marchant

12. Henry Slade

11. Jack Nowell

10. Marcus Smith

9. Harry Randall

1. Ellis Genge

2. Jamie George

3. Kyle Sinckler

4. Maro Itoje

5. Charlie Ewels

6. Courtney Lawes (C)

7. Tom Curry

8. Sam Simmonds

FINISHERS

16.  Jamie Blamire

17. Joe Marler

18. Will Stuart

19. Joe Launchbury

20. Alex Dombrandt

21. Ben Youngs

22. George Ford

23. Elliot Daly

Decent team, would be better if it had Will Rowlands. Good prop replacements, still hard to look past Porter and Furlong in a world XV though.

Rowlands is Welsh so doesn't qualify to select.

What might have been…

Yeah. He could have been starting for Wasps tomorrow.

Itoje fit to start.

Good news on Itoje.

Is that a red.

Red card Ewels

Well thats the game.

Can’t argue that.

Game over england

Oh well - game over before it's even started

Ireland have caught wales syndrome

Silly silly from Eweles though

Frak awful tackle. When will players stop being such Frak idiots

Stay classy, Twickenham crowd

Insane decision, they headbutted each other.

Ireland all offside there

EnglishReign wrote:Insane decision, they headbutted each other.

Completely correct decision.

On the plus side Ewels won't be playing next week now ...

Gonna be a cricket score

Heaf wrote:On the plus side Ewels won't be playing next week now ...

He may not play for us again. Completely stuffed us with stupidity.

What on Earth is Randall doing taking a quick tap when. You’re down a man???

RC… wow.

GeordieFalcon wrote:Gonna be a cricket score

Very much damage limitation.

Definite red by the letter of the law but it doesn't feel like a satisfactory rugby incident for that to warrant a sending off.

No 7&1/2 wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:Insane decision, they headbutted each other.

Completely correct decision.

They ran into each other at pace…

EnglishReign wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:Insane decision, they headbutted each other.

Completely correct decision.

They ran into each other at pace…

And it's a clear red card.

Nonsense decision.

I’ve seen a few red cards like that and thought they were harsh. They need to review the law in that area for sure, but for now it’s the tacklers responsibility.

That's 3 games so far today ruined by reds ... players need to learn though. Having said that it still feels like there should be a better solution ...

No 7&1/2 wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:Insane decision, they headbutted each other.

Completely correct decision.

They ran into each other at pace…

And it's a clear red card.

There has to be intent, otherwise it should be a red for both. Just because Ewels made the tackle he gets a red? Rugby get more ridiculous every year.

Just like the Wales game last year, an utter farce.

EnglishReign wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

EnglishReign wrote:Insane decision, they headbutted each other.

Completely correct decision.

They ran into each other at pace…

And it's a clear red card.

There has to be intent, otherwise it should be a red for both. Just because Ewels made the tackle he gets a red? Rugby get more ridiculous every year.

I'm just going by the actual laws. If you don't agree that they should be as they are for enough. But you're fighting a losing battle if you think it's not a red by the actual laws as they are now.

EnglishReign wrote:Just like the Wales game last year, an utter farce.

What are you talking about that was a really good game….

Nowell 100% made the difference in that scrum

EnglishReign wrote:Just like the Wales game last year, an utter farce.

Was there a red card in that game?

It's a red, from an England fan. Dreadful tackling technique.

If players don't learn and behave sensibly, we won't have a sport.
Incredibly disappointed that the game (and championship from our POV) is ruined now, but it's the right call.

Marchant has started really busily.

Ffs. We really are stuffed.