Here we go again in 2008

After a false dawn last week, the England Rugby Union team proved, once again, that they are not well organised. They lost 14-28 to a reasonable but not briliiant Australian side who were also helped by rather a lot of strange decisions by the Southern Hemisphere ref from South Africa!

None the less, England were outplayed and while there is some excuse for the younger members of the side due to inexperience, some of the older members of the team played really badly. Jonno has a big task on his hands, methinks!

A great shame

On Sunday, in the Premiership semi-final, Danny Cipriani, the up and coming Wasps and England fly half, received an horrific injury when he was double tackled and the maul fell on top of him. He suffered a fracture dislocation of his right ankle, which is immensely painful and takes a long time to heal, even with immediate and specialist medical attention. This means he is out of the Premiership final and the forthcoming England tour. I hope he recovers as quickly as possible, and is back playing the game once he is ready.

When I played Rugby, many years ago, a friend of mine suffered a similar injury. It was horrible, as his foot was almost pointing backwards. He never played again, but he did take up refereeing, and pinged me many times, the bastard!

My best wishes goes to Danny and all others injured playing this most beautiful of games.

There is hope for England Rugby

While most of the present England XV seem well past their sell-by date, the U20 team has just won the U20 Grand Slam by beating the very good Irish U20 team handsomely. The players all seem very skilled and very keen, as do the coaching staff. Cannot wait until they all get their chance in the senior side.

Update
So England were not so bad as feared and managed a reasonable win against an Irish side not really firing on all cylinders. All the best players were the younger ones!

USELESS BLOODY ENGLAND

Scotland 15 England 9 Calcutta Cup

What excuse do England have this time? What does Ashton say to inspire them? You might as well play an amateur 2nd XV. At least they might play as a team!

Scotland were pretty bad, but they did not need to be good, because England were complete and total CRAP!

Time for a lot of bloodletting at team selection, from the coach downwards. I would rather see players who are maybe not quite so individually talented, but are prepared to play as a team!

Also, it is about time to start fining players who give away needless penalties, or keep kicking possession away to no purpose, their match fee!

Here we go again!!!

Once again, the England Rugby XV have managed to give away another game. Leading 19-3 at half time (it should have been 26-3 but for a dodgy video ref decision) they gave Wales every chance by giving away lots of stupid penalties and allowing them to score soft tries. I think the players should be paid by results, i.e. not paid when they give in so shamefully.

There must be something wrong at the RFU, when they cannot work out a way to let the best coach in the country, i.e. Shaun Edwards, coach part-time. Wales seemed to have managed it.

Furthermore, they will not let us sing a National Anthem, so we have to sing the dirge of the UK one instead. Get it together you guys, or give way for people who care!

A good game of Rugby

I have just watched a very good game of Rugby on the TV, in which The Barbarians beat South Africa 22-5. It was also a poignant occasion as it was Jason "Billy Whiz" Robinson's last competitive game. He played well but did not score and was substituted towards the end. Still, it was an exciting game to watch and I enjoyed it very much.

More good news is the next World Cup will have 20 teams, as this year. This will enable some of the minnows to appear on the world stage and gain support for Rugby in their countries. Wish I was still young enough to play!

BUGGER and double BUGGER

A combination of a few silly English moments, some strange refereeing decisions and an Aussie video ref meant that England narrowly lost to the Springboks, 6-15. Roll on 2011

Isn't it nice to beat the Aussies (again) ??

After all the arrogant bluster from the Aussie camp, England beat them 12-10 in the World Cup. It was not a pretty game, but at last England are learning that you start trying to play pretty Rugby when you are 20 points ahead!

Unfortunately, the big mouthed Aussie from work has left so I cannot rub his face in it, and we just have a much more polite Kiwi to contend with. I suspect I might not be able to rub his face in it next week, but, hey, England are playing much better again.

You never know what might happen next week, but they will have to raise their game still more to beat the All Blacks (or France if the pull off an equally unlikely win tonight!)

Back to the Gloucester/Leicester game for the second half now.

Update:

Well done, France! Those are words I thought I would never utter! Now looking forward to ragging Kiwi Bloke at work rotten!

Ok, so England are not a total loss

At times, in today's game against Samoa, England looks a half-decent Rugby side, but they still had patches where they looked like amateurs. At least with Jonny Wilkinson fit again and Olly Barkley back, the backs looked as if they wanted to score occasionally

Final score 44-22

Nearly had an interesting turnaround in the South Africa/Tonga game. Tonga almost won and were a bit unlucky not too! Could be a bit tricky for England next week!

Final score 30-25

What did we learn from this Saturday's Rugby?

I think that from the Rugby matches played yesterday, I learned the following:-

England have no hope of retaining the World Cup

France are unlikely to win the World Cup

Unless they play better than they did yesterday, Wales and Argentina may not make it past the first round.

Oh well, roll on 2011

England cave in again!

After watching the second Rugby international match against the Spingboks, I am once again left frustrated and angry. For the first hour England were very good and were even leading at half time.

Then someone noticed, "Hey guys, we are playing well and making a real game of this. We should not being doing that. Start playing like drains again, as we are supposed to!"

Still there were only 3 soft tries this time. South Africa were never going to lose, but the way England caved in in the second half to let them create another cricket score was pathetic!

Flash in the Pan

So England beating France in the Six Nations was just a flash in the pan.

Wales 27 England 18.

Bugger!

Quelle Suprise!

England actually played like a half-decent Rugby team and beat France. I look forward to taunting my French colleagues at work.

On a separate topic, what is that idiot David Cameron on about, taxing travel even more? We do not all get expenses paid trips all the time and I have to travel by air for work. Also, some of us have, or will have, relatives who are abroad and we would like to visit from time to time. If you ask me, it goes to prove that smoking dope as a teenager does affect you mental abilities. And, before anyone asks, No, I do not go along with the "It's all mans fault" theory (or should I say hypothesis) of climate change. I have more than a sneaking suspicion that sunspots have more to do with it than what sort of car I drive! I was think of voting Tory again, but this indicates I should stick with UKIP!