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Thread: 4 Nations

  1. #651
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    Quote Originally Posted by Twentyman View Post
    It was same old same old. We compete for 40-50 minutes then drop off. The Aussies score a couple of quick tries and it's game over. A few points I'd like to make...

    Bennett going with 3 different halfback combinations in successive matches. I'm not buying that that doesn't disrupt the flow of the team. Why pick Brown if you're going to have Widdop doing most of the kicking? Widnes score so many tries off the back of his kicking game yet he wasn't allowed to do the same for England.

    People were pointing out Percival's errors but Watkins made a few howlers, one in particular cost us a try from the scrum.

    Sam Burgess is a liability. He costs us so many penalties.

    Just massively disappointed that yet again, I've got tickets for an international final and I've gotta watch it as a neutral.
    Chopping and changing the halfback partnership has been a disaster. Unless a player is injured its never ideal making a change at either scrum half or stand off in my opinion.
    I'd go even further that the best half back combinations are nearly always players who play for the same club or have at least had the time to understand each others game.
    It's no conincidence that Australia and the Queensland Origin team has been successful for so long with Cronk and Thurston and prior to that Lockyer and Thurston and in the same way here at Saints the Long and Martyn and Goulding and Martyn combinations worked so well as the Burrow and McGuire combination has done so for Leeds over the years.

    I'm not really sure what Bennett has acheived by changing the half back partnership in each game? Players may well have underperformed and so were dropped but but it also suggests that Bennett didn't know what his best 6 and 7 partnership was going to be and that's never a good situation to be in.

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    Australia head coach Mal Meninga: "It was a torrid game, very physical. England got off to a great start, we hung in there pretty well. We fixed a few things up, probably played more direct and got the result we're after. England are going places = HOME EARLY.
    Bennett now says a lot - which I think most fans would agree with.

    Bennett soon loosened up, though, adding: "The problem is our inability to continually maintain pressure... not finding the sideline on two occasions, which is pretty important in any context let alone against the best team in the world. Then the stupid penalties we continually give away.

    "England are very capable of being a lot better than they are right now. A lot closer than all of you in this room realise.

    "Until we get these little problems out of the road... that's manifested by their club football, I have seen that and they get away with it at that level, you can't at this, that's the difference".
    "The problems will be insurmountable if they don't have a change of attitude and buy into what I know works and won't work any other way. If they don't recognise what's beating them and change their attitude and physical behaviour on the field..."

    Even poster boy Sam Burgess was not exempt, Bennett telling the captain he "needs to change" his habit of giving away penalties for club and country.

    "It's not just English-based players that have got the problem," he said.
    He is basically saying the effort is there but the attitude and discipline aren't. IMO he needs to identify a real leader on the pitch as there is no real direction or tactical awareness. With a few more brain cells we would have beaten NZ and at least got to the final (...and lost)

  3. #653
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    Quote Originally Posted by saint at wire View Post
    Australia head coach Mal Meninga: "It was a torrid game, very physical. England got off to a great start, we hung in there pretty well. We fixed a few things up, probably played more direct and got the result we're after. England are going places = HOME EARLY.
    Bennett now says a lot - which I think most fans would agree with.

    He is basically saying the effort is there but the attitude and discipline aren't. IMO he needs to identify a real leader on the pitch as there is no real direction or tactical awareness. With a few more brain cells we would have beaten NZ and at least got to the final (...and lost)
    So Bennett says the stupid mistakes are due to the standard of our club football..... so why did Widdop miss touch with a penalty whilst we were still in the game?

    Also, is it just me or is Hodgson's distribution off the floor really slow?

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    Good point about our refs . I remember a few years ago , Saints played an Aussie side Russell Smith was the ref , he gave the Aussies everything . Then went reffing in Aus . Hicks was the same . But tbh the Aussies are in a different class to us
    Quote Originally Posted by Scouse Don View Post
    Not that bothered.Bennett will have a much better idea of what he has and what he needs. Basically if we had cut out all the individual errors we would have had a much better chance.

    Not finding touch twice is a real coach killer and left us chasing the game when they both resulted in points against and turned the momentum of the game.

    Personally I don't think Hicks refereed fairly.He allowed the aussies more leeway in slowing the ptb and that gave them a huge advantage.

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    Quote Originally Posted by saint at wire View Post
    Australia head coach Mal Meninga: "It was a torrid game, very physical. England got off to a great start, we hung in there pretty well. We fixed a few things up, probably played more direct and got the result we're after. England are going places = HOME EARLY.
    Bennett now says a lot - which I think most fans would agree with.



    He is basically saying the effort is there but the attitude and discipline aren't. IMO he needs to identify a real leader on the pitch as there is no real direction or tactical awareness. With a few more brain cells we would have beaten NZ and at least got to the final (...and lost)


    Burgess (Sam) can't deal with aggression. The Aussie forwards had him on toast. Also, when Cronk had a go at Watkins for taking him out, rather than protest his innocence, Watkins should have belted him. Perfect opportunity he had there

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    Quote Originally Posted by FearTheVee View Post
    So Bennett says the stupid mistakes are due to the standard of our club football..... so why did Widdop miss touch with a penalty whilst we were still in the game?

    Also, is it just me or is Hodgson's distribution off the floor really slow?
    I think Bennett was out of order when he said that, hardly any of the Aussie based players turned up and he kept picking Widdop who has been rotten all year.

    Let's face it this situation where the coach is away from Britain doesn't work, it didn't work with MacNamara and its certainly no better with Bennett. We need a uk based coach.



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    Quote Originally Posted by Ralph Fridge View Post
    Burgess (Sam) can't deal with aggression. The Aussie forwards had him on toast. Also, when Cronk had a go at Watkins for taking him out, rather than protest his innocence, Watkins should have belted him. Perfect opportunity he had there
    Spot on, no biff and it sanitises the game too much. When Burgess connected late in it got everyone going, the fans and the team my non league watching Nate turned to me and said "it's no good warming up now" and he was right.

    We last beat the Aussies 10 years ago when Fielden got mullered and Peacock took on Mason. These days there are no flash points like that to get the game going. It's becoming boring and 35,000 tells it's own story. No one is that bothered anymore not even the players it seems

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    Quote Originally Posted by FearTheVee View Post
    So Bennett says the stupid mistakes are due to the standard of our club football..... so why did Widdop miss touch with a penalty whilst we were still in the game?

    Also, is it just me or is Hodgson's distribution off the floor really slow?
    Not just you. He always seems to be looking for a killer pass, and he only then passes it to the first receiver (often high) once he's realised there isn't one on. He does sometimes pick out a lovely pass (there was one that created an overlap for Hall in the first half), but the majority of the time it just means slow ball for the halves, which probably contributed to how panicked our last tackles were throughout the tournament. It does make you realise how crisp Roby's distribution is.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Dux View Post
    passes it to the first receiver (often high)
    Noticed this, The number of times the first receiver had to reach up above their head or once or twice even jump to catch his pass. It slows the pass right down when the catcher has to do that.

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    Quote Originally Posted by parrsaint View Post
    Chopping and changing the halfback partnership has been a disaster. Unless a player is injured its never ideal making a change at either scrum half or stand off in my opinion.
    I'd go even further that the best half back combinations are nearly always players who play for the same club or have at least had the time to understand each others game.
    It's no conincidence that Australia and the Queensland Origin team has been successful for so long with Cronk and Thurston and prior to that Lockyer and Thurston and in the same way here at Saints the Long and Martyn and Goulding and Martyn combinations worked so well as the Burrow and McGuire combination has done so for Leeds over the years.

    I'm not really sure what Bennett has acheived by changing the half back partnership in each game? Players may well have underperformed and so were dropped but but it also suggests that Bennett didn't know what his best 6 and 7 partnership was going to be and that's never a good situation to be in.
    Yeah, it surprised me when I read the team sheet yesterday. But Bennett is his own man, and isn't afraid to make a decision. The halves are our weakest part of the team and we will have to find a combination to develop moving forwards. For mine I would have gone with Gale & Williams following on from the Scotland game. Kevin Brown didn't do a lot wrong, but I'd be very surprised if he was in the team for the world cup next year, and this is what England should be building towards. Gareth Widdop? I'm not sure what his best position is, and as I say, if he offers more than Gale or Williams in the halves.

    Regards,

    STEVO

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ralph Fridge View Post
    Burgess (Sam) can't deal with aggression. The Aussie forwards had him on toast. Also, when Cronk had a go at Watkins for taking him out, rather than protest his innocence, Watkins should have belted him. Perfect opportunity he had there



    I said exactly the same to my Dad at the time. Cronk squares up & Watkins cowers. Can you imagine the same from Inglis if George Williams did the same to him?

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    Quote Originally Posted by tilly2006 View Post
    [/B]

    I said exactly the same to my Dad at the time. Cronk squares up & Watkins cowers. Can you imagine the same from Inglis if George Williams did the same to him?
    Perhaps it's a glimpse of the mindset of too many England players; that they were too respectful & in awe of their opponents.

    Or maybe Watkins is just a sh*t-out soft-arse.

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    I think Sam Burgess is probably in need of a good off season. He's been playing pretty much constant rugby since 2014.

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    Quote Originally Posted by fishy3005 View Post
    Burgess boys having a post match laugh with their NRL compadres. Complete joke. The ozzy team gets more and more average every year but still ahead of us.
    Plenty folk called McNamara but i reckon England were a lot better under him. This England team throughout the tournament has looked flat and lacked cohesion and sync. I think their has been no team spirit. Their has been divides between club and club, NRL and super league etc.
    I think this is one of the reasons why these kinds of test matches in the last 5 years don't even compare to those of 10+ years ago.
    When we beat Australia in 2006 in the Fielden/Mason game, there was only Adrian Morley playing for England who was playing in the NRL.
    These days its too friendly between players with a lot being team mates - Graham Klemmer, Burgess' Inglis, Widdop Frizzell Dougan ect...
    There's no rivalry anymore - no hatred between the two nations. Too much mutual respect and not enough fight. Add the fact there's no 'biff' allowed to get the momentum swung with a big shot or a good scrap its just too easy for Australia to go through the motions and win a game off the back of that. Our players simply aren't as talented and we can't win a game based purely on talent alone. We need that passion that was on show in the 2006 era when we were the Great British Lions, England Rugby League just isnt working.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Drake920 View Post
    I think this is one of the reasons why these kinds of test matches in the last 5 years don't even compare to those of 10+ years ago.
    When we beat Australia in 2006 in the Fielden/Mason game, there was only Adrian Morley playing for England who was playing in the NRL.
    These days its too friendly between players with a lot being team mates - Graham Klemmer, Burgess' Inglis, Widdop Frizzell Dougan ect...
    There's no rivalry anymore - no hatred between the two nations. Too much mutual respect and not enough fight. Add the fact there's no 'biff' allowed to get the momentum swung with a big shot or a good scrap its just too easy for Australia to go through the motions and win a game off the back of that. Our players simply aren't as talented and we can't win a game based purely on talent alone. We need that passion that was on show in the 2006 era when we were the Great British Lions, England Rugby League just isnt working.
    Yesterdays game did have the look and feel of a much sanitised game. Test matches used to be a lot more high pressured games but it simply did not have that look and feel yesterday. Like you have said there is too much of a friendly mentality between players and not enough controlled agression and passion. A number of people commented on Twitter that a lot of the English players swapped thier jerseys at the end of the game. Whilst I know this normally goes on after games it seemed a lot more than usual and I'd suggest there simply isnt the same level of respect for the England jersey. As much as the RFL needed the Sport England money our identity as the GB Lions was lost. One of the things which struct me as well yesterday was at the start of the Broadcast when they were showing lots of clips from GB v Australia. It somehow meant a lot more back then.
    Last edited by parrsaint; 14th November 2016 at 12:16.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Drake920 View Post
    I think this is one of the reasons why these kinds of test matches in the last 5 years don't even compare to those of 10+ years ago.
    When we beat Australia in 2006 in the Fielden/Mason game, there was only Adrian Morley playing for England who was playing in the NRL.
    These days its too friendly between players with a lot being team mates - Graham Klemmer, Burgess' Inglis, Widdop Frizzell Dougan ect...
    There's no rivalry anymore - no hatred between the two nations. Too much mutual respect and not enough fight. Add the fact there's no 'biff' allowed to get the momentum swung with a big shot or a good scrap its just too easy for Australia to go through the motions and win a game off the back of that. Our players simply aren't as talented and we can't win a game based purely on talent alone. We need that passion that was on show in the 2006 era when we were the Great British Lions, England Rugby League just isnt working.
    The Aussies don't seem to have a problem with "passion" in the State of Origin do they? Do you think that bit of biff would have stopped so soon had it been a Wane coached team? Is that an option further down the line?

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    I detest Wane......can't stand him but I am sure the general friendly nature of the games would disappear. We need to get in their faces and wind them up, be belligerent and make them think twice about what our blokes are going to do when they pressurise a kick for example. There is no sense of jeopardy, they know we will back off and so they are calm under pressure as they know the kick chase is just a token gesture.

    In terms of State of Origin, the past few seasons have been pretty stale and again it seems to have coincided with the "no fighting" set up RL has these days. It just sanitises the game to the point of tedium.

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    Quote Originally Posted by FearTheVee View Post
    So Bennett says the stupid mistakes are due to the standard of our club football..... so why did Widdop miss touch with a penalty whilst we were still in the game?

    Also, is it just me or is Hodgson's distribution off the floor really slow?
    Wasn't impressed with Bennett's post match interview at all. It was easy for him to blame our club football but a lot of our NRL England players just didn't show up to provide any intensity over long periods. Hodgson distribution is as you say very slow, I remember McBanana taking Hodgson off and putting Roby on to get forward momentum and quicker ball away from the ruck. If you look at our England pivots of 1, 6, 7, 9 and 13 nearly all of them played below par especially the NRL ones, so I think Bennett's stupid mistakes comment is a cop out, it showed the dressing room at half time and Bennett's didn't look as though he was going to speak to the players and when asked about this at post match....he said "no comment".

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    WRT Bennett, the RFL must be thinking "what have we done?"

    I wouldn't be surprised to see a mutually-agreed parting of the ways before the next World Cup.

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    Quote Originally Posted by fishy3005 View Post
    Burgess boys having a post match laugh with their NRL compadres. Complete joke. The ozzy team gets more and more average every year but still ahead of us.
    Plenty folk called McNamara but i reckon England were a lot better under him. This England team throughout the tournament has looked flat and lacked cohesion and sync. I think their has been no team spirit. Their has been divides between club and club, NRL and super league etc.
    Spot on, 100%. I thought exactly the same, and with so many of our lads now playing and living in Australia it really does prevent them having any real kind of on-field hatred of the old enemy. In the old days it felt like we were defending British RL against the Aussies, and trying to prove to them that our comp and our country could compete with them, whereas now these boys come back for a month and play Test matches against their mates who they play with and against for 8 months of the year, and maybe they have lost that feeling of needing to prove something to the Aussies at Test level because they will feel like they have already done it numerous times at club level.

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    Quote Originally Posted by FearTheVee View Post
    So Bennett says the stupid mistakes are due to the standard of our club football..... so why did Widdop miss touch with a penalty whilst we were still in the game?

    Also, is it just me or is Hodgson's distribution off the floor really slow?
    No it's not just you. I thought he was pretty slow all round. He really looked like he had no energy. The way he played in this series, not a patch on Houghton

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    Quote Originally Posted by Belgian Saint View Post
    No it's not just you. I thought he was pretty slow all round. He really looked like he had no energy. The way he played in this series, not a patch on Houghton






    Clark should not have been dropped either.

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    Quote Originally Posted by tilly2006 View Post
    [/B]

    I said exactly the same to my Dad at the time. Cronk squares up & Watkins cowers. Can you imagine the same from Inglis if George Williams did the same to him?


    I felt embarrassed for the lad. Our halves squaring up to one of their centres would have resulted in a slap I am sure

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    Quote Originally Posted by STIDDY View Post
    Wasn't impressed with Bennett's post match interview at all. It was easy for him to blame our club football but a lot of our NRL England players just didn't show up to provide any intensity over long periods. Hodgson distribution is as you say very slow, I remember McBanana taking Hodgson off and putting Roby on to get forward momentum and quicker ball away from the ruck. If you look at our England pivots of 1, 6, 7, 9 and 13 nearly all of them played below par especially the NRL ones, so I think Bennett's stupid mistakes comment is a cop out, it showed the dressing room at half time and Bennett's didn't look as though he was going to speak to the players and when asked about this at post match....he said "no comment".
    In fairness to Bennett he also said
    It's not just English-based players that have got the problem," he said.
    .

    I also think he is correct in saying at SL level you can get away with one or two mistakes but if you are playing international RL against Aus you can't. It seems self evident to me.

    I also agree with this comment
    Bennett sees no problem with the quality and skill set of his players, but he has identified fatal attitude flaws when it comes to making on-the-field decisions.
    There was no leader (certainly Sam is not one) and we ended up after a goodish first half running around like headless chickens. In the NZ game we should have won but very bad decision making in the last 15 mins caused us to think we could score on every play instead of taking the 1 point and then get about scoring tries.

    However, having said all that I agree Hodgson was poor and on this form should not even be in the squad. It appears that Captain Sam the penalty machine is undroppable, his brothers were hardly better and I'd alsolike to know what Taylor has done to upset Bennett for his non inclusion,

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