Tag: Rugby

Check out the video highlights from Round Two of the Premiership season.

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With the dust having settled on Round Three of the Rugby Championship, we’ve studied the action to pick our standout players from the weekend.

After making it three wins from three, there’s nine All Blacks in our side with three apiece from the Wallabies and Pumas. The Springboks therefore find themselves without a representative.

Rugby Championship: Team of Round Three

15 Ben Smith (New Zealand): Such an intelligent player, who was a constant threat on attack in his side’s victory against Argentina in Nelson. Smith delivered a busy shift with ball in hand gaining 85 metres from 14 runs which included two clean breaks and seven defenders beaten. Emiliano Boffelli and Dane Haylett-Petty also played well for Argentina and Australia respectively.

14 Nehe Milner-Skudder (New Zealand): Made a rare run-on appearance for the All Blacks but did well despite being tested on defence by the Pumas’ dangerous attackers. Milner-Skudder made nine tackles but made a bigger impact on attack where he gained 48 metres from eight runs with two clean breaks, two defenders beaten, an offload and was rewarded with try for his efforts. Springbok flyer Makazole Mapimpi also played well before leaving the field through injury at half-time in his side’s loss to the Wallabies in Brisbane.

13 Jack Goodhue (New Zealand): Another superb performance from the young Crusader who has now cemented his place in the world champions’ starting line-up. Goodhue’s running lines were superb and he scored a well-taken try but also stood up well in defence. Gained 56 metres after completing 10 runs with three clean breaks, eight defenders beaten and he also managed an offload as well as 11 hits. Reece Hodge of Australia was next best.

12 Matt Toomua (Australia): A standout performer in Brisbane, the Leicester Tiger returned to the Wallabies’ starting line-up and took his opportunity well. Combined nicely with Hodge in midfield and contributed 15 points via a try, two penalties and two conversions. Toomua’s goalkicking was particularly impressive as he finished with a 100 percent record off the tee. All Blacks replacement Anton Lienert-Brown also caught the eye.

11 Ramiro Moyano (Argentina): The Test rookie came to the fore with several excellent attacking runs in Nelson and scored arguably the best try of the round. Moyano’s brilliance on attack kept the All Blacks’ defence on their toes and he finished with 106 metres gained from 10 carries with six defenders beaten, three clean breaks and an offload.

10 Nicolas Sanchez (Argentina): Argentina may have lost to the All Blacks but they did not go down without a fight and leading the way was Sanchez, who impressed as his side’s chief playmaker. Won his personal duel with Richie Mo’unga and kept the All Blacks’ defenders busy with a polished attacking display. Sanchez eventually finished with a 14-point haul courtesy of a try, three conversions and a penalty and beats out Australia’s Kurtley Beale.

9 TJ Perenara (New Zealand): Came into the world champions’ starting line-up and took his chance with a superb all-round performance. Perenara delivered a slick service to his backs and kept his forwards on the front foot with clever offloads. He rounded off a superb performance by crossing for a brace of tries and comes in ahead of Will Genia, who also impressed in Brisbane.

8 Kieran Read (New Zealand): Gets in ahead of opposite number Javier Ortega Desio after his try-scoring showing at Trafalgar Park on Saturday. While Desio was strong in several areas, he did lose possession five times with Read his usual tidy self in all aspects.

7 Ardie Savea (New Zealand): Michael Hooper deserves a mention after he helped lead Australia to victory over South Africa, despite struggling with a hamstring injury. However, we opt for Savea here after his tireless showing for the All Blacks that saw him finish with a huge 21 tackles and 13 carries for 43 metres. His game is improving all the time and this start will give him confidence.

6 Shannon Frizell (New Zealand): Nailed on for this jersey after an outstanding performance in Nelson. Frizell grabbed this chance with both hands and was everywhere in the first-half for New Zealand, causing Argentina so many problems with his carries at space. One journalist likened Frizell to the great Michael Jones, such was his performance, as he now puts pressure on Liam Squire for the six jersey.

5 Tomas Lavanini (Argentina): That was one of Lavanini’s best performances for the Pumas as he put his size to excellent use while keeping his discipline in check, making him a nuisance to New Zealand. He finished with 16 carries – only Marcos Kremer had more for Argentina – while he also made the second most tackles for the Pumas. If only he could bottle that showing and replicate it in every fixture.

4 Rory Arnold (Australia): The Wallabies needed to front up after their players were dropping like flies. Adam Coleman’s late withdrawal did not rattle Arnold, who combined well with Izack Rodda and later Rob Simmons in a strong showing against a powerful Bok pack.

3 Allan Alaalatoa (Australia): Despite all the upheaval in selection before kick-off, the Wallaby pack can hold their heads high after that win. Alaalatoa is one of those who impressed and could well have nailed down the three jersey moving forward, with Taniela Tupou an incredible option to have coming off the bench as he showed on Saturday. Owen Franks was solid in black but we pick Alaalatoa.

2 Codie Taylor (New Zealand): Dane Coles is nearing his return but in all honesty the All Blacks have not missed the hooker because of Taylor’s excellent form. Once again he stood out in open play with his pass to Milner-Skudder for his try another excellent bit of skill from the Crusader. He made over 40 metres with ball in hand against Argentina and throwing in 11 tackles added to a strong outing.

1 Karl Tu’inukuafe (New Zealand): It was another solid performance from the 25-year-old as he fills in for the injured Joe Moody. Strong in the set-piece and impressive around the field, Tu’inukuafe edges out Steven Kitshoff to this jersey after the Bok pressed his claims for a regular starting spot at loosehead. But Tu’inukuafe, a former nightclub bouncer, gets the nod here into our team.

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Check out the highlights from Round Three of the Top 14 season.

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Check out the highlights from Round Two of the PRO14 season.

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Scarlets have received a boost with the news that Wales prop Rob Evans will not require surgery after undergoing a shoulder scan on Tuesday.

The powerful loosehead was forced off in his team’s 23-21 PRO14 victory over Leinster on Saturday with what head coach Wayne Pivac initially described as a shoulder or pectoral injury.

Pivac also saw Johnny McNicholl, Josh Macleod and Jake Ball join Evans in leaving the field against Leinster, but the news on all four men is upbeat.

“It’s good news actually. Rob is a bit sore and Josh is the same, but no surgeries are required so that’s very pleasing. We’ll reassess them again next week,” Pivac said.

“We’ll have to wait another week and we’ll have a better idea on timelines then. Rob’s probably the best scenario and hopefully we will have him in back in two to three weeks.

“Johnny will be training fully on Tuesday and Jake is training too.”

Scarlets got their season up and running against Leinster, but will still be without Wales and British & Irish Lions centre Jonathan Davies for the next few weeks.

The midfield ace is currently nursing a hamstring problem.

Scarlets are at home to unbeaten Italian side Benetton on Saturday.

“We’re not rushing Jon. We want to get him 100 per cent right. There’s a lot of big rugby coming up and we’re doing OK in the centre position at the moment,” Pivac said.

“The way things have gone for us so far this season we’re quite happy with how those results have turned out.

“Wyn Jones trained fully on Monday and if he comes through scrums on Tuesday he’ll be back in contention for the weekend. Uzair Cassiem is back running and is just around the corner to make a return.

“Dylan Evans has had a bit of a bump to his shoulder, because of what we’ve got coming up we’re rehabbing him.

“With potentially losing two looseheads to the international window we need to be sensible there.”

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World Rugby have confirmed that the Rugby World Cup is set to be expanded to include 24 teams from the current 20 by the 2023 tournament.

The World Cup has featured 20 teams since the 1999 tournament in Wales, but World Rugby CEO Brett Gosper says it is highly likely that next year’s tournament in Japan will be the last to do so.

“We’re always looking from an expansive point of view rather than reducing, so it’s just a question of when rather than if,” Gosper told British media.

“We want to make sure the teams are competitive enough to move to a 24-team tournament. We have assumed 20 for 2023 but we could change that between now and 2023.

“The tendency for us is to try and look to expand. It’s about growing the global game — getting interest from fans and commercial interest in new markets.

“But you’ve got to make sure you’ve got the teams. We’re definitely in an expansive mindset, is how I’d put it.”

19 of the 20 teams for next year’s global showpiece have booked their places, with the final country to be decided at a repechage tournament in Marseille in November.

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This week we will mostly be concerning ourselves with World Cup expansion, club owners and a possible rule change taken from rugby league.

It will be a welcome day indeed for the rugby world when the governing body decides to implement its latest change to the World Cup and increase the number of teams.

25 nations have hitherto appeared in the game’s showpiece, a somewhat paltry return for a – mostly throughout its history – 20-team competition. Discount the number of teams who have made fewer than three appearances and you’re down to the bog standard 20. While those five, and indeed a good four or five of the remaining 20, have contributed to many a special World Cup story, you feel that that number just isn’t quite enough any more.

There’s enough of a groundswell of popularity in places like Russia, Germany, Hong Kong and Chile that the global game will benefit from adding those fans to the mix, and there’s enough good quality coaching seeping around the world that these teams will be far better prepared than the Ivory Coast ever was for its lone World Cup turn. Sceptical of that? Germany’s coach for the November repechage tournament will be Mike Ford, father of George, ex of Bath and Toulon. Two of the other coaches in the repechage are Peter de Villiers and Kingsley Jones, neither of them strangers to top tier teams.

But there is still some debate about when this expansion will come: 2023 or 2027. And we’re going to make our position here indelibly clear: much as we think the expansion is a good thing, it has to be 2027.

Why? Because if it is 2023, there will still be room for project players, i.e. those who upped sticks from places like Cape Town and settled in places like Bucharest for no other reason than to garner a few international caps. While we are all for the expansion, it robs the tournament of some credibility when the newly-qualified teams are furnished with any number of journeyman southern hemisphere reinforcements popping over as they near their 30s to pick up some glory.

The 2027 watershed, on the other hand, means that any such journeymen will have had to qualify through five years of residency and wait a couple of extra years; i.e. probably long enough to get a passport, certainly learn the language and definitely long enough to not stand out so suddenly in squad announcements just after the preceding World Cup.

Rugby’s global popularity has improved in leaps and bounds over the past few years, as has the spread of quality around tier two nations and below. An expansion in 2027, will, in respect of the above, make sure that the game continues to expand to those unions and teams creating sustainable infrastructures within their national borders, as opposed to those nations spending a pretty penny to the detriment of their playing natives.

Premiership Rugby statement ???? pic.twitter.com/0Vv2jgte43

— Alastair Eykyn (@alastaireykyn) September 11, 2018

On the subject of pretty pennies…

If English rugby was not exactly holding its breath this week, it must surely have at least been looking at the heavens with suspicious eyes as CVC circled.

As we go to press the story has broken that Premiership Rugby has rejected the takeover bid from the private equity firm for a majority share in England’s club game, a bid apparently worth some GBP275m.

It’s perhaps an eyebrow-raising decision too, considering the story two weeks ago about how much the Premiership clubs were – mostly – losing weighed up against the GBP17m windfall the CVC takeover would have bestowed upon them.

Leaving aside the reputation CVC has garnered for plundering such assets – Formula One is not one iota better off for CVC’s 12-year ownership – one wonders what the consequences would have been in England and throughout European rugby had that sale gone through.

Further club v country ructions would surely have followed, as would Premiership ring-fencing and the likelihood of a further increase in fixtures: hardly what the game needs right now. The Champions Cup might have suffered – would CVC have tolerated any intrusion on its turf from the likes of Connacht or Pau?

No, if rugby is doing well enough that England’s league is valued at GBP275m, then we can enjoy the status quo, losses and all for a while yet – at least, that seems to be the attitude of the club owners who vetoed the CVC offer. And fair play to them. Almost to a man, they have been the benefactors from whose money the club game has grown, many of them sinking pound after pound into their clubs with little likelihood of return on investment beyond personal satisfaction. But when the cash was dangled before their eyes, they took the satisfaction. As will we.

Interesting…

Ospreys head coach Allen Clarke raised an intriguing suggestion in last weekend’s Sunday Times: that a kick which bounces into touch in the opposition 22 would be rewarded with an attacking line-out.

What it would mean, in theory, is that wingers and full-back would have to hang deeper to defend against such kicks, leaving a near-permanent overlap on the gain-line.

It’s long been a feature of rugby league and we’re struggling to find fault with it, beyond rendering the blitz and press defence near-obsolete. Your thoughts?

Loose Pass compiled by Lawrence Nolan

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Bristol Bears flanker George Smith has been cleared to play after appearing before an independent disciplinary panel on Tuesday evening.

Smith was shown a red card by referee Andrew Jackson in the 47th minute of the Premiership match between Saracens and Bristol Bears last Saturday.

This was for an adjudged dangerous tackle on Saracens’ Jackson Wray contrary to law 9.13.

Smith contested the charge and it was dismissed by the panel comprising Gareth Graham (chair), with Jamie Corsi and Olly Kohn.

Smith is free to play again immediately.

Panel chair Gareth Graham said: “The independent panel had the benefit of viewing this incident from a number of different angles. The footage did not clearly show whether or not there was direct contact between the Player and the head of Jackson Wray.

“The panel heard evidence from Wray who said that he could not remember whether there was direct contact with his chin; he said that this was a big collision which was well-timed.

“The player explained his actions in detail and assisted the panel by demonstrating how the tackle had been carried out. He demonstrated how the position of the ball was important as to how the tackle situation developed, as it created an effect whereby it caused Wray to bounce backwards in the collision.

“The panel concluded on the balance of probabilities that the initial contact did not involve any direct contact to the head of Jackson Wray. Wray was off-balance in the tackle and the force of the tackle and the effect of the ball being between the two players caused Wray’s head to ‘whip’ backwards.

“On Wray’s own evidence, there was then a glancing contact to the underneath of his chin which was incidental to an otherwise legitimate tackle. In the panel’s view, and taking into account all of its rugby experience, that glancing contact did not pass the red card threshold.”

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South Africa assistant coach Matt Proudfoot says his side will play to their strengths when they face New Zealand in Wellington on Saturday.

Coming off the back of losses to Argentina and Australia, the Springboks are looking to put in a response against the pace-setting All Blacks.

Proudfoot has insisted this fixture will be settled up front and wants his charges to give a solid account of themselves at Westpac Stadium.

“I think a game between South Africa and New Zealand boils down to getting your basics right. So set-phase and the breakdown are two crucial areas for us because they have a fantastic scrum, they put your line-out under pressure and attack the gain-line,” he explained.

“We have the mentality that we’re looking to improve each week and as a pack we are relishing the opportunity to come out and show what we can do.”

Proudfoot admitted the two sides have contrasting styles but that was what makes matches between South Africa and New Zealand such fascinating prospects.

“That’s one of the aspects which makes a fixture between these rugby rivals such an interesting affair,” he added.

“We are going to play to our strengths and they will continue to play to their strengths. They have a particular style and we have our own style, and you’re not going to change the things what you’ve been doing for the past six weeks in the week before an All Blacks Test.”

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Newcastle Falcons have added depth to their front-row stocks with the acquisition of former Wales prop Craig Mitchell on a three-month deal.

The 32-year-old has been capped 15 times by Wales and joins the Falcons having already played twice for their second-string side in the Premiership Rugby Shield over the past fortnight.

Newcastle’s director of rugby Dean Richards said: “Craig is a vastly-experienced campaigner who can add to our depth at a time when we have been hit by a number of injuries to our props.

“We have had a good look at him in action for our A-Team over the last couple of Shield games, and it’s great to be able to draft him in for the next three months.”

Making his professional breakthrough with the Ospreys, for whom he played 24 times in the PRO14 and a further seven in Europe, Mitchell then moved to Exeter Chiefs, turning out 26 times in the Premiership and eight in Europe.

Switching to Cardiff Blues for two years and the Dragons for one, Mitchell spent the tail end of last season with Championship side Yorkshire Carnegie and is already in training with the Falcons squad.

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