wixfjord wrote: ↑January 22nd, 2023, 5:30 pm
A few points on the re-watch that stuck out to me:
- Ross Byrne has really improved his attacking game so much.
- Joe McCarthy is still a really, really raw player. That's a good thing (ferocious hits and real natural athleticism) but also a bad thing (way too loose at times and gives away stupid penalties).
- Sheehan is well ahead of Kelleher at the moment. Better thrower and massive impact on open play.
- Doris was very quiet, obviously too a knock but even before that. Conan was excellent. Back to his best and really looked confident out there.
- Baird's impact was massive. He's taking great lines off slow ball and making 2-3 yards and quick ball.
- Our kicking game has improved a lot this year. Keenan/Byrne in particular.
- I thought that was a game we missed Ngatai/Lowe. Backline at times was a little lacking in punch and got buffeted a few times well behind gainline.
- Having Furlong/Jenkins available to us is now more important than anyone else in the team.
- I thought we tried to play too wide and not direct enough in first half. At end of the half we had a period of pick and gos and looked much better imo. However, it was clearly a ploy again to go really aggressive early and tire Racing out, which worked, just like the Le Harve game.
- If you look at that game with a cool head, we basically shot ourselves in the foot while cruising in first half (Byrne kick, Larmour yellow and try) and the second try was a pure fluke from the blocked kick. Performance wasn't great but we still beat a solid Racing team by a big score while missing multiple Lions and some key players. We know exactly where we need to tighten up and improve for the knockouts too.
It was also a good game, a good standard of rugby. I thought it was an enjoyable game when I was at it, but looking back on it, it was better than that. Their tackling is really outstanding, as is their discipline – not something that you always get with a French side away from home.
Lowe is world class – one of the three best left wings in the world [Koroibete, Lowe, Mapimpi or Arendtse] in my opinion – and I think that we always miss him when he is not in the team. Always gets go-forward, always produces improvised bits and pieces that surprise the opposition, a phenomenal try-scorer and an outstanding kicking option. In fairness to Jimmy though, he had an absolute blinder. That was the best I've ever seen him play on the wing, I thought he was pretty much flawless.
Agree with you on Keenan's kicking, that has really improved. He has good discipline with it and tends to find some empty ground.
I saw somebody write – I think it was Neil Treacy in RTE, who I actually like as a rugby writer – say that the late tries put an "artificial shine" on the game. My response to that would be that it's an 80 minute game. You play for the 80 minutes. If the game only went on for 75 minutes we'd have won the European Cup last year. All the points count.
We're a fitter team than Racing, just as NZ teams in the past were fitter than Irish teams. I remember a half dozen games against NZ when we sort of lived with them for an hour and then bang-bang, they scored two tries when we were fading and rubbed our noses in it with another late one [or two]. Scoring points in the last ten or fifteen minutes is a hell of a lot better than fumbling around and f*cking it up.
