Great game of open running rugby. Wallabies edged it 40-36
Hodgo played well & got his win as skipper. Badger had a great game and scored a pearler under the posts.
McMahon came on early.... geez he looks the goods
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Great game of open running rugby. Wallabies edged it 40-36
Hodgo played well & got his win as skipper. Badger had a great game and scored a pearler under the posts.
McMahon came on early.... geez he looks the goods
How good was that Barbarians side?! Thoroughly enjoyed that!
Great entertaining rugby
11 man line outs
tap kick penalty then an over head kick with back to try line into goal everyone chases
American football throw in at line out. 30 metres across field to The Badger on the other wing pity he lost it forward.
Badger was on fire and so was the badgers following...
Fox had the Badger do a tour of london with a sky sports team member was interesting and I would love to have been in Coca Cola West supporters home as they would have been going off seeing the Badge playing...
Get Nani Williams and badger to the force.. They just knew where the other one was great combos
Benny Dog Mac and Hodgo played so well. Good all round ball chasing and getting to the ruck and mauls.. Good straight running and setting up plays...
Horwill did 1 good thing but also cost us 6 points
Genia and Cooper rusty
Horne played a blinder
Falou was a seagull like normal getting some scraps and up in the line alot and when Baa Baas broke thru no one home...
Slipper and Kefu a little bit better than the Ben's '''
White and Foley played better knowing they fighting for position Now Genia and Cooper back
Some good back line combos and some straight running 10 12 13 with Falou seagulling
Scrums need work Maybe the Back 3 to strong for the front 3 and flattening them in the crush
Howill just to old and slow.. Line outs dropped off once Carter went off as only 2 men to throw to Horwill and Benny dog ( Predictable ) Skelton not good in the lineout
Sean Mc Mahon was my MOM Played out of his skin once given chance with Higginbottom off in first 15 with hamstring... great rugby
Baa Baas only meet on Monday and 6 days later playing.. Australia still need to fix some areas but I think Cheika just giving everyone a shot to fined the winning combos..
The Rex Report
The wallabies were loose and scrappy and lacked structure
The two Ben's - Ben Alexander/Ben Robinson did not scrum well and did not bring any physicality to the match. There was a noticeable improvement in scrummaging, direct running and sting in defence when Slipper and Kepu came on. I doubt Cheika would have been impressed.
McMahon - this kid is something special. He was the best player for the wallabies. He runs straight and very hard and busts tackles. He was everywhere in defence cleaning up after the worryingly loose and scrappy play which resulted in turnovers, dropped ball kick throughs and intercepts. The kid was impressive. He was dominating in NRC but I didn't think the standard and fitness levels of the NRC desereved "professional" status. I was surprised to see him dominating at this level but he did. The messiah (Cheika) knows though. I think it likely McMahon features in his plans of picking Australian forwards that have impact.
Genia went OK. Cooper was too deep and his game management was spontaneous but unstructured. He put on some moments of class with dazzling footwork and rare passes but he also made plenty of mistakes. The team structure looked much better when Foley came on. He stands flatter and moves forward. The entire backline runs straight and advances the football when Foley is running the show. I'm a huge fan of his organisation, straight running and game management. He is a real rough diamond for mine.
Kuridrani was powerful again and made plenty of breaks. He runs hard and straight. He was a handful and gives us great go forward.
Speight is an exciting prospect but he looked like he hadn't played for months and he looked like a man worried about stretching out after a terrible hamstring injury. He'll be better for the gallop but he was shaded by the badger on the night. Cummins let the new wallaby coach know what he could do by causing a lot of damage with hard straight running. Cheika will likely have added HB's mobile number to his personal mobile phone directory.
We need more physicality in the second row for mine. I think Carter does a lot of work and gets around the field well. I don't see him hurting anybody. I'm not sure Cheika will persist with him.......ditto Simmons although Simmons didn't play. SOS Siteleki Timani
There was a lot of tries from loose and unstructured play and for the swing it wide brigade they would have been frothing from many orifices. The poor defence and lack of structure was alarming. If this had been Wales, we would have been destroyed. The poor last 15 minutes underlines this groups lack of fitness which saw them lose the last 3 tests in the last 10-15 minutes.
New coach, new structures and a lot of cobwebs to blow out. Camp wallaby will have their body clocks aligned by the next hit out and have another week of training under their belts. They will need it. Hopefully, by the end of tour the new wallaby way will emerge.
There were many good individual performances but the lack of team cohesion was alarming
Really enjoyed that! Was a very entertaining match and thank god it's back to the rugby now! Miss the HB though..
Badger definitely made a big statement about why he's not in the Wallabies & Cheika must be wondering why the hell the ARU let him go to Japan through their own ineptitude. Preference given to an unknown quantity over the Badge in terms of contracts (Karmichael Hunt) is so incredibly stupid. Cheika should be helping Foley pressure ARU to sort something out!
I thought Speight was (in the words of our Rex) absolute toilet. Out of position, a turnstile in defence and gave himself no room to move in attack. For someone who was classified as the messiah he was very disappointing - especially if you compare him with his performance for the Brumbies against the Force for the final match of the season.
Speight is the man. He was very rusty and obviously has some psychological barriers to overcome after his very severe hamstring injury and many set backs to recovery. I think there was some rust and confidence issues. When he is fit and in form, he is one of our biggest attacking assets. The Force V Brumbies game when he scored 3 tries and made the Badger look slow and inept demonstrated his absolute class, pace and power. He's just on the comeback from a severe injury. He'll be back. HB had a blinder though. He obviously wants to make the world cup squad and made every post a winner. I thought he was outstanding
I'm a bit concerned about the over-hype of McMahon.
I agree that he made a great debut but was no way the MOM for the Wallabies. Kuridrani earned this on 16 runs for 141m alone.
McMahon, like Hooper has a great running game and hits the opposition line with strength and pace. But in the back row he needs a defensive game as well. This should be the focus of his ongoing development. 6 tackles in 62 minutes is below par when Hodgson made 14 in 77 (plus 2 Turn-overs) and McCalman 13 in 80.
Someone has to do the tough stuff in the rucks and mauls and that's where you generally find Hodgo and Dog.
The Wallabies have enough ball runners - they're called BACKS.
Hodgo's efforts in this match even more commendable as this was his 1st full game since the Brumbies game on 11 July.
The Mcmahon hype was founded on the trail of groggy fringe allblack forwards that were knocked into next week trying to tackle him. He made these allblacks ( 6. Adam Thomson, 7. Matt Todd, 8. Steven Luatua ) look pretty ordinary although Thomson was his traditional pest-like beast at the breakdown.
Australia gets beaten because our forwards can't get our world class backline front foot ball. This has been the story of Australian rugby since time immemorial. It's exciting seeing Australian forwards hitting the ball with pace and exploding through tackles leaving defenders groggy. We are used to seeing Australian forwards getting the ball 2-3 m behind the advantage line whilst flat footed and jogging to the defence before flopping at their feet.
It's about time we had some athletes in our pack that have pace and power. McMahon has these attributes. The Rebels have him listed as a blindside flanker at 100Kg and 186cm. As he grows, he'll beef up a bit. The kid is good to go
Despite Sean McMahon clocking up only 6 tackles in 65 minutes of rugby (IMO below par for a BSF), his involvement in rucks was very impressive.
In his 65 minutes, McMahon had the 3rd most ruck involvements for the Wallabies with 36 and early engagement (1st or 2nd) on 27 occasions (75%). (IMO this too is below par but similar to Hooper).
Some others stats for interest:
Horwill - 83 minutes - 50 with 34 early (68%).
Hodgson - 77 minutes - 39/32 at 82%.
McCalman - 83 minutes - 31/26 at 84%.
Fianga'a - 54 minutes - 28/26 at 93% (maybe he wasn't as bad as I thought).
Alexander - 54 minutes - 28/21 at 75%.
Robertson - 54 minutes - 21/16 at 76%.
Toomua - 64 minutes - 21/17 at 81% (Does alright for a little bloke!)
Skelton - 32 minutes - 20/14 at 70%
Kuridrani - 83 minutes - 20/18 at 90%.
Folau - 83 minutes - 18/16 at 89%.
Hanson - 28 minutes - 18/17 at 94%.
Carter - 57 minutes - 16/14 at 88%. (Well below his involvement in last 3 tests)
Kepu - 28 minutes - 16/12 at 75%.
Slipper - 28 minutes - 13/12 at 92%.
Higginbotham - 18 minutes - 5/4 at 80% (2 runs for 16m and AGAIN a single tackle)
I gather this ruck data myself.........(1st and 2nd means after the Tackler)
Anybody else notice the apparent reluctance of the commentary team to actually call Hodgson's name? I counted only 7 instances and 2 of those were going to and returning from the blood bin.
Considering his level of involvement I found this to be curious to say the least.
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