I thought I would start this thread for those of you who follow rugby and are looking forward to the World cup.
With little over a month till it all kicks off, what are your predictions? Who will shock and surprise? Who will under-perform? Who will be the player of the tournament?
Maybe I’m byist, but if Ireland can get their form together and play consistently well I can see them doing some damage, though i still find it hard to look past the All Blacks…
Thoughts…
cant wait…would love us to get past the qfs for the first time but it will all hinge on the oz game…hopefully itll be pissing rain that night in auckland!!cant look past the kiwis at the moment and after what happened in canterbury it would be nice to see them do it in their own backyard…and id be very worried if i was a welsh fan…sean o’brien/sonny bill for player of the tournament
shit,i meant christchurch not canterbury…fail
Yeah I agree the Aussie Game could make or break Irelands Tournament, but I personally think they can beat them if they play the right game plan. Quade Cooper is one of, if not the most, dangerous 10s going forward, but when Oz are on the backfoot, he loses his effectiveness.
I can see Sonny Bill having a good world cup, and no doubt he will get a lot of media attention. Sean O’Brien is a great player and I hope he has a good tournament as well. I can see Wales being a shock early exit.
Toss up between OZ and the AB’s I’d say. USA to shock, Ireland and France to disappoint.
Ireland getting their act together is a big ask with the way they’ve performed over the last 18 months. One great performance in the last 8 games papers over the cracks but Ireland are in serious danger of being humiliated by Australia and Italy.
Watching the Australia/South Africa game the other day, SA are in trouble as well with austrlia looking very strong indeed. James o Connor is one talented motherfucker
yeah we’ve been fairly shite since beating SA in 09…however there have been signs of a good team in there somewhere…
it can be argued that indiscipline(france) and shite refereeing/paddy wallace (wales) cost us this years 6 nations…i think one of the main reasons for our inconsistency is that a munster forwards first instinct is to go to ground and recycle while the leinster forwards will look for a offload…
during the england game it seemed everybody was trying to play the same way and look what happened…mind you,the sight of a red rose always focuses the mind of an irish player…
I hate to say it but the All Blacks. Home field advantage. SBW. Great depth at some positions (unlike Australia). I’d put them down as favourites. I just hope Spies plays for SA again, love his highlight reels.
All Blacks, all the way.
AB’s are the ultimate chokers, i think its just gonna happen again, although it is made for them with home advantage and the earthquake.
Cant read too much into the tri nations as SA have a severley weakened team out. AUS to shock I think and player of the tournament will be quaid cooper, the man is a rugby genius! Hope he delivers…
From the home nations - I just think it will be the same as usual, England going further than the others, not because im an english man, just because i havent seen anything to convince me otherwise. Mentality needs to change.
France to crumble - dont know if lievermont is still coach or not, but how you can build a team with that lunatic is beyond me.
Samoa to shock i think…
i think they’re going to choke too…they would be severely fooked if anything happened to carter/mccaw…definitely carter anyway…England always seem to do well in tournaments…they seem to be the germany of the rugby world… backs away slowly
also saw this earlier,for the rugby loving american T-Nationers, thoughts on their replica jersey?i felt it was quite apt with the recent release of captain america…
http://www.rugbystore.co.uk/collections/new/newreplica/usa_test_third_rugby_shirt_ss_2012
Probably All Blacks. However, they have many unfair advantages over Australia. Union is the national sport of New Zealand, it’s their main code and they have over 145,000 registered players. By contrast Australia’s main code is League, there is very little cross code trading from League to Union, most the best players in Australia are graduates from a small number of private schools and Australia has only 85,000 registered players. So to sum things up, Australia is fucking awesome.
[quote]IrishDiablo wrote:
i think they’re going to choke too…they would be severely fooked if anything happened to carter/mccaw…definitely carter anyway…England always seem to do well in tournaments…they seem to be the germany of the rugby world… backs away slowly[/quote]
i think they could live without mccaw… he just isnt the player he was a few years ago.
lol at the england comment. i was a little embarrassed by our 2007 tournament, we played soo so shit. Hopefully the 2011 6 nations is a taster of things to come… how did ireland do in that again? 
haha yeah we were fairly poverty alright but im hopeful that the england game was a turning point…coupled with leinster winning the hc and munster winning the league playing a more open style than they traditionally do makes me quietly optimistic…things could be worse i suppose,i could be a wales fan!!
True enough the only team that are worse chokers than Ireland are the Kiwi’s. The home advantage and motivation of the players after a very tough year for the NZ nation will probably be enough to finally swing it for the AB’s but I’d still watch the Wallabies closely.
Samoa won’t shock too much, anytime it comes close to a world cup they get their full strength squad back and do pretty well. If all their players weren’t contracted to NH clubs they’d be one serious contender.
Players to watch:
Sean O Brien
James O Connor
Rocky Elsom
Richie McCaw(obviously)
Quade Cooper
Courtney Lawes
… To name a very select few. Man I can’t wait tio it gets under way
[quote]IrishDiablo wrote:
haha yeah we were fairly poverty alright but im hopeful that the england game was a turning point… [/quote]
Don’t hold your breath, as with Munster, one standout performance every few months papers over the cracks. Consistency is key, and we just don’t have it. Obviously I’m hoping for the best, but gotta be realistic. I’ll give Martin Johnson one thing, he’s really come along as a coach and has builtba he’ll of a good and confident squad after a disastrous start
[quote]IrishDiablo wrote:
haha yeah we were fairly poverty alright but im hopeful that the england game was a turning point…coupled with leinster winning the hc and munster winning the league playing a more open style than they traditionally do makes me quietly optimistic…things could be worse i suppose,i could be a wales fan!! [/quote]
do wales even have a national rugby team…? OOOOOOOOH
[quote]Jereth127 wrote:
[quote]IrishDiablo wrote:
haha yeah we were fairly poverty alright but im hopeful that the england game was a turning point… [/quote]
Don’t hold your breath, as with Munster, one standout performance every few months papers over the cracks. Consistency is key, and we just don’t have it. Obviously I’m hoping for the best, but gotta be realistic. I’ll give Martin Johnson one thing, he’s really come along as a coach and has builtba he’ll of a good and confident squad after a disastrous start[/quote]
I hope so. I know we do well in tournaments, but the ireland game in the 6 nations leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Take nothing away from ireland, they were far the better team and really wanted it, but england just didnt turn up. In my mind, they knew the job of winning was done and seemed to switch off.
bitter taste is wrong. i meant it makes me nervous as an english rugby supporter
[quote]rugggby wrote:
[quote]Jereth127 wrote:
[quote]IrishDiablo wrote:
haha yeah we were fairly poverty alright but im hopeful that the england game was a turning point… [/quote]
Don’t hold your breath, as with Munster, one standout performance every few months papers over the cracks. Consistency is key, and we just don’t have it. Obviously I’m hoping for the best, but gotta be realistic. I’ll give Martin Johnson one thing, he’s really come along as a coach and has builtba he’ll of a good and confident squad after a disastrous start[/quote]
I hope so. I know we do well in tournaments, but the ireland game in the 6 nations leaves a bitter taste in my mouth. Take nothing away from ireland, they were far the better team and really wanted it, but england just didnt turn up. In my mind, they knew the job of winning was done and seemed to switch off.[/quote]
Possibly, but take it from me, England coming to Dublin is always a big deal. People who never watch the sport tune in and one could argue it’s the game that carries the most pressure of the year. So talking of a bitter after taste, yeah the Irish have that in spades. Many here just can’t leave the past in the past.
I guess we’ll see where both teams stand in the august warm ups, England will be rearing for some retribution in twickenham in a few weeks, it’ll be a good test for the Irish.