jonesy2 says...

Kevin83 -- yeah giving up tries will tend to mean defeats (are you serious with that little analysis?). ireland havent bossed anything.

blametheref-- ireland are hardly missing players and there is no way ireland can play like that this week if they could they wouldnt be 8th or 9th in the world

Posted 14:36 21st June 2012

Kevin83 says...

Blame the Ref: "Think Ireland would welcome Carter and McCaw not playing more from the psychological aspect"

Carter I would agree with but McCaw not really. If he had a psychological edge then i don't think Ireland would have bossed the breakdown as much as they have I the first two tests.

I think they have finally learned how to combat Ritchie (be he tired or not) at the ruck. Which is why they have, for once, been the better team at that phase in these tests.

Its the Loose play that's killed us. Giving up tries to easily at important times in the game. Like last Saturday.

Posted 16:14 20th June 2012

blametheref says...

Think Ireland would welcome Carter and McCaw not playing more from the psychological aspect. Melamu is an amazing player, hard as they come, but surely it would be risky to start him considering he's been out for a while. NZ need to play their best team possible next Saturday because Hansen's living on cloud cuckoo land if he thinks our best performance was last Saturday. Though I think he was trying to play on Irish minds with his comment it will have the opposite effect. The 3rd test will be a full on 80 minute test match because Ireland believe they threw the last match, not that they were just unlucky...The danger for NZ is that Ireland, even without so many key players, have become a unit during this tour and found some pride as a team...They are now dangerous to any opponents

Posted 09:07 20th June 2012