Ben O'Keeffe and Wayne Barnes are probably privately praying their respective countries don't get to the final.
Rugby Union 21/22/23 Discussion | RWC time!
- Thread starter unchanged_lineup
- Start date
- Status
I know Wayne Barnes gets a bad rap from most, but at least he's consistent with being extremely picky. This guy here is really bad. Never liked him
I swear any time I watch Rugby ( not often) and see this ref, it usually results in penalties galore.
Fiji's scrum half is a bit daft, he tries long passes for no reason and make England defensive job easier.
England peaking at the right time? 
I think @JPRouve will tell you most, if not all French referees are shit.
They are winning it I reckon.England peaking at the right time?
Brainless penalty after brainless penalty. It’s like they’re trying to prove every single stereotype right about Fiji’s flaws as a rugby team. Woeful set pieces, terrible discipline and constant bad decisions.
God it’s rough watching a shite team and wanting them to somehow not be shite. I thought I’d get a break from that with no PL football this weekend.
God it’s rough watching a shite team and wanting them to somehow not be shite. I thought I’d get a break from that with no PL football this weekend.
I'm actually torturing myself watching this after last night. I can't believe the level of mediocrity will be rewarded with a semi final place. If Fiji had any discipline I don't know how England would score much.
It’s grim alright.
Fecking lost to the team at the bottom of their division this morning.
Poor Pogue. Please tell me the younglad's football team are on a hot streak?
It does seem really unfair, and extra salty because it's England. Sport can throw up some cruel narratives.
It's accurate.
Oh and the hockey team I play for got a hiding yesterday afternoon.
On the plus side, I turned down a chance to go to the Aviva on Friday night.
We would need a historic turnover of players to prevent this at the next World Cup, Berine, Lowe, furlong, JGP, VDF, bealham Henderson all the wrong side of 30, I’m just including the players I think will have a chance of making it, you can get away with having an older prop, but the backs have to be young or in there prime, the French have 1 back over 30 and he’s a back up the kiwis have 2 in smith and Barrett
It's why I hope France win this. They took that very ambitious decision to rely on youth after the last world cup. It's such a pity that Ntamack didn't make it.
This ref is just 
Was that Sinckler being an idiot?
This ref wouldn’t look out of place as a PL football ref. Certainly loves the sound of his own whistle.
Why not just take the bloody points there!
A couple of those passes looked forward.
The issue with the ref is that he is biased, he never refs teams equally. Here you can see that he is happy to sanction Fiji for fouls without warning when he either gives warnings or ignore english fouls. And he doesn't thaat every games, sometimes he switches and starts being unfair to the other team and gives leeways to the team he was unfairly reffing.
Hand on the ground isn't allowed when you're jackling, right?
Fiji are shite. Record books won’t show the quality of this side of the draw. A semi final is a semi final. England will probably get pumped but you never know.
I watch Rugby only during the world cup and have very limited understanding of the game so correct me if I am wrong but how has this Fiji team made it to the qtrs?
Seems so much weaker physically compared to England. Struggling to win thier own throw-ins more often than not. The kicking has been the worst I have ever seen. Not just for free kicks but even the clear out kicking has been very poor.
Seems so much weaker physically compared to England. Struggling to win thier own throw-ins more often than not. The kicking has been the worst I have ever seen. Not just for free kicks but even the clear out kicking has been very poor.
Reynal is getting worse and worse.
Hopefully they go on to win it now, the last season with Munster was a joy to watch even at the start where we weren’t setting the world alight but you could see the amount of players that rowntree was willing to bleed or give a more prominent role after the dark days of johann
@Pogue Mahone can answer that.
Australia being absolutely shocking, basically.
Yep, he's class to watch.
Right decision to go to the points this time.
Because Australia are even worse currently.
Australia were awful basically
when a side as good as england play, it’s not unusual that they make the opposition look rubbish.
The first two QFs yesterday and today are genuinely like a different sport to the other QFs. Or at least like a different tier of competition.
They were in a piss easy group, basically. They got here despite losing two games already. Including against Portugal. Who are one of the lowest ranked teams in the whole competition.
Worse draw in the history of sport.
- Status