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Lions Watch 2017


John Lambies Doos

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The scary thing about the gulf there is that the All Blacks weren't quite at their best. While they were obviously still excellent, there were bits of sloppiness - more missed tackles than you'd expect, a few knock-ons, failing to find touch - and the Lions exploited none of it. If they get within 10 points of them once I'll be stunned.

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Nz will feel they need to improve. They were probably a bit below par and still cruised to 30 points. As for lions it was almost exactly as predicted. They had chances but butchered them. Gatland killed them with the selection and the lack of ambition

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It's actually not. Finn offers a spark that the others don't have - a something out of nothing.
I like Farrell and Sexton as players, but they don't have the same spark. They are definitely more controlled and consistent, but at this point, to win the series, we need to take risks.


I completely agree regarding the respective strengths of each number 10, but Gatland's tactics would completely stifle any sort of flair. We saw some individual brilliance for the Lions' first try, but it's all completely useless when the tactics throughout the 80 minutes play into the ABs hands.
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The scary thing about the gulf there is that the All Blacks weren't quite at their best. While they were obviously still excellent, there were bits of sloppiness - more missed tackles than you'd expect, a few knock-ons, failing to find touch - and the Lions exploited none of it. If they get within 10 points of them once I'll be stunned.


Spot on, no one in the NZ camp will be happy with that performance which you can see by Kieran Reid's interview.

Meanwhile the Sky Sports pundits (completely different context as it's not the players themselves, understandably) will be wanking themselves into a frenzy from the 'positives'.
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Let's hope the Scottish players get a start midweek and put in a performance and force their way into the squad for the second test.

Any player that starts on Tuesday has next to no chance in playing in the second test
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Any player that starts on Tuesday has next to no chance in playing in the second test


This was said about last weeks midweek game and Daly and Williams both started that game, played well and subsequently started the test match today.
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What's the point in the lions? England could tour New Zealand and post better scores than the Lions will. Why bother? Unless they are going to be an entertaining team then I struggle to see why this matters. Nobody in Britain or Ireland care more about the Lions than they do their own country, so who wants to see a composite team attempt to grind out a win? Obviously I wanted the Lions to win, but that's more out of some vague notion that I should than any other reason. This tour seems utterly pointless at the moment.

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Murray was hopeless. Box kick after box kick and just gave ball away. Rhyss Webb better player. What was the point in bringing sexton on. Commentary said to tighten the game? It was 23 8 at time. Wtf. You tighten a close game to try and close out. Warburton did nothing, I'd have stander in there. Get lawes in instead of Jones. Itoje on 50 mins. Williams had a great break for first try.. but to not even touch ball not to mention catch it for AB last try was criminal.
Obrien played well and Davis was quite good.. not normally a fan. Watson great in first half not good second. Daly anonymous.

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Murray was hopeless. Box kick after box kick and just gave ball away. Rhyss Webb better player. What was the point in bringing sexton on. Commentary said to tighten the game? It was 23 8 at time. Wtf. You tighten a close game to try and close out. Warburton did nothing, I'd have stander in there. Get lawes in instead of Jones. Itoje on 50 mins. Williams had a great break for first try.. but to not even touch ball not to mention catch it for AB last try was criminal.
Obrien played well and Davis was quite good.. not normally a fan. Watson great in first half not good second. Daly anonymous.


Suspect Murray may have been following the gatland masterplan but yeah I prefer Webb. Think sexton coming on was more about getting teo off the park. Farrell going to centre was only way to do that. Teo and aw should be nowhere near the test squads (as most people said prior to today). Not really sure what gatland can do from here. He doesn't have another way to play and even changing personnel now is too little too late. Wrong coach wrong squad wrong tactics.
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30-15 still flattered Lions - ABs took foot off the gas in the last quarter.


The first half was fairly equal. Second half New Zealand stepped it up a notch. The worry for the Lions is that there's not much they can do to the team. Obviously there will need to be a change at full back or the wing, but for the most part that's the strongest side available to Gatland. Finn Russell is the only Scot who could possibly make a case for being involved in the next test. And he's literally making up the numbers.

At least we saw one of the great Lions tries.
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The first half was fairly equal. Second half New Zealand stepped it up a notch. The worry for the Lions is that there's not much they can do to the team. Obviously there will need to be a change at full back or the wing, but for the most part that's the strongest side available to Gatland. Finn Russell is the only Scot who could possibly make a case for being involved in the next test. And he's literally making up the numbers.

At least we saw one of the great Lions tries.

Yeah the worry is that nz can and likely will improve. The irony is that the off the cuff way finn plays is probably the only way to get at nz but there's little or no chance gatland would commit to that. Even if he did trying an entirely new system of play in 7 days us nigh on impossible. So frustrating that gatland refused to see what absolutely everyone else could.
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54 minutes ago, jmothecat said:

What's the point in the lions? England could tour New Zealand and post better scores than the Lions will. Why bother? Unless they are going to be an entertaining team then I struggle to see why this matters. Nobody in Britain or Ireland care more about the Lions than they do their own country, so who wants to see a composite team attempt to grind out a win? Obviously I wanted the Lions to win, but that's more out of some vague notion that I should than any other reason. This tour seems utterly pointless at the moment.

Tend to agree. With the amount of money in modern rugby it's a bit of an anachronism.

Much different in the old days when the Lions were made up of a ragtag bunch of doctors, farmers and salesmen...

 

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Watched this game in an Auckland pub with a few other Lions. Apart from the first 5 minute of each half we were second best. We must take our chances against the All Blacks to have any chance of beating them.

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Guest Bob Mahelp

Any Scot who calls the Lions 'we' needs a f*cking reality check.

Have some fucking self-respect.

I respect the principle of the Lions, but I refuse to accept an inherent bias that determines that Scottish players...no matter what evidence....are always going to be undervalued because they pull on a blue jersey rather  a white, red or green one.

And because of that, Gatland and the rest of them, and the Lions, can get to absolute f*ck. 

Mon the All Blacks.

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