No....PR nickname for Samson LeeQuote:
Originally Posted by AntRobertson
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No....PR nickname for Samson LeeQuote:
Originally Posted by AntRobertson
Spend 5 minutes (and nine seconds) to enrich your lives, gentlemen. Here is my gift to you all:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVsYJjaAvFI
World Cup organisers received a staggering 600,000 ticket applications for the England v Wales game. That's 100,000 more applications than they received for the final.
http://www.walesonline.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-news/twickenham-could-become-mini-millennium-10107579#rlabs=3%20rt$category%20p$5
From an interview with Japan lock Justin Ives, their preparation for the match v SA
Quote:
That's where Steve Borthwick comes in.
The 35-year-old Englishman knows the Scots well, having played 57 tests for England at lock. He has coached Japan's forwards since 2012.
"Steve works on the lineouts like no one else I've ever come across," Ives said. "We were running South Africa's lineouts for the last couple of months against each other, knowing what to look out for and what to call against them. We're not the tallest team but we know we're probably the fastest lineout."
Ives is convinced head coach Eddie Jones will show his tactical nous once again.
"Scotland have a massive height advantage on us, so we'll just have to be smarter, and I'm pretty sure we've got one of the smartest coaches around," Ives said.
Rugby World Cup 2015: Long wait over as NZ-born Justin Ives finally gets chance | Stuff.co.nz
For those of you who fancy Japan can still get odds of about 5/1 with betfair for them to beat Scotland or evens with a 12 point head start in the handicap. I think Scotland will win by 15+.
Bit hard to argue against that given the SA result.Quote:
and I'm pretty sure we've got one of the smartest coaches around
Money flooding in for Japan now - dropped to 4/1 for them now. As you will know, the odds from the bookies does not relate to who they think will win, but represents where the money is going from the punters.Quote:
Originally Posted by buriramboy
Hahahaha..... just saw that, Wales favourites.... Hahahahah...... I reckon you've picked up some sort of tactic from somewhere.....Quote:
Originally Posted by pseudolus
I'm not even bother putting your argument to bed with facts.... it's already transparent.
Interactive: The stats that explode the All Blacks chokers myth
By Dylan Cleaver. Data analysis by Harkanwal Singh
12:46 PM Wednesday Sep 23, 2015
https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2015/09/1821.jpg
All Blacks captain Richie McCaw and team-mate Carl Hayman during the 2007 Rugby World Cup quarter-final between New Zealand and France. Photo / Brett Phibbs
South Arica were momentarily successful. So too John Eales' Wallaby teams of the early-2000s. But nothing has been quite as successful at stopping All Black dominance as the advent of the Rugby World Cup.
Or has it?
Popular opinion would have it that the All Blacks only need to be in the general area of a World Cup knockout match and their collective trachea begins to restrict and that lack of oxygen to the brain sees them divert from game plans, subside into blind panic and, next minute, they're running over the bonnets of expensive cars outside Heathrow Departures.
The All Blacks are the ultimate World Cup chokers, their critics and even a few of their fans would have you believe. Trying to define choking is a little bit harder. If it's under-performance when faced with pressure, then there're probably 100 examples of choking in any single game. Is it simply falling short of the favourites' tag? This definition raises more questions than answers as "favouritism" in itself is a fairly arbitrary concept.
Were the All Blacks really favourites in 1999, for example, given they were one year removed from the five test losses in a row? Likewise, in 2003 an England side that was at one stage reduced to 13-men beat the All Blacks in Wellington, a sure sign that version of the All Blacks wasn't built for a World Cup win.
Forget the hype for a minute, and look at pure results.
https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2015/09/1822.jpg
On its own, that statistic doesn't tell you a heck of a lot because you'd expect the numbers to be high. The involvement of minnows during pool play gives you plenty of ticks in the win column and, once you get to the knockout phases, you can only lose a maximum of two games (the third v fourth playoff being the second).
More accurate would be to measure the All Blacks win record against the other 'Big Five' teams.
https://teakdoor.com/images/imported/2015/09/1823.jpg
Straight away you notice New Zealand is no longer Top Dog, with the Springboks just shading them. Theirs is a smaller sample size and it is pointless to speculate on what might have happened at the first two World Cups if Apartheid-era South Africa had been invited. All you can conclude is that South Africa are a strong tournament team.
Perhaps the most instructive feature of this table is that the Southern Hemisphere Giants dwarf their northern counterparts in terms of World Cup pedigree, but neither England nor France get labelled World Cup chokers (in fact, Les Bleus are often seen as World Cup specialists, despite having never won one) and the All Blacks do.
If we are to accept that the choke level dissipates the further you go in the tournament -given the quality and the form of the opposition invariably increases the deeper you go - then how should the All Blacks choke-o-meter read?
Again, arbitrarily, the Choke Scale might read something like this (and this is counting the 1999 quarter-final playoffs as pool play):
Failing to progress from pool play - Def-con choke;
Losing in pool play and progressing - Awkward choke;
Losing in quarter-finals - Major choke;
Losing in semis and 3v4 playoff - Bitter choke;
Losing in semis - Minor choke;
Losing in final - Midget choke;
On this entirely made-up Choke Scale, all the Big Five nations have avoided a Def-con scenario, but only the All Blacks have avoided an Awkward choke.
The All Blacks and France have both endured a Major choke just once. The All Blacks lost to France in the quarters in 2007 and France lost in the quarters to England in 1991. South Africa and Australia has both suffered two Majors (the Boks from only four tournaments), and England three.
Could you then launch an argument to say England and South Africa are the biggest World Cup chokers? Not likely to get much traction outside of New Zealand, again because they never have the same level of expectation around them.
In terms of the Bitter chokes (seriously, nobody wants to play third v fourth playoffs), the list looks like this, in order from 1987-2011: Wales, Scotland, England, New Zealand, France, France, Wales. Of the Big Five, South Africa and Australia have avoided this scenario.
France and New Zealand, with three semifinal losses each in six attempts, are the most prolific Minor chokers. Australia have two from five and England and South Africa one each, from four and three semifinals respectively.
Nobody can match France for a Midget choke either, with a three-from-three finals futility record. England have lost two from three, New Zealand and Australia one from three, while South Africa have won on both occasions they have got there.
Perhaps a 'choke' is better measured by what happens in game. Throwing away a seemingly unassailable lead might be referred to as a choke. In that case, the All Blacks semi- and quarter-final collapses against France in '99 and '07 respectively might be the ultimate chokes, although looking at it through that prism fails to give Les Bleus the credit they deserve in 1999 or, facetiously, Wayne Barnes in 2007.
It has to be said - however staunchly you defend the All Blacks - that these were at best unusual losses, at worst the sort of meltdowns that give rise to the 'ch' word.
What does it all mean? Nobody is immune to choking and there's no way the All Blacks have a mortgage over it.
- NZ Herald
what are the odds for a aust kiwi final ?Quote:
Originally Posted by pseudolus
cling to every hopeQuote:
Originally Posted by AntRobertson
Shut up, because maths! :mad:Quote:
Originally Posted by baldrick
Nice to see the kiwi's are choking already.
Argentina game?Quote:
Originally Posted by sabang
Speaking of which...
Pumas are my new not-so-dark horse. I think they'll be too much in the Quarters, reach the Semis and possibly surprise someone (my head hurts too much right now to work out the permutations).
probably play Ireland in the quarters and if they win they will meet Australia in the semisQuote:
Originally Posted by AntRobertson
I would love to see a NZ Ireland QF more than any other game that doesn't involve Wales....
It's win/win.....
That would be good.Quote:
Originally Posted by baldrick
Ireland were my old not-so-dark horse so whoever wins I can claim to be a font of rugby knowledge. :)
Didn't we used to have 'betting' thread on world cups, be they football or rugby?
no chanceQuote:
Originally Posted by Bobcock
the frogs love playing NZ in the quarters :)
You mean it has happened once.....
There seems to be a myth that the AB's get knocked out by France in the QF all the time... it just happened the once...and once in the Semis....
Remember the AB's have beaten them in 2 finals....
The Frogs strike back.
With Farrell, Barritt and Burgess starting? Do me a favour. This is a 20+ point drubbing England are going to get now.Quote:
Originally Posted by Bobcock
Absolute tosh.Quote:
Originally Posted by AntRobertson
ABs have consistently been the number 1 ranked team in the RWCs, and are always knocked out by teams a lot lower than them. The French in 2011 final would have won that match without the usual Kiwi 16th man blowing the whistle for them all the time.
The choke tag has been well earned, and the fluke result of 2011 where they were helped over the line by the IRB putting the competition there, and the ref who was blatantly helping them, only goes to add grist to the mill because they choked then, then.
Incorrect. Because maths. :chitown:Quote:
Originally Posted by pseudolus
:rofl:Quote:
Originally Posted by pseudolus