Leicester Tigers

Per earlier posts Slade out plus Nowell or Cockanasiga in for the bench would be better for me.

Theory seems to be S Barrett will boost their lineout impact where NZ troubled ENG last game. But I agree losing Cane from the breakdown is quite a trade off. Looking like Ford, Faz, Manu and hoping May shakes off slight injury.

Yes .. the Cockanasiga vs Nowell trade off is x-factor attack vs all round rugby ability including his (Nowell) noted flanker like attitude at breakdown. That being said Cockanasiga could just break one or even two tackles out wide to score crucial points. EJ will go Nowell first I think.

WAL vs FRA .... FRA score two quick tries against the famous WAL defence .. you wouldn't have predicted that. WAL don't panic and battle on. FRA brain dead red card kills match. You expect WAL to quickly pull back and win well. They didn't. You would expect FRA to capitulate and implode. They didn't...

Absolutely .. yes I recall that one.

Bookies have NZ 7/17 vs ENG 13/5. Sounds about right. BUT I honestly think neither team have been properly tested for more than 15/20 mins max. That is the interesting bit. Team wise 10/12/13 I would go with Ford, Faz Manu as I thought (contrary to many) that Slade was very rusty other than his inte...

I agree. During the RWC match viewings I haver often thought to myself how come the ref, touch judges, back room officials and the commentators don't think that was forward ? I wonder wether flat / very slightly forward is OK .. but there seem to be at least two or three per match. Maybe my referenc...

Interesting question as to preferring to play AUS or WAL in the quarters. I though both were quite fierce in their head to head but both have also showed some sloppiness such as with AUS passing / catching and WAL lineout. As an ENG fan I think I would prefer AUS overall, (which is how it will most ...

My 10 cents on Ben Youngs is that he can slow us down in set piece and mixed play plus his kicking is erratic. Yes he does see space wide and knows Ford, Faz, Manu, May all very well indeed. That being said I noticed an improvement when Willi Heinz came on vs IRE. Maybe IRE were done by then. For no...

Much more interesting for now is how the warmups WAL vs IRE 31st Aug and IRE vs WAL 7th Sept turn out. I will be very brave and go for home victories in both cases. Wales should win well say 25-10 then Ireland desperately scrape through at the Aviva 13-9 ??? You could imagine an injury or two (hopef...

From an ENG supporter .. what would you change in the ranking system? https://www.world.rugby/rankings/explanation as according to those rules WAL are 1st. Note that since 16th November 2018 NZ have lost to IRE and AUS, drawn with RSA, while beating ITA, ARG and AUS. As an ENG supported I would not ...

ENG were more powerful and particularly expansive than in the second welsh match (which was a poor slugfest). ENG vs IRE had some really well constructed back moves too which is a strong positive. In addition they looked a lot fitter than IRE. IRE are a conundrum at the moment IMHO. They seemed very...

Thought Ford was great yesterday. Definitely more expansive than Faz. Faz does the tactical kicking slightly better but Ford creates space and plays the gain line better. Faz stays at 10 for me but ENG could easily mix it up with Ford to 10 and Faz to 12 or substituted.

Agreed on Francis and glad Teo is left out .... of course centre options exist via Daly, Faz and Nowell under fallback options. Jones has quite a lot of back three players, but those three options and the fact that Slade could cover 10, give a lot of flexibility.

The ENG vs WAL 11th Aug match showed Englands physical training is really coming together. They were more lively for sure than the Welsh who rightly pride themselves on being one of the fittest teams around. Still nearly six weeks to go but promising signs. I suspect Jones will swap the team quite a...