The first two rounds of the Six Nations have left plenty to be desired, but did the World Cup raise our expectations to an unreasonable level? The guys discuss the opening rounds, as well as Danny Cipriani’s move to Wasps and where Jamie Roberts sits in the current pantheon of great centres.
Video credit: The Rugby Revolution
17 replies on “The Third Half: Were 6 Nations expectations too high?”
I’m not sure how the RWC could give anybody a heightened expectation of what we’d be provided with in the six nations. After all, not one of the six nations teams, with perhaps the exception of Scotland, performed with any distinction at RWC.
Not convinced even Scotland performed that well but i think the point they are trying to make is many people suddenly wants the NH teams to emulate the SH playing style forgetting that these are mainly teams low on confidence or in transition. The knowledgeable rugby fans all knew what to expect even if they hoped for more
Of course they were! Expectations should be high in the Southern Hemisphere! But why for the six nations? They were all teams that were clobbered, unfortunately! Once you look past the myopia of the inter-Celtic rivalries, ‘clobbered’ seems a very apt word!
We were a couple of decent player decisions away from the semi’s being 2 NH teams and 2 SH teams so apart from a distaste by some for playing style I never quite understood the hyperbole about the “awful” NH teams anyway. Last 8 teams were the champs cup and the 4 of the 6 nations sides i.e. the top 8 sides in the world at that time. Last 4 were the champs cup sides, nobody came close to knocking NZ away from winning it. All went pretty much to form and, as I said, a couple of decent decisions another way, esp. in the Scottish match, and we’d have been 1/2 and 1/2 in the semis. No desperate handwringing needed.
Sigh …. English fans trying to claim that the rest of us did as badly as them again ….
I don’t necessarily agree with that, for me the NH teams are quite far behind. I know Wales and Scotland came close (score wise) to winning – but they didn’t. That is what sport is all about.
Losing regularly, even if the scoreline is close, is still of no use. Wales have proven time and again that they are more than good enough to compete with anyone, but they have proven on far too many occasions that they don’t beat the best, often enough for me that dismissing it as ok because you were a decent playing decision away from a win. If you do that time and again it does way beyond that simple microcosm that led to a score/no-score in that particular fixture. I use Wales as an example, but I recognise that many teams are guilty of this too.
On the England dig – I just think a lot fans word it poorly. What it is perfectly reasonable to say is that England are not considerably worse than any other 6 nations side. The WC does not change that fact, however poor we were.
I see your point about Wales, believe me. Few would be as annoyed at our constant ability to lose those big games as me and I completely agree – good enough is a win, not a near win.
On playing style – I don’t think SA are anywhere sig. above the 6Ns sides and I would like to see how Arg would do against Sco/Eng/Wal rather than the hapless and, in my opinion, disrespectful (I genuinely think they had an eye on the semi) Irish side they played. (I can hear the grief now – I hope my pt comes across as a dig at that specific Irish side on that day, not a general dig at Ireland).
So for me this leaves Aus and NZ as out ahead and I completely agree with that – BUT Aus did only squeak past Sco and Wal and Sco put on a fantastic display against them.
It was a great performance to watch, they went right at them so I don’t see the gap as that huge. It’s big enough, believe me, but not to the point of some of the hyperbole e.g. “They were all teams that were clobbered” or “not one of the six nations teams, with perhaps the exception of Scotland, performed with any distinction at RWC”. Wales, ffs, beat the hosts in their own stadium. I know it’s not “as long as we beat The English” but some credit where it’s due for coming through that cauldron and beating the match favourites. That was a performance of distinction. For 75 mins we were well into SA, there was a decent performance. A big diff between that and a win, completely agree, but it’s these extremes that I take issue with.
To go back to small wins/losses – a team that is sig. better than Wal/Sco wouldn’t just squeeze past them. And NZ – we all know they won it all at a reasonably comfortable pace – much easier than 2011. Nobody is on their level.
It was more of a dig about the type of Eng fan who keeps trying to lump all the NH sides in together – I posted a riposte to this idea on another thread, the general details were
– Eng were at home
– Eng didn’t beat a single side above them in the world rankings (Wales did)
– Eng got mullered by Aus (Wal and Sco didn’t)
– Eng lost to Wales.
So overall I would say there is a pretty strong case that Eng performed sig. worse than the other sides, given the expectations, home advantage, etc. I do though agree with, in terms of quality, “perfectly reasonable to say is that England are not considerably worse than any other 6 nations side”.
In terms of performance it depends what “considerably” means as some commenters would have it mean virtually nothing – which it isn’t. Eng performed worst. It’s a thing that is best just acknowledged and then Eng fans can look ahead, surely. By trying to claim some sort of revisionist parity with the rest of the 6Ns sides, by saying “well, we all sucked, nobody sucked worse than anyone else really” is just trying to rewrite the history of how that world cup went.
It’s an extension of “it was a poor 6 nations” whenever Fra or Eng don’t win it.
I partially agree with your post. I think the gulf between NH and SH does exist.
Argentina seem to have pushed on in the last 2 years and are now ALMOST as good as the top NH teams but with a far more attractive playing style
SA may play ugly but have a very enviable win record against NH teams.
Aus seem to have shored up their biggest weakness of the set piece so no longer struggling against NH teams
NZ different class
As far as comparative performances of the 6N teams at the RWC
Actual Performance:
1. Scotland – Out of group, lost QF by narrow margin against 2nd place
2. Wales – Out of group, lost QF by narrow margin against 4th place
3. France – Out of group, but destroyed in QF by winners
4. Ireland – Out of group, but destroyed in QF by 4th place
5. England – Close to getting out of group
6. Italy – Not close to getting out of group
Performance vs Expectation:
1. Wales – exp: 3rd in group – Exceeded
2. Scotland – exp: 2nd in group, destroyed in QF – Exceeded
3. Italy – exp: 3rd in group – Met
4. France – exp: 2nd in group, destroyed in QF – Met
5. Ireland – exp: Top group, Win QF, Lose SF – Under achieved
6. England – exp: 2nd in group, Lose QF – Under achieved
And yes i think these expectations are realistic removing any national bias looking at team strengths and fixtures considering injuries and home advantages etc…
Great table that does summarise it well.
It summarises my pt – Eng underachieved so to try and say everyone sucked doesn’t really reflect it and just comes across as a bit of desperation to ignore any differences between the performances – usually as a way of dismissing any idea that Eng did worse than anyone else.
Did anyone really expect Eng to lose their QF? Maybe should ask that a different way – what was the split like in terms of fans/media/RFU over that? Some fans/media/blazers were definitely coming across like they expected further than a QF, surely?
Oh come on Brighty you know how it goes. You know that your not favorites really but you look at the fixture long enough and you can convince yourself that their weaknesses are bigger than they really are and your strengths are greater, home advantage becomes an insurmountable object in you mind etc…
There is always a chance to win as the gaps aren’t as big as anyone thinks and hope gets the better of you.
Everyone is guilty of it, you do it all the time with Wales.
I agree Leon – that’s all part of supporting. I hoped and had a tiny smidgen of belief that Wales could win that world cup. You know – bit of magic here, some luck there, etc. No issue with.
I just meant that even objectively I think Eng were expected to make the semi’s surely?
Depends how much you rated home advantage. Personally I was hopeful that we could top the group as we had a decent track record against Aus and Wal at Twickers in which case I fancied us getting to the final but I knew that 2nd in the group was a death sentence
Remember we never beat SA once under Lancaster if anything they were his bogey team
However as the tournament neared and I saw how fragile our set piece was those hopes faded very quickly to 2nd in the group. After the Wales game I knew we were out
At no point have I disagreed that England’s WC was a complete and utter disaster. I honestly don’t know an England fan that doesn’t recognise that the WC was a complete disaster, and to be honest I don’t even see media outlets suggesting otherwise either.
If you don’t think Wales under-performed then fair enough. Yes, getting out of a tough group was a job well done, but it’d be sad to think a nation with such a hugely talented player base had the ambition to just get out of WC groups. It’s perfectly reasonable for someone to believe they also under-performed (especially in comparison to SH sides).
I don’t think any comment that groups together the NH sides perspective failure at the WC is an England fans way of suggesting that they were no worse than other NH sides. Are you expecting them to stop mid-sentence to specifically point out that whilst all sides (in that persons opinion) under-performed that England were in fact worse? The idea that this is some clever English way of attempting to dupe people into believing that everyone did as badly as them is frankly pretty daft.
But some do use it as a backhanded way of sniping at the non-Eng sides Jacob, that’s what rankles e.g.
“They were all teams that were clobbered, unfortunately! Once you look past the myopia of the inter-Celtic rivalries, ‘clobbered’ seems a very apt word!”
The old “yeah, we’re shite but so are you” balls. Wales weren’t good enough but we were not as shite as Eng. Does that matter when winning world cups? No. Does it matter when some Eng fan is telling me that Wales were shite in the world cup? Yes. Simple as that for me. Give credit where it’s due, that is all.
I don’t think there is anything clever about it – it’s as transparent and ludicrous as claiming fixture order in the 6 nations is an important factor (and I know you didn’t). I see no problem in expecting someone who you’ve beaten to have a little bit of “well played” in their comments, rather than “yeah, but you were shite as well anyway”. Isn’t one of the reasons the games are played to answer those sorts of questions? I tend to find (again, not you) the ones who can’t bring themselves to acknowledge the better play of their opponents are the ones who in general make stupid comments about sport.
Fair enough if you’re having England fans talk in that way – just surprises me that it’s griped you this much when I’ve seen very little of it. There are always going to be “fans” on either side that talk complete nonsense about the sport unfortunately.
One thing I would add is that I don’t think talking about the relative failure/success of NH vs SH at the world cup has anything to do with belittling Wales win against England, and everything to do with the fact that it is quite clear that the SH seem to win against the NH more often than not and the WC highlighted this more than ever.
I don’t see referring to that as any English fan trying to paper over cracks by attempting to claim Wales were as bad as us – simply acknowledging a comparative failure of NH sides to win against them when it mattered most.
None of the 6N should be resting on their laurels on the back of a magnificent RWC. But England went in, by the bookmakers, as second favourites and didn’t make the top 8.
We didn’t just fail to beat Wales, we failed to beat the Welsh second XV (OK exaggeration, but they were well off full strength).
It was a disaster and being not that much worse than Scotland isn’t the scale I was hoping to be assessing our performance on!
Wales and Scotland at least walked away with some credibility in going out in a tight game with a competitive performance.
I’d give Wales and Scotland a ‘par’, Ireland, France and Italy a bogey and England taking about 12 shots.
There’s no real question that England (and Ireland) underperformed and Wales were clearly hampered by injury. To be fair, England were rather hampered by their own ineptitude as regards selection with an untried centre pairing in a critical game (why take Slade then not play him when JJ was obviously crooked). But it seems to me that this may have done England a favour in the long term by forcing them to leave behind the rather tedious defence heavy backline that was proven not to work time and again and to sort out the set piece and breakdown.
My worry is that by getting the QFs, Wales have been saved this introspection. Injuries aside, the 6N appears to show that there has been no evolution in Gatland’s game plan and even with a settled backline the penetration is still not there to enable what is a good side to become world class and start beating rather than just challenging Aus and SA. To me, that 10 minutes on the Aus line against 13 men highlighted the fact that until Warrenball evolves into something more subtle, Wales are going to continue to challenge but not quite beat the SH sides.
Was 2015 that much better for the first 4 weekends? Scotland Vs England at Murrayfield at the start of Feb isn’t really a recipe for a classic.
At the moment it’s just like …. a 6N
As we’ve seen that traditional NH rugby comes up a bit short against modern SH rugby I do hope towards the end, as sides settle and gel, we’ll see some sort of recognition that route 1 attrition only gets you so far on the world stage. That we need to attack with sharp as well as heavy blunt instruments.
So still hoping …..