Christian Wade scores twice in first rugby match in four years

One thing, why are we policing the chasing lanes? Why encourage high ball kicking? Sometimes a chasing player may do something brilliant but it's mostly an easy way to move the ball and I'd prefer it was discouraged.

Sexton once again the beneficiary of incredible double standards. Some of the rules simply didn't apply to him. The referee even watched that replay about 5 times in slow motion to see if he grounded the ball. If an NZ player had made that tackle it would have been a yellow card.

Ireland led by Sexton were the biggest bunch of whingers to ever play the game. NZ's dislike of Ireland was not caused by losing to them, it was caused by the Irish players, commentators and media being such giant crybabies.

I genuinely think Ireland are the best team in the world, and I think they will beat the ABs on Friday, but they are by some distance the team I like the least, and I know many people, not just from NZ, who feel the same.

As Eddie Jones showed us in 2022 and 2023, great coaches don't stay great forever. Mallet was a properly world class coach in 1998, and never hit the same heights after that.

His words in 2019 before the RWC final that he now says should have resulted in Eddie's firing:

"Was Saturday’s sensational World Cup semi-final win over New Zealand England’s greatest ever performance? Yes, unquestionably, would be my answer."

So let's fire the coach one game later? Duh!

The reality is that Ireland are a settled team with tons of continuity, an established style, and a good depth chart, whereas NZ are fundamentally rebuilding. The questions are all about what Razor is doing and how far along he is in that program.

NZ are very close to really clicking. Against England all of the chatter is about how England could have closed out a win, but failed to do so. This has obscured the observation that NZ were by far the more creative and effective in attack, beyond the 3-1 try differential and disallowed tries. They gave away a lot of unnecessary penalties, and made many simple errors (including knock-ons and loose kicks). Those things are very fixable, and when they do so we are once again going to be staring at a formidable NZ team.

Last week we heard the England fans talking confidently about their chances against NZ, but England did not end up looking like the better team on the field or the scoreboard. The England defense was impressive enough, but still could not stop the tries.

Ireland certainly has a better chance, of course, but NZ is improving fast, and I would not be surprised at a convincing All Black win this week. It may turn on whether NZ can cut out the simple mistakes.

SA has beaten NZ four times in a row, including in the RWC final.

I don't think the addition of Spencer for Mitchell helped from that POV but one player should not make such a big diff!

Interesting question about Skelton's role next weekend Miz. From what I hear he may start from the bench, which would be a bit of a waste.