It definitely has been a weekend of entertaining rugby. Many tries, crunching tackles, 100th caps and even a few punches thrown in for good measure. International matches always have a different taste to them with the National Anthems and Hakas; when players are playing for pride they seem to be more testosterone pumped than ever.
The weekend kicked off to an action-packed match between Wales and Argentina. Well, for Wales anyway. Thirsty for revenge after last year’s loss, Wales showed some powerful rugby against a brave Argentine side. Even Santiagio Cordero’s tinkle toes was not enough to cause the home team any real problems; resulting in a 40- 6 win for the Welsh team.
The most tense match of the weekend saw England and New Zealand battle it out in an 80 minute thriller. In the end, although the British put up a good fight, the All Blacks have yet again shown why they have been the best team in the world for the last four years, with a 22-30 win and a 13th consecutive win. It was a shame to see Dan Carter come off the pitch after only 26 minutes, due to injury, for his 100th cap with the All Blacks; but even more disappointing was the emptiness of Twickenham Stadium whilst his outstanding achievement was celebrated at the end of the match.
After a humiliating loss to Tonga in the 2011 World Cup, the French ended their 4-match losing streak with a strong 38-18 win over the Tongans. Les Blues might not have delivered a perfect match but they did show some promising rugby, especially with the new Morgan Parra- Rémi Tales combination. It looks like Philippe Saint André might have finally found a 9/10 combination worth sticking with. The good performance of the French was however overshadowed by Yoann Maestri’s red card. Essentially he was sent of the pitch for being used as a punching ball, a yellow would have sufficed.
A nail-biting match was also seen between Italy and Fiji resulting in a 37-31 win for the Italian side, who celebrated the 100th caps of Sergio Parisse and Martin Castrogiovanni. The Fijian side showed not only bad discipline but also dangerous rugby; including three illegal tackles and one deliberate knock-on, resulting in four of their men being sin-binned in seven minutes, reducing the team to 11 players. The Italians had their fair share of yellows card too (two in the second half) but they were lucky to get out of that match without any paralysed players.
Having showed some great rugby against Samoa last week, Ireland performed poorly against Australia losing 15-32. For a while it looked like Jonathon Sexton’s kicking skills would be enough to keep Ireland close to the Wallabies on the score board, but the holes in their defence were just too big making it far too easy for the Australians to run through. Even when Australia was reduced to 14, as Tevita Kuridrani was given a red card for a dangerous tackle, the Irish were far too scrappy to take advantage of it. If they don’t want to be humiliated against New Zealand next weekend, I hope they will focus their week’s training on defence.
If you want an example of the score not reflecting the match, Scotland vs South Africa was the one to watch. Scotland did not deserve to lose 0-28. They showed great resiliency throughout, with excellent defending on their 5-meter line, multiple times. However, the Springboxs showed how ruthless they can be with two tries in two minutes. The Scots were left exhausted both physically and mentally – their physios will definitely be kept busy this week.
Let’s hope next weekend we will see fewer yellow cards and especially fewer dangerous tackles as the Autumn test matches come to an end. Sadly I feel like it will be a very difficult weekend for the Europeans teams.
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