Wallabies tame Sonny Bill and smash Baa Baas

TPN's throwing has improved a lot this year and is just as good as Moore's. If you watched the int'l games late last year, Moore's throwing was far from perfect. I think Freier's the best thrower. I'm not that worried about who starts out of TPN and Moore and they should share it around. I do think overall TPN is better though - and a thoroughly nice guy (Moore might be too!)

Even though im not a SBW fan, nothing personal i dont really follow league that much (once again nothing personal) but i think they guy really needs to be given some credit. He really didnt shame himself at all. Given some experience at higher level comps he really could do some damage to opposing teams. good luck to him. It just seems the Sydney media and league fans damn him at every opportunity. Ive seen a lot worse debuts than that. Another thing i noted that the Baa Baas back line had a lot more composure and looked more dangerous when Jackson came on at 10 and Mcallister went to 12.

bennalong, I'm just saying he had a better debut than Tahu, that's all. I don't really care about this whole SBW thing one way or the other, but I've seen worse performances. I dunno what the Aussie media are on about at the best of times, so I'll chalk this up as another of their random episodes. As for Luke-baby, I think he's pretty clearly a 12 who can play 10 when things are going well. It'll be interesting to see whether Henry starts him at second five or uses him off the bench. Both our centres are injured, right? Nonu and Toeava isn't that enticing. Perhaps they'll shift Nonu to 13 and play McAlister at 12.

I agree with Peter K about TPN. I think his throwing has improved this year and he offers so much in tight and (here's where he has it all over Moore) just as much in the loose. TPN's kick chase, gather, pass under extreme pressure for Horwill onto O'Connor for the young fella's try was awesome. That's not to say Moore was bad, but TPN is really putting it all together.

I think SBW looked decent in attack, he just got shown up seriously in defence sturctures. The boy can tackle, but he seemed to have the same issue knowing where to slot into the defence that other leaguies tend to. Tahu has taken some time to do this. Playing within a BarBars team that probably didn't have much defensive cohesion or structure wouldn't have helped though.

Jameswm agree totally re not so Sharpe. I thought all the backs played really well and the frontrow and Horwill. Sharpe totally a non entity, no impact. Thought the loosies were average as well Hodgson, Smith and Brown. Polotou Nou was fantastic, IF and I mean IF he can throw under pressure he should start ahead of Moore. The scrum was noticably more powerful and directed when he came on. Elsom and Palu straight in when fit. Kimlin for Sharpe. I would look at starting Pocock, for my mind easily outplayed Smith and Waugh.

The other thing I meant to say is they HAVDE to give Kimlin a go. Sharpe is just ponderous in comparison. Kimlin is faster, on the ball more, more physical and aggressive despite his lighter frame and his skills are better. He'd make a good combination with the aggressive, tighter Horwill and this combination could take us through the next two world cups.

I thought McAllister said he hadn't actually been playing 10 for some time. I thought he looked pretty poor at 10, and then when he went wider, he looked spectacular and made breaks from wider out at second receiver at will. He is probably the best angle runner I have seen in ages. Massive fan. Should be playing centre for All blacks this year I would imagine rather than 10, but who knows. SBW was outplayed, as expected, but I thought he was dished up shit ball. When he was coping big hits, he was always reaching up for the ball, and he is tall, so how bad where the passes? Good first touch. At least he was good the whole game smiling. Different level from bottom of the top 14 table to playing the wallabies. Wallers looked pretty good I guess for first game, but Baa baas were pretty poor overall. I thought all flankers had a pretty quite game. None really shone. Adam two dads actually put away his bombing game, and had a go, and also did some pretty good long kicks in counter. Good for him. That is my major beef with him, when he just up and unders. Would have been good to see Rabbit get more game time, and I notice he didn't use Cooper much either. I loved the dummy dummy go from Gits. Take me back a long time. Noone uses that too much these days. Horwill picked up from super 14 I thought. He is great in tight, and also wider. He has a great try scoring ratio. Lets hope he can keep it up. In all honesty, I don't expect much from either Italy, or France, but we will see. Maybe the Wallabies are putting things together for a good year.

Jerry, who plays 10 when Donald comes off? We are critically short on replacements there. At the moment our backup is Wepu (!), and if one of those two were injured, the next in line would be Brett from the JABs who had an atrocious season. It's best to reconsider McAlister with that in mind, even knowing his preference for 12. Jameswm, Marshall = foul-tempers-"r"-us. His attitude is just the same as it ever was.

Can someone explain to me what Justin Marshall was on? He came on and had two tackles, both times deliberately attacking the head of an opponent and deserving to be sin-binned. Then there was the arguing with the ref, and continuing it on as the ref was walking away. He's had his moments of foul play before (wasn't there a hand stomp once?), but not normally like this. It looked like he was on a personal mission to maim as many Wallabies as possible. What a foul-tempered, cowardly individual. Retire now if you're going to be like that. As for the rest of it, I don't know if the Wallabies discussed SBW before the match, but he certainly got his share of attention. He seems to run high and make his ribs an easy target. Shame on you guys writing Mortlock off. He's the hard warrior the backline needs, with creative guys inside him and flyers outside. AAC was pretty good, but let's see O'Connor get a full game at fullback.

Good News - I'm not that impressed with calling up McAlister to the TN. What's the point? He doesn't cover centre or wing which was Kahui's role. The AB's don't need cover at 12 as Toeava was in good form in that position for the Blues and like Nonu plays 12 as the 'inside centre' role (rather than the traditional NZ 'second five eighth' role that Luke plays). And I just don't think he's a test calibre 10, though obviously Henry does.

McAllister has been recalled to the All Blacks to play France in replacement for an injured Richard Kahui. Will be interesting. Don't think he has had enough game time at 10 of late to move in for Donald as yet. Time will tell. A thought for the future.... 10 Carter 12 McAlister 13 Nonu/SBW. And they can pretty much all cover each others positions in case of injury. Within reason. ie McAlister could replace Carter, Nonu to 12, SBW 13. Nonu could replace McAlister etc... The Evil Wizard Mortlock will always pose a threat regardless, against any opposing 12/13. BaaBaa's playing Aussie twice? Again this weekend?

OJ Tahu wasn't playing ! ? The fact that you mention him means he's on your mind for some reason. Good! The Wallabies looked sharp. Chris Jack said that after the last game in England they'd gained intensity. And further, that Robbie Deans instills pride in yourself and your team. It shows.

Matt, Don't agree re Waugh/Smith. Thought latter was outstanding especially in broken play where his vision was masterful To my mind he eclipses McCaw in that area & is far more dangerous linking up with backs. Great to see the enthusiasm of the "younger" team. BaaBaas just too old, even Collins Jools-USA

Not Tito.. Collins and Jack.

The starting xv contained 4 survivors: Lewsey, Dermody, Jack and Tito.

KO - From my quick view of the teamsheets it seeems that about 16 of the guys played in the same 22 against England and Australia. Having said that the England team were Enlands 3rd team and once they settled they did pull back the score. I enjoyed the Baabaa V Wallaby match as a bit of light hearted entertainment (which is what it should be). Baabaas were esiappointing, even considering factors such as motivation, training and combinations. I thought a bit of persoanl pride may have got them motivated. OJ - Williams was better than Tahu?? Splitting hairs, as both of them have failed to show much. SBW needs to get into S15 to learn to operate within limited space and time windows. From what I observed last night he must have a lot of time/space in T14 rugby.

'Yeah didn’t think of that. Except as you said they beat England the week before. By the beginnig of last night’s game the BaaBaa team had been together for 2 weeks. One week longer than than the Wallabies.' .. And had never played together as a team. Have a look at the Baa Baas team sheet versus England - only 4 players remained. Then have a look at the quote from Jerry Collins where he admitted the team had done no training for the Australia game. Then have a look at the 3rd string team England put out, and then look at the changes in the xv for the Argentina game.

Pablo I'm beginning to think that the SANZAR nations are using these all the upcoming test series as tuners. I don't expect the French to trouble the AB's that much. If they do then the AB's will have to play sub par. And the Lions will need to find something if they are going to be anything but tackling bags for the SA's. I can't remember which british write said it but " Tri-Nations is the real A Grade of International Rugby". At the moment the two strongest Nations in the North are split between a increasingly dubious Lions tour or running around in the States and Canada.

"He was also booed by a small section of the crowd wearing blue and white when he cleaned up by a Lachie Turner grubber in the second half." And heckled by a large portion of the crowd wearing gold for most of the game. SBW got shown up several times, and played a part in letting in several of the tries. However, it was a big ask, and I think he will have learnt a lot from it. The kid's a talent, and union is better for having him. I was actually disappointed in the game. The Barbars were very disjointed, as you would expect, but to let in 8 tries and be in their own half most of the game actually got boring. I couldn't believe this was mostly the same team that knocked over England. They must be playing really poorly. Australia has all the structure and panache, but had only been in camp a week. I didn't think it would produce such a result against a bunch of awesome players. The BarBars gave the Wallabies a torrid time late last year with little prep, and that was against a team at the end of a tour. Having said that, I hear the BarBars were enjoying the Sydney pubs pretty well in the week before, so perhaps all the talk about them being super serious was just that, talk. This looked to me like litle more than a training run. Italy will be slightly tougher, but we should touch them up too. It's all very well to blow the rust out, but is it going to be too much of a step up when we start playing the "real'" Tests in the Tri-Nations?