Great comment Bernie. And disappointing if that this is the case. I for one have no idea about grassroot rugby, development and so will refrain from making any comments about this.
Positives – having not really watched Hunt play for the reds I lvoed his game on Saturday. Strong in defence, good combo with Folau from the Bronco days and provides a real playmaking option at 12. Folau’s return to form was great to see. The handling and intent of Hannigan was a real positive too.

Negatives – After watching the wallabies for 20 years and more lately the Northern Hemisphere teams whilst in London, there is one word that comes to mind forward pack. Wallabies place to much emphasis on east to west. Focus on getting forward ball, territory and use that as the platform to launch attacks of a higher percentage.

Backline play is crucial and I think we have always been ok at that but it is the forward pack that has been missing now since the era of Foley, Eales et al that sadly have never really been replaced. Without a decent scrum and lineout you cannot make the most of turnovers or penalties and miss the chance to use set pieces as an attacking platform. The breakdown is the next area – we have always had great no 7 – smith, pocock, hooper but we need to be more aggressive as a team at the cleanout. We need to get over the gainline, cleanout and use that as the platform because we have the backline to cause most teams major problems on our day.

THanks moaman. I did go over some of the 2nd half scrum footage and have to concede that the dark arts of scrummaging are beyond me. Happy to defer to my much more esteemed colleagues on this one

Great question JW89.
I went back over the footage of each of the 6 mauls that the Lions attempted on the back of attacking lineout throws:
1. first maul made 10m inside the Lions half and was solid
2. The maul got pulled down before it got going – unclear if NZ managed to tackle catcher or it just collapsed
3. Penalty against NZ
4. Maul went to ground and turnover after warburton stripped
5. Maul collapsed but play continued – NZ players were pushing in from the side before they stepped away but probably did enough to splinter the maul.
6. Penalty against NZ for tackling Faletau whilst in the air

Its a fine line but essentially on the 3 occasions that the maul failed to get any metres, it collapsed. Whether that was just accidental or whether the NZ forwards were able to tackle and bring the lineout catcher down before the ball could be fed back was hard to gather from the footage.

I think the maul will still be factor but they need to mix it up. Would love to see the lines throw it deep and let the centres and wingers go to work – didnt see much of that in the game.
I am not a maul defence expert so this is pretty rudimentary analysis. Love to see what some of the resident experts have to say.

Thanks for the comment JW89. Cant argue with any of what you said. Win the breakdown, get over the gainline and they might be a chance

Thanks for the kind words SAKiwi!

Good read Declan and good suggestions. Really good discussion on the thread too. All 3 Lions discussion threads have been real quality. A welcome change from some of the bickering and negative nonsense on the football threads

Thanks for the comment System of a Downey Jr. The first half was a good contest but I still think the Lions were clearly beaten. They struggled to slow it down, compete at the breakdown, contain the phases and go ahead from a brilliant NZ tight five. I agree that WG and the team have done a good job on this tour. It is very difficult coming together over several weeks, learning a new gameplan and playing cohesive rugby. I was perhaps a bit harsh on the first half performance but based on what I had seen in the lead up matches I really thought that the forward pack would get on top in the clinches and win the gainline. But alas, I underestimated just how powerful and skilled this entire NZ team is

Thanks Russell Neville. All good points. And yes, the Wallabies will need a miracle to win back the BLedisloe this year. Was excited by our attacking intent against Italy and we were deadly at times but the forward pack still has a long way to go. And then theres the scrum…

Thanks Connor33. Cant argue with your suggestion for the change for the Irish connection. I would like to see Rhys Webb come on but whether it is to start or come on with 30min to go is the question. As for Farrell, perhaps he was injured but Id like to see him have another go with a forward pack that gives him better go ahead and better continuity.

Thanks Fionn! Seems like England are truly blessed with enormous depth at the lock position. I wasnt sure about the selection of AWJ either, and after this performance I hope Gatland makes a change there

Thanks for the comment Batdown!

Thanks for the comment Harry. Yes several pieces of magnificent skill – i enjoyed the one handed pick up from Barrett.

Fionn – im sure you are right. where do u think he could have made a difference?

Thanks for the great comment taylorman. I will admit Im a bit young for the 1994 reference but certainly remember the French beating the All Blacks in 1999. I certainly hope we see more counter attacking play from the Lions backline.

agreed. But in some ways he had to. they werent making metres and were losing the territory battle. With a couple of successes when Smith dropped catches – it was a tactic they felt they needed to resort to in order to alleviate pressure and get up the field

Thanks for the comment Kevin. Perhaps after watching the lead up games I expected different. I guess its what you define by compete. If you mean try – they certainly did that. Did they have moments of brilliance and brief periods of ascendancy – they did with several line breaks and an excellent 10min period either side of halfway. But overall, i think they got fairly well beaten in most areas bar lineout. I didnt include any stats above but here are a few (probably get accused of cherry picking) – 559m v 412m run, 62% to 37% territory, 14 to 22 turnovers conceded. Couldnt find the gainline statistic anywhere that I saw during the sky sports coverage but from memory NZ dominated that as well. Ultimately credit to the All Blacks, I really was in awe of their performance.

THanks for the comment Neil. I am not sure I said that they didnt compete – far from it. “Everyone tried hard and had a go”. All they can do is compete harder which is a triusm for any sportsperson on a losing team around the world. Perhaps harsh terminology with my “delusional” comment. I really felt the Lions could win this series, but in my humble opinion based on what I saw today, they dont have much chance of winning the series from here but I hope they can provide a contest

Nice read Simon. Grappled plenty with this issue myself. Trophy chasing is just part of sports all over the world. What enabled this to happen was the TV deal that changed the cap from 70 million to 94 million helping GSW to keep their players and sign KD. Most teams can have a big 3 (by paying a lot of luxury tax) but never seen a big 4 like this – or where a team that went 73-9 added the arguably the second best player in the NBA to their roster.

great article Dan. one that we grapple with a lot. Greatness is greatness IMO regardless of how much team success that they achieved. Team success provides the athlete with a chance to show their wares in the toughest of arenas but that is a function of being part of great team. I do not think that team success elevates one great athlete over another.
Put Le Bron in the spurs team and he might have had a lot more than the 3 championship rings. but he has carried, willed his teams to the finals on multiple occasions and whilst he may not win as many as MJ or even Kobe, he had to do it with inferior teams and for that reason he deserves to be mentioned in the same breath as MJ.
You also cant go past numbers for they are the ultimate true measure of a player. Lockett’s record as the all-time greatest goal scorer puts him above Dunstall even though Dunstall won numerous flags.

I take the view that we shouldnt hate the creator/writer. Evan produces an article with a creative idea and as an ‘expert’ writer, he needs to produce 1-2 articles per week covering areas that no one else has talked about. This is not as easy as it sounds. If you dont like the slightly negative slant of article or werent interested in the topic, you are always welcome to read something else.

As for the topic, i think its an interesting one. most of the stuff covered already but from a playing perspective Troisi and Kruse are better off playing in the HAL. Certainly Troisi’s career has flourished in Oz and then gone into relative hibernation overseas. but money is king and when playing well, players have to cash in on what is likely to be a last ‘big’ contract to secure their financial futures. I would love to see Troisi run around for the MV but i would not begurdge him if he looked for greater money overseas even if it meant he saw less playing time. the other caveat is the challenge of entering a ‘tougher league’. One could stay a big fish in a small pool so to speak but as JB alluded to, the challenge of also improving or trying their hand in a different environment can also be alluring.

Great discussion. most of the points about supporter engagement were eloquently raised by Rakshop. Of the couple of socceroos matches I have been to atmosphere is a bit stale. When home matches are few and far between it can be hard to develop chants, songs that most of the crowd know. Engagement is hard enough but most of the A-league clubs eps MV and WSW have shown the level of atmosphere that can be produced when you have engaged fans, coming week in week out. Unfortunately without an really big active supporter contingents (fanatics do an ok job) to get this going and then continuity in terms of frequency of games, I doubt this will ever change. That isnt to say the socceroos are not well supported, you just dont get the vibrant, intimidating atmosphere you see at many of the A-league venues through the season.

As for the choice of venue – maddening discussion. Hindmarsh holds 15000 and some 35,000 will miss out if it was held there and I doubt atmosphere would be any better. AO is great for the fans – close to river, city, lots of eateries and a fantastic gameday atmosphere and although I havent been there i am told by many old adelaide mates that it has great acoustics. Perfect choice of venue for a game of this calibre in the city of churches.

As for the socceroos and lack of friendlies – yes balance could be better and would be great to see them involved in more home fixtures but with the small windows ACQ, WCQ there just isnt enough room on the calendar. I also think many times, a training camp is more useful than a friendly. With so many players from different clubs, they need to learn and practice the system, combinations in a camp rather than waste much of the window preparing for a friendly. of course friendlies are then needed to put this into practice.

Great article Sean. Brutal and hilarious.
yep – we are all enjoying the plight of hawthorn whilst it lasts. hopefully it isnt a case of bottom out, get pick 3 and be there or therabouts again next year. Want to see a prolonged period of misery for the hawks (yes – my hatred for the hawks almost runs deeper than my love of carlton).

nice read Vibhor and some good thoughts. Arsenal can have their FA cup – we needed UCL qualification much more than an FA cup (although it would have been nice to win both). Our end points tally would have good enough to win many epl seasons. Just picked the season that chelsea scored the 3rd (i think that is correct) highest points total in the EPL era – only behind Mourinhos chelsea and Wengers invincibles. Vintage Spurs bad luck.
Only area to improve is central attacking midfield depth – eriksen is the heartbeat and if he goes down we may be in trouble. I think Janssen will come good. I have seen enough to think he will offer something up front. Cant believe everyone is writing him off – it takes some players a couple of seasons to adapt to epl level e.g. erik lamela.

Brilliant read Jeremy! Agree with the neutral view from sweden. Need the warm ups to test combinations etc. Great article on bbc about the failures from the 2005 Lions tour. http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union/40069682

I have to say – Im more of a pearl jam fan but never realised how good audiosoave were. Set it off great track. Enjoyed Gasoline too.
How about Temple of Dog – Hunger strike