ENGLAND'S DEFENCE BLACKS OUT

 

(Image taken from BBC)

 

Well the last time the All Blacks came to Twickenham things didn't go that well. And after a Six Nations campaign best decribed as cack, things admittedly weren't looking very promising this time out. Andy Robinson was still standing but the general coaching set up was pretty much overhauled. As for this match, well the playing staff got overhauled as well, I certainly hadn't heard of Paul Sackey, Anthony Allen, George Chuter or Pat Sanderson before.

Sure enough, it was the All Blacks who were first to attack and Dan Carter opened the scoring by kicking over a penalty. Then it was England's turn to really surge and Jamie Noon found space to go over the line only for the video ref to disallow it because Noon had his hand under the ball. 'Yeah right' said the real rugby experts and I'm not going to argue with them. The next All Black attack resulted in another Carter penalty. At which point the holes in England's denfence became obvious. There's no way Aaron Mauger should have been able to burst through the England defence from his own half but that he did and Carter converted. England finally opened their account after a surge from a scrum, Ian Balshaw being unable to finish the move off, only finding Noon who did. In was the All Blacks who had the last word in the first half though with Carter adding a penalty before Sackey essentially passed to Joe Rokococo to give the visitors a second try which Carter converted and the England defence got shredded yet again before the half was over with Carl Heyman the beneficiary. 28-5 New Zealand at half time.

Result, a very hungry England and it soon showed when the All Blacks couldn't handle a lineout five metres from their tryline and Ben Cohen collected five, with Charlie Hodgeson finally finding his kicking boots to convert. Both kickers missed penalties though but Allen in particular was having a poor debut and Carter took advantage of the rookie to grab a try of his own and convert it. Luckily for England, Mauger booted the ball into Shawn Perry's arms soon after, leading to a debut try for Perry. Hodgeson added in a penalty and then All Black Chris Masoe got sin-binned, giving England a great shot at a comeback but it didn't happen and Carter had the last word with two penalties. Final score 41-20, a record Twickenham defeat.

Welsh rugby fans would have been in a better mood after their team's match against Australia at the Millenium Stadium. The Aussies opened the scoring with a Matt Giteau penalty but the homeside replied likewise through Stephen Jones before Giteau converted his own try. Gavin Henson added a penalty of his own to the Welsh tally but Giteau banked another seven in response. At which point the Welsh hit top gear with Shane williams hitting a try that was converted by James Hook, a rookie kicker who was red hot for the rest of the match, kicking a penalty early on in the seond half before converting another Williams try to put Wales 26-17 up! The Aussies were in no mood to be embarrassed though with Giteau converting a Cameron Shepherd try and Chris Latham put the Aussies completed the turn around before Hook levelled the match for good at 29-29 with one last penalty.

Next up for England are the Argies, and given that this is rugby not football, they certainly should win that!

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