U20 Rugby Championship 2025
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@Bovidae said in U20 Rugby Championship 2025:
It would interesting to know how many were in the 2023 Aust U18 team that played the NZ Schools.
This is the lineup from the first game between NZ Schools and Australia U18 in 2023:
So I count 8 players who were part of that team, including the reserves (Barrett; Brosnan; Wilcox; Ata; Brial; Fakafonua; Fowler; Sharples), who will feature tomorrow. Similar to the NZ team, in other words.
Interestingly, there's only 3 players from the 2024 U18 team - Eli Langi; Nick Hill; and Nick Conway - despite the fact that they were pretty dominant. Cooper Watters was part of the excellent Australia 7s team at the Global Youth Sevens, so he'll be another one to watch.
I haven't seen the NZ U20 team play so I'm not sure how they'll go. It looks like they'll be able to play an expansive game, with dry and relatively warm conditions. I still think NZ age grade teams have an edge through the quality of their passing and running game, especially on hard and dry pitches, so they should go reasonably well. With the U20 TRC being in Gqeberha and the U20 World Cup being in Italy in July, this should be the first U20 season in quite some time where the conditions should be consistently suited for running rugby.
The Junior Wallabies will want to tighten up in defence, as the game against the Japan U23 XV showed there was a lot of space out wide and a lack of defensive communication amongst the back three. I'm not sure how good Sid Harvey's defence is on the wing, but he'll be tested.
I couldn't remember the name of the Aust TH prop (Goddard) who gave some of the NZS LH props a real working over in the scrum. But he's not there. Finn Baxter is the son of Al. I'm going to be interested to see how the tight five holds up with a view to the U20 WC.
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The officials for the first four games.
New Zealand vs Australia at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, Gqeberha - 14h00
Referee: Christopher Allison (SARU)
Assistant Referees: Thomas Bertazza (Arg), Phumzile Mbewu
Television Match Official: Ben CrouseSouth Africa vs Argentina at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, Gqeberha - 16h10
Referee: Todd Petrie (NZ)
Assistant Referees: George Myers (Aus), Sean Muller
Television Match Official: Ben CrouseNew Zealand vs Argentina at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, Gqeberha - 14h00
Referee: George Myers (Aus)
Assistant Referees: Christopher Allison (SARU), Sean Muller
Television Match Official: Quinton ImmelmanSouth Africa vs Australia at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, Gqeberha - 16h10
Referee: Thomas Bertazza (Arg)
Assistant Referees: Todd Petrie (NZ), Phumzile Mbewu
Television Match Official: Quinton Immelman -
HT score: 17-10 in favour of Australia U20s. More than deserved as well, the NZ U20s are suffering from poor ball-retention (breakdown, lineout) as well as ill discipline. The attack looks okay in phase play but they've had too few opportunities in the opposition 22 due to turnovers.
Two tries were disallowed for the NZ U20s but both decisions were correct (2 knock ons). Letiu has been poor, unfortunately, so Oudenryn might make an earlier appearance than intended. The NZ U20 defence, after a very poor start, has improved but there's massive gaps in the defensive line as well as a poorly-organized pillar defence.
The NZ U20s will have the breeze in their back in the second half, so an opportunity to play for a bit more territory.
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Streaming on Rugby Pass TV:
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Simpson has put in some excellent kicks during this game. One of the better players for NZ so far.
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To me, there was a pretty clear shift in momentum. After the penalty try to NZ made it 29-17, Sinton kicked the ball out on the full. Australia scored quickly afterwards and the game shifted back in their favour.
Couple that with the poor decision to go for the scrum on the Australian 5 metre-line, and all you can really say is that a draw is probably a fair result.
