The Silver Fern

How annoyed must the Canes be about having to set a scrum with 2 mins left?

Had the ball and momentum. Injury stoppage meant time ticked along as scrum was set and reset, and then got hit with a penalty. Don’t begrudge stopping as that Force player looked stuffed. A real sliding doors moment for the game and season.

@cgrant I be pleased if Lomax does, I really got on his wagon we first arrived at Ta$man, just loved how he scrummed, had a back so straight you coauld put a cuppa on it, but took a while to really come through. I from old school that reckom a real straight back allows the power coming through from behind to go where it sholud.

Good we got 5 points... Drua were appalling though, they try to play too much 7's rugby in this comp, that's never going to work well in 15's.

@antipodean said in Brumbies vs Hurricanes:

@NZbloke said in Brumbies vs Hurricanes:

Canes made some pretty poor handling errors... but disappointing to lose to a dour Brumbies team that lack imagination.

It's a clear contrast in styles and speaks to where rugby is at: Brumbies don't "play" rugby; they play for territory and set piece (read lineout) opportunities. Canes are the opposite but don't have the cattle to secure possession; average backrow and poor skills means they give up the ball.

Brumbies carry the ball less than almost any other team in the comp and when they do they hardly offload. It's about minimising errors. Boring to watch but effective.

I'm looking forward to watching them play the Blues because the Blues have a vastly better backrow and are playing a more rounded style of game.

You don't have to play boring safe rugby to win, reckon the best way to win matches is a balance of good forward play & attack with your backs when it's on, you're giving yourself a lot more attacking options, that's the main reason why the Crusaders have won so many Super titles over the years.

Nothing wrong with Canes backrow, they clearly have the skill sets... in general we just didn't play that well overall.

Brumbies use to be really robotic when George Gregan was their halfback... as we know he use to basically execute very short inside passes all day long to either a forward or back running up the middle, use to be utterly boring crap.

@Canes4life said in Hurricanes v Reds:

@NZbloke said in Hurricanes v Reds:

Was bloody annoying that the ref pinged us heaps in in the first 15-20 minutes on 50/50 calls, so was hardly surprising the Reds went out to a pretty big lead in that period... at least after that the ref started to ping both sides.

Yeah it was a dodgy first 15 by the refs, I mean how the hell did they miss that crooked throw by the Reds? One of the worst misses I’ve ever seen. What made it worse was that the Reds gained a penalty a few phases later which got them on the front foot.

That's for sure, in the first quarter the ref let the Reds get away with a lot of stuff - gave them a huge advantage starving us of ball... from a penalty they could either have a crack at a 3pointer, or kick the ball out 40-50 metres downfield & then have the throw in to the lineout as well.

Canes desperately needed those 5 points to stay in the mix, other than that we didn't get that much benefit out of the match... MPs lack of depth is really hurting them, they were very poor at the breakdown & awful at defending the rolling maul, at times they were ok at scrummaging.

When Canes get back to playing one match a week we should be looking to field our best team each week, play all our best combinations together, which will give us far better flow in our game, making the Canes much more of a threat.

@hydro11 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@gt12 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@antipodean said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@hydro11 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@antipodean said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@hydro11 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@antipodean said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@hydro11 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@antipodean said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@hydro11 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@antipodean said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@hydro11 said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@antipodean said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@bones said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@cgrant said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

It was a very kickable penalty. How many chances to get the 3 points : more than 70% IMO. How many chances to score a try via the lineout ? 20% maybe ?

I'm struggling to understand this concept that it's impossible for the canes to win in normal time, yet so much more acceptable they'd win in extra time. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

Trying to score from something they're bad at (lineout - maul) against a team excellent at defending a maul. Extra time provides unstructured opportunities which is something the Canes are reasonable at.

It's not just a maul though. Even if you don't score from the maul, you should be able to recycle and get an unstructured opportunity 5 metres out.

Did they..?

Going for the lineout has less than a 50% chance of success, so can't use the fact it failed to prove your point. It has to be based on the likeliness at the time.

Let me get this logic right: A Canes lineout has more chance of losing possession that winning it, so it's better to attempt that to its inevitable conclusion (as we saw), than to force other opportunities?

No. The lineout has less than 50% chance of leading to a try. Obviously, we have more than 50% chance of winning the ball back.

Ok. A Canes lineout has more chance of not leading to a try than scoring one, so it's better to attempt that to its inevitable conclusion (as we saw), than to force other opportunities?

Yes. Going to golden point also has more chance of losing than winning.

There's only two teams competing in golden point...

Yes, but the Crusaders are a far better team, thus giving them a greater than 50% chance of winning in golden point. I don't believe you think the Hurricanes are as good as the Crusaders, or would be as likely to win from that point.

Even if you think golden point is a 50/50, Jordie still has to kick the goal to take us there. Unless you give him a 100% chance of doing so, there was a sub 50% the Hurricanes won from that position.

I understand now. You weren't going to win so why delay the inevitable, get it over in normal time!

That’s exactly what I’m reading too.

We’ll only get one chance as we aren’t good enough. Fair enough.

What I find hilarious is that the Canes were 6/10 against the Saders for line outs won.

But the kick is the risky option.

Our lineout is much better than that normally though.

Ahhh that poor display must have contributed to J. Blackwell's dropping from the side that fronted against Moana Pasifika.

@machpants

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@nzbloke said in Moana Pasifika vs Hurricanes:

You're sounding like a broken record

You are the absolute world champ at ironing.

This competition is looking more and more amateur every week dealing with these restrictions.

@cgrant said in Hurricanes vs Highlanders:

@bones
A midfield combo with the two twin brothers could be fun but it won't happen under Foster's management.

Ardie and Julian?

@canes4life said in Blues vs Hurricanes 02/2022:

@pakman I think you need another angle to safetly say there was no doubt it went over. Those images are far too blurry to suggest that it definitely went over.

My technological skills are inadequate to get clear pictures on Fern, but if you run the tape back and forward there’s no doubt.

It doesn’t change anything, except maybe the referee’s association should ask the touchies what they were doing!

@act-crusader said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

@pakman said in Crusaders v Hurricanes:

Just watched first half. Canes right on top. Crazy score at 16-12. Chch didn't do much right, one try ought to have been ruled out for forward pass, lucky only to have one in bin. Canes should have had at least 6 more on board. Canes 16 - Chch 5 would have been fairer reflection. Amazing!

So we came from 16-5 down to win? Makes the win that little bit more sweeter. Onwards and upwards. Get on the bandwagon, Tony Johnson certainly has 😉

Second half 26-20 to Chch. Hard to argue with too much with it. That said, had Ardie's try stood (thought the decision of no try was correct) doubt Canes would have leaked those quick tries.

Had Canes taken their chances they would have won, but that's rugby.

Take aways for me:

Canes backline play electric;

Jordie MOTM for me; but

Chch pack (maul especially) is their matchwinner.

Match highlights:

@duluth said in Hurricanes v Blues (pre-season):

@kiwimurph

Oops, yes I forgot

it's Northland, totally understandable

Old Hurricanes promo video. Didn't know where else to post it and didn't want to derail the 2023 thread.

Can't remember seeing this before; it's hilarious.

@gt12 said in Hurricanes v Reds:

I didn’t comment on the penalty try, I commented on whether he should be given a YC.

In that position i.e. in-goal, you can't really have one without the other under the current framework.

@stargazer haha that's great.

That loop de loop try is one of the more embarrassing things I have seen on a football field

@mikey07 nah, we're battlers.