Rugby

ITv coverage in the studio has been a bit embarrassing. Having blokes in kit reenacting game moments to make points has been a bit embarrassing.
Just seen to former Welsh lads showing how you warm up by passing a ball to one another with training tips on ffs.

Japan sensational win over Ireland today asking for a big response from Schmidt team now.
Really memorable day for the hosts and have a chance of getting through now.

Japan were absolutely awesome. Ireland just weren’t in it from 25 mins onwards.

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Japan were great. Interesting to see how the games against Samoa and Scotland go. Played both at the last WC too. Beat Samoa and lost to Scotland. Those results might give them a QF spot.

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Was there any referee hi-jinks like in the football 2002?

If not fair play, theyll get through ahead of Scotland

They won’t need a dodgy ref to beat Scotland.:yum:

Won’t stop them complaining about one :arteta:

Brilliant game between Wales v Australia. Wales running away with the first half bus Aussie with great response.
Wales get the job done but think it maybe highlights strengths and weaknesses of both sides.
Great entertainment though.

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Yeah I watched most of that, Melbourne isn’t a rugby state but I’ll try and watch all the wallabies World Cup games. I thought we might get em in the end, but the welsh did just enough milking the clock last 10 mins to take the sting out of us.

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Scotland Samoa coming up. Huge one for Scotland staying in the tournament.
Won’t be easy and slightly fancy the Samoans here.

Two tries for Scotland and big chance of getting the five for the bonus point they really need.
Game looks won already just need to keep the momentum up.
Didn’t see this response coming but Samoa been disappointing out there.

Was tense as fuck watching the last 15 minutes of that yesterday. I said to my dad at halftime, they’ll score after and they did which gavrvthem the momentum to push on but we had enough about us in the end to pull a little gap between us.

Alun Wyn Jones, what a fucking man :clap:

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Interesting to see if Scotland get the bonus point, will be very important come the end of the pool stages. If they only get 4, then they are under pressure to get 5 in both games against Russia and Japan.

If Japan lose to Samoa, it wont matter so much, but if they win then they’ll be on 13 or 14 points, so Scorland need to be getting to at least 14 which would include beating Japan and getting 2 bonus points from their last 3 games, 1 of which they should really get.

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Scotland have been incredibly lucky to get the bonus here. Samoa so so error prone.

Caught it whilst working from home,I don’t think I’ve seen a much worse performance from Samoa than that

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Proud nation and that’s gotta hurt because they were abysmal.

https://twitter.com/GaryLineker/status/1179380044931719169?ref_src=twsrc^tfw|twcamp^tweetembed&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fhome.footybite.com%2F

Good old Tancredi weighing into the debate - the comment below absolutely killed me :arteta:

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My mate briefly dated a guy from New Zealand. He’d gotten as high as some provincial team or something so they had some form of haka which he decided to perform one night for us after a few beers. One of my mates responded by doing the macerana (or hakarena as he called it) and I’ve never been able to take the haka seriously ever since :smile:

They broke up a few weeks later and she has hated New Zealand ever since :joy:

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Just the other day some Irish bloke was telling us how ‘unfair’ it is to do the haka before the game.

Linker also said this:

“Just a bit bored by it now. How would a dance in anyway intimidate a sportsman. Their rugby ability is another matter entirely but the haka… nah,”

Does he seriously think the haka is performed by the All Blacks to genuinely intimidate?

Imagine thinking that a professional rugby team of the highest class would have focused their game-plan around intimidating a bunch of other pros with a 1 minute war-dance?

I personally don’t think the ABs should do it every game, and wouldn’t care if they never did it. Hakas aren’t an All Blacks thing, using the haka in sports is really a gimmick for the non-maori around the world who see it as part of the entertainment.

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I can understand how it looks trivial to people from a different background, so I don’t really take offense to people mocking the All Blacks haka etc.

Every haka is specific and many schools will have their own. It’s not all about wardances and can be about celebration or whatever.

There’s not many things more powerful than being part of performing a haka that’s significant to you personally. But it’s about context.

Here’s a video of our schoolhouse haka performed for all of the leavers in my year, by all those staying behind. It is very powerful in context and you can hear me and my bros crying at the end.