- Oct 2, 2004
- 48,253
- 47,312
- Staff
- #4,881
While I won’t lose any sleep if BV misses the Wales game (though I’m sure I heard he would be back in the next month but I could be wrong) I was looking forward to seeing him up against Tobi but that isn’t happening now, obviously. Moriarty is a monster though and is probably
a better ball carrier than Faletau but as we touched on yesterday he needs games and it doesn’t look like he’s going to get any.
Yeah, you could get 2 long term injuries in the second row and still put in 2 very good players. Mind you, you’re no different to any other side (bar NZ) in that you have certain areas (not many tbf) that you’re weak in. I don’t even think you’re current, starting 9 or 15 is good enough let alone 2nd/3rd choices. I also think you lack top quality depth in the back row (probably the only area we trump you in) but you have some good up and comers. It would be interesting to see how you’d fair if you suffered the kind of injuries we have in the areas where you can’t really afford to lose them (like us in the 2nd row and center).
Having said all that there’s still a lot of rugby to play until the 6N kicks off and I’m sure they’ll be more injuries. Like I said earlier, though, we’re in big shit if AWJ gets injured. He’s played a lot of rugby and in that Northampton game he was really putting it about. I’d love to see him rested for the league (seeing as we’ve completely fucked that up this year) and just play champions cup games from now on but that won’t happen.
We all want to see the best players playing against each other but I think we’ll be sitting this one out in that regard. We’ve still got A lot of quality in the backs, though, even without Davies. Fingers crossed Liam Williams comes back ok.
Yeah I think that's fair about England by and large.
Scrum half is definitely an area of weakness, although to be fair Danny Care has been superb for both club and country this season (albeit against limited opposition for England).
15 is a potential area of weakness, although Brown remains solid, if unspectacular, and in Daly/Nowell/Watson we have plenty have options to play there.
The back row is weaker than Wales, albeit I think Wales' back row is often (and rightly based on individual quality) talked-up but never seems to quite deliver. Almost a case of too many options means they don't seem to know their best combination, and the obsession with Warburton means he always gets back in when his glass body has healed, regardless of how well anyone else has done. Mind you England have some bloody good players coming through in that area so I think that gap will be bridged soon.
We also have issues in the centres, although that's partially masked by Farrell playing at 12.
I think generally, if both teams could pick a fit first XV, there wouldn't be much between them. I think England's front 5 would possibly be the difference, plus the strength they can always seem to bring off the bench.
And ultimately that's the big difference. Wales have a great XV and a reasonable 22 to pick from when everyone is fit, but when they do get injuries there is then a big drop off (in some positions at least) to those who come in.
It's where England and New Zealand look very strong at the moment, because there is such a large pool of strong players to pick from, whereas other nations are all reliant on keeping people fit.
I do really hope we get a World Cup where everyone is fit (for all teams) in 2019.