Four Nations Week 3

[Danoz Direct]

New Zealand v England
Forsyth Barr Stadium, Saturday 8 November 2014
Kickoff 6:00pm

1. Peta Hiku 2. Jason Nightingale 3. Shaun Kenny-Dowall 4. Dean Whare 5. Manu Vatuvei 6. Kieran Foran 7. Shaun Johnson 8. Jesse Bromwich 9. Issac Luke 10. Adam Blair 11. Simon Mannering 12. Kevin Proctor 13. Jason Taumalolo
14. Thomas Leuluai 15. Greg Eastwood 16. Martin Taupau 17. Tohu Harris 18. Lewis Brown

1. Sam Tomkins 2. Josh Charnley 3. Kallum Watkins 4. Dan Sarginson 5. Ryan Hall 6. Gareth Widdop 7. Matthew Smith 8. George Burgess 9. Josh Hodgson 10. James Graham 11. Liam Farrell 12. Joel Tomkins 13. Sean O'Loughlin
14. Daryl Clark 15. Brett Ferres 16. Thomas Burgess 17. Chris Hill
Official Match Hashtag: #NZLvENG

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Australia v Toa Samoa
WIN Stadium, Sunday 9 November 2014
Kickoff 4:00pm

1. Greg Inglis 2. Josh Mansour 3. Michael Jennings 4. Dylan Walker 5. Sione Mata'utia 6. Daly Cherry-Evans 7. Cooper Cronk 8. Aaron Woods 9. Cameron Smith 10. Josh Papalii 11. Sam Thaiday 12. Greg Bird 13. Corey Parker
14. Boyd Cordner 15. Robbie Farah 16. Aidan Guerra 17. Ryan Hoffman 18. Ben Hunt 19. David Klemmer 20. Matt Moylan

1. Tim Simona 2. Antonio Winterstein 3. Timoteo Lafai 4. Joseph Leilua 5. Daniel Vidot 6. Ben Roberts 7. Kyle Stanley 8. Isaac Liu 9. Pita Godinet 10. David Fa'alogo 11. Frank Pritchard 12. Leeson Ah Mau 13. Josh McGuire
14. Dunamis Lui 15. Reni Maitua 16. Sauaso Sue 17. Mose Masoe 18. Jesse Sene-Lefao 19. Tautau Moga

Official Match Hashtag: #AUSvSAM

 

[Morkel]

Beau Scott ruled out of the game against Samoa. If only we'd selected 9 other back-rowers in the squad! Oh wait, Sheenius got dis.

 

[Morkel]

I'm salivating at the thought of McGuire & Parker playing directly opposed.

One thing I'll say about Samoa, and it's not to water down their efforts, is that they're playing like they have nothing to lose. Throwing the ball around, kamikaze tackling, it's great viewing, and they've almost come away with the win in both games. It'll be interesting to see if they tighten up their discipline in order to starve Australia of the ball, or whether they continue to roll the dice and go balls out. I suspect the latter, however it means that they're just as likely to win by 4 as they are to lose by 30. Can't wait though.

 

[Ranga]

Go josh show sheens why he should have picked you over other backrowers

 

[Alec]

Beau Scott ruled out of the game against Samoa. If only we'd selected 9 other back-rowers in the squad! Oh wait, Sheenius got dis.

Thank god, Scott is terrible at anything above club level.

 

[Broncoman]

Thank god, Scott is terrible at anything above club level.

I don't understand why people think this. He is a tough nut that is hard to crack at both levels of the game and is solid. His performance and contribution in the Blues victory in game 1 is very underrated.

 

[Big Pete]

Scott rubs people the wrong way.

Carries himself like an enforcer on the field despite not being that particularly skillful, strong or athletic. His numbers don't look great and since people can't be arsed to watch every game (let alone analyse it) they just write him off as an overrated scrub.

However, I thought he was really solid for the Blues this year and did a really good job of protecting Reynolds while the series was on the line.

I remember being really perplexed he was selected over Tariq Sims for the backrow position in City v Country. Turns out the selectors made a good call.

Speaking of defensive coaches, Brisbane could do worse than give Matt Parish a gig.

 

[Alec]

He added nothing in attack, a despite coming up with a few good defensive plays, got caught out even more.

 

[Big Pete]

Neither did Dallas Johnson - not every player has to be an attacking player.

Most of his defensive blemishes occurred when the series was dead. Yeah, they happened but the job was already done and as we evidently saw, it was a tough one.

 

[Unbreakable]

1. Greg Inglis
2. Sione Mata'utia
3. Dylan Walker
4. Michael Jennings
5. Josh Mansour
6. Daly Cherry-Evans
7. Cooper Cronk
8. Aaron Woods
9. Cameron Smith
10. David Klemmer
11. Greg Bird
12. Sam Thaiday
13. Corey Parker

14. Ben Hunt
15. Josh Papalii
16. Boyd Cordner
17. Josh Jackson

Something like that I guess, give Jackson his debut, would rather him over Hoffman or Guerra.

 

[Cult]

Scott rubs people the wrong way.

Carries himself like an enforcer on the field despite not being that particularly skillful, strong or athletic. His numbers don't look great and since people can't be arsed to watch every game (let alone analyse it) they just write him off as an overrated scrub.

However, I thought he was really solid for the Blues this year and did a really good job of protecting Reynolds while the series was on the line.

I remember being really perplexed he was selected over Tariq Sims for the backrow position in City v Country. Turns out the selectors made a good call.

Speaking of defensive coaches, Brisbane could do worse than give Matt Parish a gig.

The worst thing about Scott is that from the top tier seating of Suncorp he looks exactly like Darren Lockyer.

Also so what does Dylan walker have to do to get dropped?

 

[Big Pete]

Doesn't he what?

It was like the Crying Game when I found out who it really was.

It wasn't right Cult3, it wasn't right.

And yeah, Walker was woeful again. Was willing to give him a pass on his debut since he held his own defensively and was played out of position but gee he kept England in the game. I doubt we'd see it, but I'd be interested to see Moylan at fullback with GI in the centres if it meant getting rid of him.

 

[Alec]

Neither did Dallas Johnson - not every player has to be an attacking player.

Most of his defensive blemishes occurred when the series was dead. Yeah, they happened but the job was already done and as we evidently saw, it was a tough one.

Dallas Johnson was a FAR better defender, and he only played 1 test.

I don't buy that he only struggled because the series was over, he's just not a great defender. Even someone like Gillett can sometime come up with good defensive plays.

 

[Big Pete]

I don't want to defend Beau Scott but when you come out and flat-out call him terrible I don't think you're giving him or the Queensland side enough credit.

Queensland targeted him heavily in both Games 1 & 2. Result? NSW won the series for the first time in 8 years.

Of course it wasn't all down to that, but it was certainly apart of it as NSW resisted wave after wave of offense.

 

[Super Freak]

I actually think we should keep the same side, and just bring Jackson in for Scott.

I don't like Thaiday at prop, but I thought Klemmer played the way he did because he was coming off the bench so I think we should just stick with that.

The forward pack for Samoa are not the fittest bunch, so Klemmer coming on when their forwards are tiring will benefit us. He was a handful against England, hard to bring down and dragged defenders. He attracted 3-4 defenders a few times so if he can get some offloads away, that would be great..

 

[Cult]

I don't get the Klemmer praise. I think James Tamou has some competition for the slowest moving prop ever now. He basically walked up to the defensive line.

 

[Morkel]

Tough decision. Normally when it's a multi-game tournament you want everyone in the squad to get some game time. But it's also a must-win game. And with the following week being the final, they'll still want to give Cronk & DCE as much time as possible to perfect their combination (and in saying that, whoever is the bench utility, which I do hope will be Hunt). Jackson on the bench is fine, as we're not losing much at all with him, but what about Moylan? It's a massive drop from Inglis to him. And you can't put him on the bench unless you leave out the intended utility for the final. The only other option would be to drop say Jennings (who's the most settled centre in the team) and put Inglis at left centre. That way Walker can still have a chance at getting his confidence back up and work on his combo with Mansour.

01 - Moylan
02 - Mata'utai
03 - Inglis
04 - Walker
05 - Mansour
06 - DCE
07 - Cronk
08 - Woods
09 - Smith
10 - Thaiday
11 - Bird
12 - Papalii
13 - Parker

14 - Hunt
15 - Klemmer
16 - Jackson
17 - Cordner

 

[Danoz Direct]

Tough decision. Normally when it's a multi-game tournament you want everyone in the squad to get some game time. But it's also a must-win game. And with the following week being the final, they'll still want to give Cronk & DCE as much time as possible to perfect their combination (and in saying that, whoever is the bench utility, which I do hope will be Hunt). Jackson on the bench is fine, as we're not losing much at all with him, but what about Moylan? It's a massive drop from Inglis to him. And you can't put him on the bench unless you leave out the intended utility for the final. The only other option would be to drop say Jennings (who's the most settled centre in the team) and put Inglis at left centre. That way Walker can still have a chance at getting his confidence back up and work on his combo with Mansour.

01 - Moylan
02 - Mata'utai
03 - Inglis
04 - Walker
05 - Mansour
06 - DCE
07 - Cronk
08 - Woods
09 - Smith
10 - Thaiday
11 - Bird
12 - Papalii
13 - Parker

14 - Hunt
15 - Klemmer
16 - Jackson
17 - Cordner

One thing they definitely won't do is drop Jennings.