The highs and lows of scratch rugby teams

The Lions, after a couple of weeks together, played an invitational Royal XV. The top players from Britain and Ireland played a side in which only two of them had any Super-14 experience, and that for "bad" Super-14 sides like the Cheetahs who are always in the bottom two or three places.

The Lions, eventually, won. They didn't really deserve to though. There were a lot of new combinations on the pitch, and you would have to say that they didn't work. None of them. The front row creaked, the second row folded, the back row struggled on the back of that. 9, 10, 12 didn't work too well - I know I'm down on ROG, but I'm blaming him again. Both scrum halves expected him to be further forwards than he was. This left him reaching for the ball and kicking and passing off-balance. You can argue that a 9 should be passing to the 10, but in the heat of the moment they pass to where they expect him to be (The Baa-baas v England had a couple of great shots of this, and Marshall to Jackson it worked like a dream) and my gut feeling is the passes were OK, but O'Gara runs slightly slower in a match situation than training, hence the passes looking bad.

Because ROG was scrappy, Roberts got a lot of dump-off ball. He coped admirably, and had a pretty good game, but because it was dump-ball he struggled to be really creative with it.

Earls had a shocker. I feel sorry for him, the youngest player, started nervously and got worse, not better. Some of the blame for that must go to POC too, who ignored him early and let it get worse.

The back three had a pretty good game. There were odd mistakes in there, including a howler from Shane Williams, but everyone makes mistakes every now and again, and that's probably it for a big one from Shane for the tour. They were really the only players that shone, plus Roberts. I'm not sure what the coaches learnt, but what I learnt is that the Lions have to really pull their socks up quickly, or they're stuffed come Test time.

In contrast two not-scratch sides faced in the Super-14 final. The Bulls crushed the Chiefs. Some of that was the exhaustion factor; the Chiefs played two tough matches, then flew from New Zealand to Pretoria, and played the Bulls. The Lions won't have that. But the Bulls, before the last 20 minutes and racking up the score, were still clearly in the lead. They stopped, almost completely, the most efficient attacking unit in Super 14 rugby. They scored comfortably, and were dominant all round the pitch. The Bulls, with a leavening of Sharks, Stormers, and maybe the odd Lion and Cheetah, will make up the Boks, and they will play a LOT better than the Royal XV.

And then the Baa-baas v England. A really scratch team - they only met last week - ran England ragged for 60 minutes. Their lines were sublime, their experience showed, and it didn't show that they were a scratch team. England, who admittedly were also somewhat fresh-faced in many positions, didn't have a clue, until changes to players and fatigue meant that the lack of established partnerships and patterns meant the defence of the Baa-baas creaked, groaned and cracked and England clawed their way back to make it close. Justice was, however, served as the Baa-baa loose forwards pulled off another big tackle, another turn over, and ran the ball into touch to end the game.

The Baa-baas were a more experienced group than the Lions, but there were fewer experienced partnerships on the pitch, which ought to make a difference. But they played sublime attacking rugby, and good defensive patterns and really deserved to win by more. This match, and hopefully next week's against Australia, are wonderful examples of why the Baa-baa matches remain popular. Attractive running rugby, high skills, good spirit and the names of last year, or the year before, showing the young pups they've still got it. Glorious - and beating England even better of course!

Penalty shoot-out

I have to say, in common with a lot of the commentators and fans I didn't like the penalty shoot-out to end the Heineken Cup semi-final. The first few kickers, OK, they're all skilled, practised kickers - it's a fair challenge of a skill they're meant to be good at. Past that... Williams v Crane taking penalty shots? Farcical. It did produce a winner, but in such a fashion that even die-hard Leicester Tiger fans feel it wasn't really a fair way to decide the match, and it resting on the "failure" of one of the best players on the field for the previous 100 minutes (and in the world in his position) to execute a skill that is basically not required for him is cruel.

Apart from Jordan Crane, who is young and cocky and wasn't rubbing Williams' nose in to be fair, a lot of the Leicester players went to commiserate with Williams, kudos to them and the whole sport that this should be their first thought in the situation.

I hate people that criticise without suggesting an alternative, but this time I might just have to do that. I can think of several possible solutions and they all have swings and roundabouts.

I'd like to see a sudden-death extra time, but the pressure on the officials and on the fitness of the players would be immense. Similarly, reducing the players on the pitch to allow the game to reach a conclusion sounds exciting, but (say) 5 minutes of 7's after 100 minutes of 15-man rugby - the players today are fit, but that's insane levels of fitness required. And, of course, who knows how many cycles of extra time would be needed? You would run the players into the ground. It's in the spirit of rugby, but these days recovering for an important match the following weekend (Leicester are playing in the Premiership play-offs this Saturday after 100 minutes on Sunday, ouch my aching limbs just thinking of it!) has to be considered too.

Sudden-death overtime probably won't work then. So we're faced with some other contest. How about a different kicking contest? You can have whoever you like take the kicks - no rotating the kickers unless you want to. Start on the middle of the 22, then the 15m lines on the 22, then the 5m lines on the 22. Then, if necessary, repeat the distribution across the 10m line. Then the half-way line.

You aren't faced with Martyn Williams missing a kick he's got no business attempting at any other time - you are faced with trained, experienced goal-kickers doing their business. It continues until one makes a sufficiently serious set of mistakes to let the other side "win" the match. If they miss, it's still a big loss for the team, but teams and kickers are used to coping with that. It's not a "spirit of rugby" solution in the same way as playing some sevens would be, but it's far fairer than this foolish import for soccer - at least it's challenging a skill that those executing it have practised.

Lions choices

Yesterday's Heineken Cup semi-final made one choice for the Lions coaching staff: Stephen Jones is going to be the starting number 10. It's possibly left them with a decision too - Quinlan went, quite clearly, and gouged the Leinster captain's eyes. If he gets the ban he should for it, he won't be touring, so who will replace him?

ROG was a great fly-half. He is still a good one, but something has changed. Two years ago, if Munster or Ireland were under pressure, ROG was unflappable, and would kick the ball down the field and relieve the pressure. He hardly ever made a mistake, and if he did it was never in a critical part of the field. Yesterday, however, Leinster put the pressure on and ROG crumbled. To my mind, and recorded in this blog, he looked rather like that during the 6N too. I don't know what it is, maybe he's just old enough he's lost a step or two and so he's getting hit more, maybe he's just accumulated enough bumps that his rhythm is off, but whatever it is, that imperious control has gone. It can come - as it can for anyone - when the people around him are playing well, but when they're playing less than brilliantly he looks frail. Playing against the Boks in South Africa you know the fly half will be under pressure. He'll be under pressure to tackle, to kick, to cope with bad ball, and more and he's just not delivering. If McGeechan et al are insane enough to write his name in that slot the 6, 8, 10, 12 in green will be rubbing their hands together and hammering through that slot knowing that ROG will crumble, and if you can kill the number 10 then you stop the whole team playing at once.

Jones can have a bad day of course, but the question is more, can ROG have a good one, can he really be exposed in the hope that he'll suddenly have a good one, when the other way round it's probably less likely that Jones will have a bad one than it is that ROG will have a good one.