Well the weekend saw the start of the Rugby World Cup Quarter Finals - down to 8 teams and it seemed all too predictable really - except not everything went exactly as it was thought it would . . .
Starting with England vs Australia a replay of 2003 - when the two met in the final . . . and as we know England won the World Cup . . . it seemed as if this game was a formality - after all South Africa had easily dispensed with England beating them 36 - 0 and this more or less summed up England's current form in their run up to the World Cup . . . England's first game against US resulted in England winning but they did not look convincing - final score 28 - 10; other games saw England see off a challenge from Samoa 44 - 22; and then had to beat Tonga to go through, which they did but less than convincingly 36 - 20; Australia on the other hand had kicked off against Japan - beating them 91 - 3; then faced Wales and beat them 32 - 20; Made short work of Fiji 55 - 12; and convincingly dealt with Canada 37 - 6; So on paper they should have made short work of England but instead ended up losing to them 10 - 12 . . . England had vastly improved their game and in the end just managed to do enough to totally put Australia off their game . . . pressurised and followed up all kicks and ran out worthy winners.
The All Blacks - as has so often happened to them failed to deliver - however this is the first time they have not proceeded past the quarter finals so a national day of mourning may be in order . . . unbelievable - so much pressure on the team to bring back the trophy for them - The coach has said they done their best - he will be replaced before Christmas - so the planning will start for the 2011 RWC and guess where that is being held - New Zealand. Final score was NZ 18 - France 20.
France on the other hand were also basically written off before the game - they lost their opening match to Argentina (shhh - don't say this too loud but I think they may go all the way to the final - although they will have to lift their game - and play a lot better than the last game - more about that later). In fact I don't think France thought that they would ever end up in possibly their last game (such was the feeling that they were not going to progress past this game against NZ) in Cardiff stadium - the French press were scathing in their assessment of the inept organisers - the French themselves. But all that is history now - and at the Scotland Argentina game the next day the biggest cheers of the evening were when short clips were shown of the French team . . . which didn't say much of the game.
Before the France New Zealand game I said to Judi France are going to take this - during the game I was complaining about it was not close enough for me and slowly but surely France drew ever closer to NZ score - followed by a withering look from Judi - I was in trouble later . . . lol.
Sunday saw South Africa and Fiji meet in once again what on paper was a mismatch . . . by this time I was taking some stick about how Fiji would take SA out . . . It was a thrilling game and Fiji came so close to pulling off another upset. SA were 20 - 6 ahead - a Fiji player was sent off - usually that would signal the team with the advantage with numbers would be able to make the other team pay - however what happened was Fiji scored 2 tries in 2 minutes and suddenly the score was 20 - 20 and we had a game on our hands - you can argue a number of things but the score line said it all . . . SA fought back and the final score was 37 - 20 but Fiji had most of the stadium behind them and you could almost feel them willing Fiji on to pull off the upset - but it was not to be - but it was on a knife-edge for quite some time.
Which brings us to the last game i
n the quarter finals Scotland and Argentina - I had tipped Argentina long before the game as I mentioned - I was now in hostile territory - although they were wary after my France predictions . . . it was not the best of the games - Scotland had not impressed me in the run up, at all - there were short spells but on the whole - and as for making 13 changes and playing their B side against the All Blacks at Murrayfield and lost 40 - 0, I'll not tell you my feelings about that - (unprintable . . .lol). Not to mention the fact that in my opinion Scotland actaully tripped into the quarter finals - Italy missed a number of kicks - all Scotland's points were from the boot and they just didn't look like the business - considering that they played their B team because of the Italy game and then they kicked all their points???? Argentina totally outplayed the French in their first game - and took Ireland on and arrogantly did not kick for touch and invited Ireland to come at them - not something a team often does and still beat them 30 -15. This was why I felt Argentina would just be too strong for Scotland and I'm afraid they were, however, if truth be told the game was there for the taking and I think had Scotland had been more cautious and adventurous - a little less 1 dimensional they could have taken it . . . Scotland's best spell was after the 4 substitutions . . .changed the game immediately - but the inertia was lost and Argentina managed to weather the storm (and miss a few penalties . . ) the score Arg 19 - Sco 13 - a close game.
So the weekend started with a number of newspapers claiming Scotland may be the only Northern hemisphere team left in the World Cup . . . in the end how different it was.
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