Unfortunately, the AB's have not been in such good form since that upset in Chicago when Ireland defeated them and bought to an end their 50 plus games unbeaten record. Watching how well the AB,s performed the other day, may be a sign they are on the way back to their pre unbeaten previous form. Time will tell, but its a game we will share live with all our NZ and Irish friends and family on a whatsapp group call, although the slight match time delay, with NZ being about a minute behind does mean we have to curb our reactions, so not to spoil the upcoming moments for them. They do the same for us when the games are based in the southern hemisphere when we experience the time delay. Before whats app etc we used to phone NZ and put the phone on loud speaker on the coffee table for the entirety of the game, so we could share the moments together, the world cups could get quite expensive after a while even with special phone rates deals, but it was worth it.
Should be quite a night. In reality, whilst we call the team Ireland, its mainly Leinster players which does give them an edge as they all play together all year round and many have come up thru the same limited number of rugby playing schools and thru the the Leinster academy, not unlike the NZ rugby playing schools and academy system.
I still think South Africa is the dark horse to watch out for, if their kicking game had been on form, they would have defeated Ireland the other week...........its good to see Fiji in the quarters. I do despair with England, although traditionally they always do well once they get past the indifferent/poor performance in the pool games. I'm less certain this time and we certainly don't deserve it based on current performance.
Last edited by JohnHarris; 08/10/23 09:18 AM.
