Is Lancaster copying the All Blacks?

In support of this contention...

Exhibit P1
His moving Manu Tuilagi to inside centre and bringing in Joseph at 13 to try to mirror Nonu at inside centre and a slighter faster outside centre in Smith for the ABs.

Exhibit P2
His playing a fullback at wing in Foden. Mimicking Cory Jane and Israel Dagg playing there for the ABs.

What next? Winning?

Yes. They already said they would "Use Wayne Smith without employing him" and by that they mean copying his strategies.

Unfortunately, NZ tailored their strategy to opposition and they seem to be just copying the versus SA approach that was necessary in 2009 when SA became so dominant playing the pressure game with a lot of kicking.

The game is moving on and they will need to find success now, not a plan for retrospective success.

If they continue to copy Wayne Smith, expect to see a very flat attack with off-loading on the gain line. But to be fair I'm not sure ENG have the ball players in the backs and especially the linking players in the back row to pull that off successfully.

It started years ago!

First we brought in those failed AB's Hape, Hartley and Flutey, then we tried to steal your power by brazenly wearing a black change kit to the WC, now we have pinched Thomas the tank and we're copying your super-smart extra sneaky tactics of playing a full back at wing (gosh who'd have thought of that?! Def not Martin Johnson...) And playing a big 12 and smaller 13, madness!

Fantastic,the article give me a good laugh.

anotherworldofpain wrote:Yes. They already said they would "Use Wayne Smith without employing him" and by that they mean copying his strategies.

Unfortunately, NZ tailored their strategy to opposition and they seem to be just copying the versus SA approach that was necessary in 2009 when SA became so dominant playing the pressure game with a lot of kicking.

The game is moving on and they will need to find success now, not a plan for retrospective success.

If they continue to copy Wayne Smith, expect to see a very flat attack with off-loading on the gain line. But to be fair I'm not sure ENG have the ball players in the backs and especially the linking players in the back row to pull that off successfully.

To play a flat, offloading game with English players, perm a back row from Robshaw, Guest, Easter, Wallace, Skinner, and pick a fly half and wingers to play with JTH, Lowe, and Brown.

Not entirely serious, but there are English players who can and do play that way. You just have to pick 'em and play them together - as much as possible

yappysnap wrote:It started years ago!

First we brought in those failed AB's Hape, Hartley and Flutey, then we tried to steal your power by brazenly wearing a black change kit to the WC, now we have pinched Thomas the tank and we're copying your super-smart extra sneaky tactics of playing a full back at wing (gosh who'd have thought of that?! Def not Martin Johnson...) And playing a big 12 and smaller 13, madness!

Well actually Hape, Hartley, Flutey and Waldrom have never been never an AB shirt.
We picked Smith as a 13 because he's a really good 13.
We put Nonu at 12 because we didn't have any good 12s at the time.
We put Jane at 14 because we didn't have any good 14s at the time. We were just lucky they worked out all right. Mind you it took a while for Nonu to get any good at 12.

They should pick Manu at 12 and use him like Jamie Roberts, he'd be a handful....it would also solve the centre crisis England have suffered since Greenwood and Tindall and might give them a hint about how to play in the backs

Hes woeful at 12 and always has been

yeah, the Manu needs space.

Triangulation wrote:In support of this contention...

Exhibit P1
His moving Manu Tuilagi to inside centre and bringing in Joseph at 13 to try to mirror Nonu at inside centre and a slighter faster outside centre in Smith for the ABs.

Exhibit P2
His playing a fullback at wing in Foden. Mimicking Cory Jane and Israel Dagg playing there for the ABs.

What next? Winning?

Does that mean the All Black copied the welsh

Exhibit A - Moving Nonu to inside centre and Smith at outside centre, to try and mirror Scott Gibbs at inside centre and the slighter faster outside centre in Mark Taylor.

Exhibit B - Playing a fullback on the wing in Lane/Dagg. Mimicking Wayne Proctor and Kevin Morgan playing there for the Welsh.

Exhibit B - Having Graham Henry as head coach and then replacing him with Steve Hanson


But then you could ask if that is just a case of Wales copying .....



Being serious the centres are like the backrow, it is not about being a certain size for a certain shirt, it is about having skill sets that ballence. Also if your fly half is not as defensively great as you would like a solid centre next to him gives him more support. Or if he is less skilled at getting the back line clicking then a skilled distributer at 12 would be ideal.

Also with the back three, they are almost getting to left right and central fullback in the modern game, where they all need to be able to feild the high ball, see gaps in field and have a decent boot on them.

P.S. I can't think of anyone else converting a Scum Half to Fullback and then to Wing, so I guess that proves Lancaster is original.

Copying the All Blacks is a good beginning! There was a time in English rugby when, out of sheer pride, they'd bend over backways NOT to mimic their SH opponents. There was a certain sense of defiance in trying to usurp the freaks from down South with the grim reality of stoic English rugby. Beating NZ or Australia wasn't enough, beating them by inflicting the English version of rugby on them was the dream.

Even Johnson as coach yearned to do that, even though history was against him and his player's skills were forcing him down another route. But he did savour those forward meat tries.

Is Lancaster opening up? Well, I think it's where rugby simply has to go - he won't be alone.

I agree with ScarletSpiderman about balance - in the modern game, positions shift during play so it's much more about having the right combination of skills on the pitch.

A good example is the England 2003 midfield. Wilkinson is less creative than most international fly halves, which was why it was important to have Greenwood [1] playing in one of the centre positions. Usually he played 12 (but wore 13) to Tindall's 13, but when Catt played, he moved to OC. Both combinations were unconventional, but both worked, albeit against different types of opposition. Andrew, Carling and Guscott had a similar balance, with Guscott providing the inventiveness.

England don't have that balance of skills today. The missing bit seems to be creativity. None of the current crop of FH's is a wizard in the way that Carter or Evans is, and most of the options at 12 are built for defence and being a target man rather than for creativity. Joseph might be the answer - but that would exclude Manu, which is a tough call for anyone to make.

[1] As has been pointed out, the player from that era who is most sorely missed today. The closest I've seen to a direct replacement might be Tom Casson, but he is probably 2 years away from being remotely ready.

Thats a good point poorfour...i think england's lack of creativity is based on an enduring Leicester style of rugby - big pack grind them down etc. But England are more than capable of creativity and there pre 2003 form is a lesson in support/offload running rugby

Poorfour wrote:[1] As has been pointed out, the player from that era who is most sorely missed today. The closest I've seen to a direct replacement might be Tom Casson, but he is probably 2 years away from being remotely ready.

The same Tom Casson who's career is stagnating as Quins ignore him? He should take a look at Rory Clegg and ask to be released.

That would be the one DaveM. Hopefully if he's fully fit he should get a run out now that JTH is injured. If he doesn't then I agree it may be time for him to have a look around at other clubs.

To be fair to us though he did get a lot of game time last season before he was injured.

Unfortunately we can't play every one, there's only 23 places in the team.

DaveM wrote:

Poorfour wrote:[1] As has been pointed out, the player from that era who is most sorely missed today. The closest I've seen to a direct replacement might be Tom Casson, but he is probably 2 years away from being remotely ready.

The same Tom Casson who's career is stagnating as Quins ignore him? He should take a look at Rory Clegg and ask to be released.

Depends on how you define "stagnating" and "ignore". True, he's not playing regular First XV rugby, but he's 22 and has a 24-year old in front of him who doesn't get injured much and has only just made the EPS. Casson has played more first team games at Quins (10) than at he did at Sarries (0). Last season he played in 4 games of consequence and won them all, including beating Toulouse in Toulouse. With JTH likely to be away with England this season, he should get more game time.

It's not a bad position to be in for a player at the start of his career, and it's clear that COS is very happy to start rotating players once he feels they are ready for it. And as I said, I don't think Casson will be there for a bit. There's a lot of skill there, but also a lot that he can still add.

Which said, if Botica gets favoured ahead of him over the course of the season, I wouldn't blame him for looking elsewhere. I think he'd be making a mistake, but I wouldn't blame him

mowgli wrote:They should pick Manu at 12 and use him like Jamie Roberts, he'd be a handful....it would also solve the centre crisis England have suffered since Greenwood and Tindall and might give them a hint about how to play in the backs

Tuialgi is an out and out running 11. But he's too suspect on aerial skills and can be turned in defense so he's never going to be an all-round great. If you just want bishbosh at 12 play Banahan. Suspect you dont want bishbosh there at all though.