Player ratings

I've checked planetrugby's player ratings a couple of times today and I see they have made a few changes. McCaw was at 6 / 10 initially, which is ridiculous. He then magically moved up two points and they changed the description. Then Cruden was not on long enough initally until someone complained he set up Nonu's try and played well coming on and suddenly he gets a comment and a rating. But Ben Smith, Piri Weepu and Sam Cane come on at the same time and still don't get a rating because they didn't play enough.

Picking a player of the match was a difficult mission last night. Nonu had a strong game and made a vital contribution right after the Argentinian try to set up Aaron Smith. Savea and Jane both got hat-tricks and Jane's last try was textbook stuff how to intercept a ball, switch the ball to the outside arm and use your inside arm to fend not once but twice and go for the line.

The one thing I agree though with planetrugby's ratings was giving Kieran Read the highest rating. Watch the depth that Read comes from to take the beautiful pop pass from Messam and then the switch to the left and the offload which Jane took smartly low down. Then watch the textbook tackle from an unbelievably low body position to spill the ball which allowed Savea to kick through and kick through again to finally dot down with little to spare.

Ratings are very difficult to judge, but some were well off the mark. 7 tries to 2 and you don't get a fair representation of the way both sides played. NZ were not that good and Argentina were not that bad. But some of the ratings were ludicrous. So what if Romano had to go off early and needed two blood changes. Does he really warrant 5 / 10 for that? Sometimes I think the people rating the players weren't even watching the game and they made the picks from random.org.

Here's a brief highlights package in any event: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3OgKS3-vySA Ratings shouldn't be decided on that but just because Richie McCaw gets taken off at 60 minutes and Read stays on to the end does not mean that Read was appreciably better than McCaw. I remember there was a moment in the game when Argentina had a rolling maul on and precious few ABs in front of them. McCaw somehow managed to singlehandedly stop that maul, get up to make a decisive tackle and then made a tackle and prevented the Puma forward from going to ground and won the scrum. It wasn't an isolated incident but, rather, a microcosm of his game. Someone give an uppercut to these raters.

Yes, I also check a few ratings out this weekend to see if our papers are really unbiased. And they are not. I bought a two news papers and checked some online news player ratings.

First thing I checked was Zane's rating versus Lambie. Lambie outscored him in all the SA news papers. The reason I looked was because we are all so against Zane and Meyer with his blue tinge glasses. But after this week I am really wondering. Zane have not done anything wrong since Meyer choose him and yesterday he far out performed Lambie in almost every aspect of a fullback in my opinion. So I watched the game again and came to the same conclusion.

So when I saw your article, I went over to planetrugby to check out their rating and they are the first (and also first non SA) source that agrees with me. Player ratings also probably change because of provincial, national bias etc.

Fern, I agree with you Zane had a good game, but I would still prefer Lambie in the team.

Biltong wrote:Fern, I agree with you Zane had a good game, but I would still prefer Lambie in the team.

I still to think there are better players than Zane (but I am probably still looking through Stormers glasses), but you can't give Lambie a higher score than Zane in the last few games which Rapport and news24 did. That is clearly emotion showing and we are not measuring them on the merit of that particular game or games.

In all honesty, Taute would probably be my first choice at fullback now when he gets kicked out of center and Lambie on the bench because of his versatility. But I don't think Lambie would get the starting 15 position if he is going head to head against any other S15 SA fullback.

Anyway, we are getting off topic. I just wanted to use that as an example of how we let things influence ratings.

Of course you prefer him to Zane but I agree that Zane had a good game. Lambie's kicking was immaculate and he got good distance. Often it depends on what you look at.

Most of the Argentinian players had 4, 5 and only a few 6. Just because they lost by many doesn't mean they should be rated that low.

In any event rugby is a team game and these individual ratings detract from that. Sometimes it's hard enough to find man of the match. Sometimes it's possible to say he had a poor game or he had a great game but only on an individual basis and that doesn't tell the whole story.

I'd give NZ and SA as a team 8 / 10. Things to work on but overall very encouraging.

To be honest I would leave De Villers at 12 for the next game, I liked Taute at 13, he has a lot of pace and worked well in defence there, put Frans at 15

My mind is that the "player rating" article is cheap tatty dross paper filler and a poor excuse for journalism.

If you could watch those two games and have nothing better to say than 1-10 on the players then you should give the job to someone who cares more and has a better brain.

But Kia - Savea got two, not a hat-trick! Not sure if that makes your decision easier

Yes, you're quite right AWOP. Savea will be happy with that performance as will Ian Foster. The backline moves looked slick and finally the passes stuck. Credit must be given when due. Now it needs to be done again in the heartbed of SA rugby.