Jamie George vs Dylan Hartley - Round 12

First topic message reminder :

If not beaten to the punch I shall be posting a match thread for the first of England's AIs shortly. To avoid that descending into a complete off topic farce (and prompted by an article I read today) how about we discuss this now perennial subject in a single thread rather than ruin any others.

Facts

1) Hartley has started every test under Eddie Jones with England winning all but one of them
2) When available George has been on the bench.
3) Jamie George started all 3 tests in the summer for the Lions, his only international starts



Opinions

1) Jamie George is the best hooker in the Aviva Premiership
2) Depending on your point of view, George was either outstanding in NZ or was lucky to start all 3 tests (opinions on Lions threads did differ that widely)
3) With injuries to Taylor and LCD, the options behind George and Hartley do not inspire confidence.
4) Eddie Jones has placed skipper Hartley on a pedestal and deems him undroppable.


For what it is worth: 1 & 3 I agree with, 4 I deem to be utter lovesacks and 2 I am in the middle (such that I feel George never really showed his premiership form and at times was rather meh - yet was still better than the other two options)


Discussion Points

1) Is George a better hooker than Hartley?
2) Should Hartley be in the match day squad (ie ahead of Dunn who is a real novice)
3) Does George's dynamism make him better suited (than Hartley) to the role of a finisher?
4) Are England best served over a full 80 minutes by starting George and bringing on Hartley or vice versa (noting that last season George typically played only 10 minutes less than Hartley in each game)
5) Is Hartley's place in the squad due to being captain, or the lack of any other players, outside of George, capable of playing international rugby.



Add your own discussion points, but please lets leave this issue out of the AI threads

Spoken like a great captain.

Scottrf wrote:I doubt you'll get any Saints fan questioning Hartley's captaincy. And I say that including him potentially costing us a prem title against our biggest rivals. We just play better as a team with him on the pitch.

Not sure you can say that about Saints this season can you? Do all Saints fans feel that way?


Fortunate? Most definitely.

Great? Debatable.

As I said leading that inexperienced Argentina tour was a sign of competent captaincy.

Then again it helps when you have a good coaching set up.

cascough wrote:

beshocked wrote:

Scottrf wrote:I doubt you'll get any Saints fan questioning Hartley's captaincy. And I say that including him potentially costing us a prem title against our biggest rivals. We just play better as a team with him on the pitch.

Not sure you can say that about Saints this season can you? Do all Saints fans feel that way?


Fortunate? Most definitely.

Great? Debatable.

As I said leading that inexperienced Argentina tour was a sign of competent captaincy.

Then again it helps when you have a good coaching set up.

Beshocked, please stop trying to twist what others actually say. It doesn't make for pleasant discussion.

Scott said "I doubt". So that's Scott, in his opinion (which I assumed he's based on his experience) doubting you'll find Saint's fans questioning. Note the word doubt is defined as "a feeling of uncertainty", nothing more.

Which is why I said do all Saints feel that way- it's one of those debatable things.

How much weighting should coaching/player quality/ individual player leadership factor into a victory?

What's the most important?

For me the winning mentality of this current England side is not down to an individual, not even an individual coach. Though of course there have been cases of individual excellence like Care's vs Australia which of course is important too.

Defensively, England have been strong - defence coach and execution of this by the players should be praised.


Scottrf you say that Saints play worse without Hartley, that's fair if you feel that way. I personally don't feel the same about England but then again it would be interesting to see if there was a dip in results without Hartley in the squad


You can see more the value added by someone, sometimes when they are not there. Hartley has not been absent from Jones' England so has not been tested in that sense.


I don't think England were weaker without Brown but then again you might disagree.

Watson was not really that assured but filthy conditions full debut at full back. Understandable.

Exciting opportunity for George.

Beshocked, I deleted my post because it was over zealous.

I can see it now

Samoa take a couple of our line outs :-
Beshocked says the throw was perfect, Joe Launch just isn't good enough in the second row, it should be Kruis and Itoje in the second row so Jamie can throw to the second rows he knows.

Samoa take a couple of hooks against the head in the scrum:-
Beshocked says Joe Marler f***** up with his bind and George couldn't get to the ball

England play really well and at the end DH comes on and scores three tries:-
Beshocked says its all down to Jamie George tiring out all the defenders

tazfalklands wrote:I can see it now

Samoa take a couple of our line outs :-
Beshocked says the throw was perfect, Joe Launch just isn't good enough in the second row, it should be Kruis and Itoje in the second row so Jamie can throw to the second rows he knows.

Samoa take a couple of hooks against the head in the scrum:-
Beshocked says Joe Marler f***** up with his bind and George couldn't get to the ball

England play really well and at the end DH comes on and scores three tries:-
Beshocked says its all down to Jamie George tiring out all the defenders

Well I do think the lineout was shakier on the Argentina tour at least initially with a Launchbury-Ewels combo, it probably didn't help Hartley.

England lost their first throw and first scrum.

Launchbury isn't famed for his lineout work.

Hartley himself is more comfortable working with Lawes unsurprisingly.


It's a stunning revelation but club mates generally have a better understanding.

Perhaps I should have said I doubt you'll find many. I haven't asked every fan. But you got the point I'm sure.

George is the better player.  Hartley is the better captain.  The Lions didn't need a captain, so George started all 3 tests - why would Gats pick him ahead of all the other hookers (Welsh included) if he didn't clearly think George was the best player in that position?  Could England thrive without Hartley?  I am not sure, I see the use of co-captains by Jones as a sign that he doesn't see any other outstanding leader (no disrespect to Robshaw but he didn't cover himself in glory when England captain).  It is only a matter of time before Hartley's performance drops to a level where his captaincy no longer warrants selection.  I suspect it will be at the end of the 2019 world cup, barring the wheels coming off.  George will then be the starting hooker and the question will be does he justify his starting place ahead of Joe Bloggs who is 7 or 8 years younger.