>Friday, 12 May 2017 19:35 Blues v Cheetahs, Eden Park 21:45 Brumbies v Lions, GIO Stadium
>Saturday, 13 May 2017 19:35 Crusaders v Hurricanes, AMI Stadium 21:45 Rebels v Reds, AAMI Park
>Sunday, 14 May 2017 1:05 Bulls v Highlanders, Loftus Versfeld 3:15 Kings v Sharks, Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium 9:40 Jaguares v Force, Estadio Jose Amalfitani
BYES: Chiefs, Stormers, Sunwolves, Waratahs
EURO RUGBY
Challenge Cup FINAL >Friday 12th May 2017 20:00 Gloucester v Stade Francais, BT Murrayfield
Champions Cup FINAL >Saturday 13th May 2017 17:00 Clermont Auvergne v Saracens, BT Murrayfield
Ireland and England won't make it out of the pool stage. Cap it.
Christian Collins
you need to spoiler that shit kiwi
Jonathan Sanders
So what's the official reason they make the draw 2.5 years beforehand? Do NZ need that long to find the money for the hotel?
Josiah Walker
Saturday for SA A Championship (also valid for WCQ)
Chile x Brazil Paraguay x Uruguay
Hudson Gonzalez
...
Asher Davis
Spoiled your mum's shitter last night, son.
Jason Wood
Well the ABs have to stay right to the end. It's a lot cheaper for you lot.
Connor Clark
B U R N
Sebastian Torres
Ireland got a nice group. SA might turn around or be completely dead by 2019 Wew at England though I think France will get knocked out /our/ group is nice too
Christopher Stewart
saved to my kiwi 'banter' folder
Nolan Cook
rugby is gay
Dominic Myers
You have a kiwi banter folder? Jesus son, take that BSK dick out of your mouth for a sec.
Zachary Gutierrez
A: 1- Irelands 2- Japan B: 1- Aotearoa 2- uMzantsi Afrika C: 1- Argentina 2- France D: 1- Australia 2- Georgia
Angel Jenkins
>based hue
Jason Brooks
>Georgia >England knocked out Friendship with Brazil ENDED
Connor Powell
I took ur mum uMzantsi
Christopher Bailey
I'm predicting this will be the greatest /rug/ thread in recent times.
Thomas Wood
>Georgia Petition to ban Hue"""""bro""""" for his abysmal rugby """""knowledge"""""
Blake Hall
I thought posting autistic predictions was his gimmick
Parker Hughes
Any streams?
Bentley Torres
Cheering for it. But the problem it's Chile and Paraguay hosting the weekend matches.
Jose Rivera
>Tekken 7 - 2nd June >Lions series - 3rd June
Christian Young
>waiting for a tekken game
Isaiah Rogers
Scotland
Noah Hall
Who is this cutie?
Henry Peterson
She was the MC at the world cup pool draw. She stole out hearts as they destroyed England's chances.
Austin Brooks
She's the main character in my rugby anime
Kayden White
Can't wait for the Japs to take a page out of our book and poison the Kiwi's with foul sushi lol
Isaiah Cook
>NRL player can't cut it in french rugby KEK why is league so shit?
>mfw every yuro team is claiming they're in the "pool of death" in 2 years
Daniel Wood
It'll be good to see France knocked out in the pools for once. Then nobody will be able to stop >us in the finals.
Joshua Martinez
I'm pretty sure Australia has knocked nz out just as many times as France.
Cameron Perez
i need to bulk more
mirin
Samuel Garcia
>tfw ireland and scotland battling to become 2nd in the group after losing to nipsland >tfw it will be just to get annihilated by NZ in QTs >''2023 will be our year, ireland for 2023 semifinalist!''
Thomas Ortiz
>Sup Forums x destroying the format of my post
fuck, stop adding captchas you fucking jews
Brayden Johnson
how will argentina fare? will be hard against the big fat french and the tough englishmen
Alexander Roberts
impossible to know right now, a lot of young players both coming and already trying to get used to the level of play, team going through a reconstruction and consolidation of tactics, plus traditionally peaking at the WCs which is way preferable than peaking at tours. It could go either way, Pumas may be top tier everyone piss themselves level or french im not in the mood and cant even remember how a rugby ball looked like tier with the random great game. But since they so use to peak at WC im trusting the team.
Adrian Torres
the kiwis are so far ahead atm that if the wc was held tomorrow and there was a case of kiwi sushi poisoning they'd probably still win it.
Luke Young
>Everyone talking about irrelevant World Cup draw >no one talking about world rugby raising the eligibility threshold to 5 years
Colton Torres
i like that, it's tiring when already good NT on top of having the best of an already good pool of players also get the best of all the 2nd tiers. >tfw no nationalized pieces of shit on the Pumas EVER
Will never understand how the euro teams specially ever feel proud or even happy when their team wins something with foreigners in it.
Jose Mitchell
Because no one can argue with that, it has no side to it, it's just a 100% good and needed change. No real discussion to be had, should be longer if anything.
Angel Howard
Exactly
Wyatt Rivera
the big nations with their professional leagues will keep attracting pacific islanders and saffas anyway, and many of them will gladly stay for 5 years instead of hoping to become a regular for a country that is thousands of miles away. in the cases of pacific islanders only nationalism can hold them. no big money for test games.
i think only germany will be seriously affected from this
Carter Gomez
Bundee O'Aki is pure Irish though.
Evan Harris
>entire kiwi team in hospital for food poisoning >a quickly thrown together jet lagged b team still managed to win it all
Parker Hughes
Even if Scotland and Japan improve between now and the World Cup, they're unlikely to have any giant players. If >we can win the group while avoiding the kind of injuries picked up against the French, and South Africa continues to decline at its current pace, then a semi-final could be on the cards.
Th-that would be nice...
Julian Nguyen
If he displaces garry ringrose he ain't irish to me. If he gracefully takes up his spot on the bench as a utility back then he's irish in my books.
Parker Phillips
The problem is greedy kiwi coconuts looking for some scratch in Europe because NZ can't afford to pay them. Residency should be 6 or 7 years and if you've repped someone else, even in league, you can fuck off.
Brody Morales
south africa have been formidable in super rugby
the SA rugby decline is a meme
Jaxon Jenkins
Literally scrape the best super rugby players left and they could win.
Reminder that the Welsh National Rugby Union Team traveled to NZ and got absolutely spanked by the Gallagher Chiefs who had more than half their players missing (see pic related). The Welsh side to play their Chiefs only had nine players deemed not good enough to play the AB's, where the Chiefs 10 of their regular full strength side.
Further reminder that after this embarrassing loss the British and Irish Lions tried to back pedal on their contract which has them playing weakened New Zealand Super Rugby teams mid week. They then entered damage control a year before a game was meant to be played saying they players will be over worked and be unable to perform at their usual strength during the tour.
Northern Hemisphere rugby literally shakes in their boots at the idea of playing weakened Club rugby teams, and us Kiwis know a lot about shaking.
Brody Rivera
Memerose remains a meme in my book. He's better than the average player and he's got good potential, but he's getting fellated by Dublin media every time a pass from him goes to hand. It's cringe-inducing.
People forget Henshaw is only a year older than him, made his debut far younger, and was a far superior player this time last year to where Ringrose is now. The level of fanfare he's getting is totally unwarranted.
Justin Myers
Maybe I have been caught up in the hype but I think there's something to be said for playing actually irish people ahead of blow ins. Yet if we had a better full back I'd have payne at 13 so I dunno.
Isaiah Edwards
How autistic do you have to be to keep posting this?
Carter Hill
Payne is unironically the best 13 and 15 in Ireland at the minute, although both Ringrose and O'Halloran have the potential to be better players than him in a few years time
Parker Wilson
>Dublin media Doesn't exist.
Kingrose is a star in the making.
Evan Gomez
"In the making" being the key phrase
Ethan Young
>O'Halloran He's overrated.
Lacks the physicality for test level rugby, he's always dominated physically and concedes possession too easily. When he runs out of options he panics or becomes hesitant and kicks it away. Reminds me a bit of Murphy actually in how his test career will pan out.
You'll see it if he's finally selected.
David Brooks
Oh no, I agree, and I'd have an Irish team of O'Halloran, Conway, Ringrose, Henshaw, Zebo, Sexton, Murray, McGrath, Best, Furlong, Dillane, Henderson, O'Mahony, van der Flier, O'Brien.
That said, there are so many people who are only upset about the residency rule now because a) they've invested in the Ringrose meme and b) the project player is from Connacht. They could have handled a Leinster blow in taking Ringrose's spot, or if Aki had taken the spot of some lad from Munster like Scannell. After all, they didn't give a shit when Payne came in and "stole" Marshall and Cave's spot, they didn't care about Stander despite Ireland having a production line of back rows.
Aki is unforgivable though, because he might commit the cardinal sin of displacing the Dubs' golden boy, and he doesn't have the Indo, the Examiner or the Belfast Telegraph to go out to bat for him like a player from one of the other provinces would. At this stage he would have had multiple two page spread interviews about his life and how much he loves Ireland, and a few interviews on Off the Ball or BBC Radio and all the other shit the project players do.
Jacob Rivera
Ringrose has the skillset and physical attributes to be the perfect 13 and has already demonstrated having the intelligence of a player many years his senior.
I agree he has a lot to do but he's going to be a big thing in the future.
Michael Johnson
Bullshit. Off the top of my head, he's shown his physicality against Toulouse and Wasps this year and Leinster in last year's final. He's well capable of hand-offs and I've seen him take down far bigger players than himself regularly.
I understand what you're talking about, but having been at nearly every Sportsgrounds game since he got back into the starting side, it's not his fault what happens. He's been conceding possession this year because Connacht's breakdown work has been atrocious. O'Halloran's body shape is good and he doesn't generally get himself isolated, but Heenan got so fat this year and McKeon seems like he's nervous every time he's going for the ball, so if Muldoon isn't on the scene, no one seems to contest for Connacht for almost 5 seconds a lot of the time and by the time they go in the penalties gone. It's been happening with all of our back three players this year, and O'Halloran's probably has it happen less often than others (it's constantly happening with Niyi).
I don't know where you're getting the idea that he panics, except maybe the Toulouse game away, but that was primarily because he was the only one trying to make things happen and the clock was against them, so a little bit of panic was justified. He's generally extremely cool under pressure, even when the rest of the team around him is utter dogshit.
Michael Wilson
>t. O'Halloran
I agree tho
Ethan Young
There's a reason practically every international head coach picks solid players at fullback over the snazzier attacking player if that snazzy player lacks the required defensive abilities of defensive positioning and the ability to retain possession.
Smith > McKenzie/Dagg Kearney > Zebo/Payne (Though not for long) Halfpenny > Williams Spedding > Dulin Brown > Watson/Daly Hogg is an exception
Granted there are other selection criteria like what players are actually available to a coach, for instance Halfpenny, North, Williams is better than including Cuthbert in any shape or form or when Ireland had few back 3 options this year. And I don't think O Halloran currently has the required qualities.
Charles Morales
M8 we aren't gonna get out of group stage.
Go jags tho
Eli Johnson
Scotland will beat Ireland to top their pool Argentina will knock out France and come second behind England Tonga or Samoa will beat Italy and come third in that group Wales will beat Australia for the first time since 2008. Georgia will also pull off an enormous upset against Oz in a scrum-filled, low-scoring rainy game and come second in the pool.
Screencap this post
Chase Martin
Aren't >we "americas 1"
Noah Brown
Payne is better both in attack and defense than Kearney tho
I agree I think O'Halloran needs to improve defensively but he's definetly Irelands best project fullback
Leo Rogers
>When he runs out of options he panics or becomes hesitant and kicks it away you just described zebo yet no one ever fucking calls him out on it cos muh "flair"
Mason Miller
>Payne is better both in attack and defense than Kearney tho Yeah I agree. That's why I'm very glad for the emergence of Ringrose.
Better wingers and we'll be flying.
Colton Rogers
Ah yes, I remember that convincing win by the Irish in the 2017 6N against the Scottish team. Very impressive stuff.
Caleb Butler
i want this to be true
Gavin Bell
>scotland beat ireland in murrayfield >ireland were missing payne, trimble, sexton and o'mahony >they think this gives them power over us
Jaxson Clark
very dicey post, but I think it's muscular enough to have some truth to it.
Ryan Rivera
Adam byrne, jacob stockdale and sweetnham all look very promising.
Chase Rivera
Man if georgia got ahead of wales I'd cream myself. Never gonna happen though.
Luke Wood
>scotland beat ireland really makes you think
Christian Robinson
Stockdale has been really impressive and considering he got most of his game time coming off the bench he still managed to score 9 tries 2nd most in the league
Aiden James
I want all of this to happen except scotland fuck scotland
I've been more impressed by him than peepootau. Remeber being impressed by him in the irish under 20's too, same year as arnold and ringrose came of the scene iirc.
Eli Adams
Pitty arnold is rotting somewhere in munster behind sailli and taute.
Grayson Wilson
please do not bully us, muscular NZer
Cooper Young
i support scotland over a lot of teams, but ireland is not one of them i wish you were in the death pool instead of france so that you could BTFO england.
Daniel Scott
Arnold was great I wish Ulster had kept him and sent someone like Marshall or Cave down there
Ulsters 2017 Backline could have been 9. Olding 10. Jackson 11. Piutau 12. Arnold 13. Stockdale (He was better there than Marshall) 14. Trimble 15. Payen