South Africa unlucky to lose

I knew that the games were going to be close, but the QF games certainly had a lot of us in a bath of sweat. The quality of the rugby was of the highest level and nobody could have argued that they did not get their money’s worth. Wales started off the first of the quarters with a definite game plan and the Irish came unstuck at the first major hurdle.

Tries from Shane Williams, Mike Phillips and Jonathan Davies, plus a penalty from Leigh Halfpenny and two conversions from Rhys Priestland, helped Warren Gatland’s team reach the last four of the RWC for the first time since 1987. This will also give credence to the argument by some that the Irish win against the Wallabies in the league stage was a flash in the pan. Wales continues to impress and I will not be surprised to see them in the final in a couple of weeks.

France put aside all their differences in the dressing room and with their coach behind and had one focus and that was to beat England. They looked very determined when the national anthem was sung and were very soon into their stride. England whilst being steady in the league has been very stereotyped and thus predictable. The French flair was there for all to see. Their kicking game got England on the wrong foot and one wonders whether the decision to play Toby Flood and Wilkinson together was a good move. The statistics of the metres gained by France with their kicking were awesome to read and they had obviously done their home work. The third row was fantastic as a group and the backline with Mermoz was just champagne. After Wilkinson was replaced and Flood moved into the # 10 slot I thought that the back line looked more incisive, with Flood leading the way. Playmaker Tuilagi was a marked man and the French bottled him up like good wine to be savoured later. There will also be the question mark on whether Martin Johnson was the right man to continue coaching as a number of stalwarts from his era remained in the side. Already a committee has been appointed to look into England’s failure to go beyond the quarters and the results of that would be fascinating to read once made public unlike in Arsikland.

The Springboks did everything right except for winning the game. The Wallabies are extremely lucky to be on the winning side after such a poor performance. Quade Cooper was in two minds in most instances and was lucky not to have been replaced. Genia more than covered up for Quade’s poor show and the coach must be wondering what could be done in the all important semis next week. If the Wallabies play in this fashion, they could be out of the tournament in the first 20 minutes of the game. The Wallabies made almost 150 tackles as against the 54 made by the Boks and that will surely tell on the bodies of Pocock, Elsom and Horwill. The Wallabies rely excessively on Pocock for turnover ball and he did not let them down in that respect. He is a scavenger par excellence and feeds on the fringes of every breakdown point. O’Conor had a good game running well and off loading well in addition to his kicking prowess. In fact O’Connor was wayward with the conversion under pressure from a questionable charge by the Springboks but did not dwell on the setback. This happened in the league game against Russia as well and the referee chose to ignore this on both occasions. It was surprising to see that skipper Horwill did not challenge this was well. If the quarters are anything to go by, the semis will be a humdinger.