Apart from that dodgy 10 minutes, that was the best England performance for a very long time. Fantastic at the breakdown and in defence. Earle a colossus man of the match, closely followed by Farrell who showed he's still a world class 10. No one expected England to get to the semis. They won't beat France or SA, but that performance was much more like it and restored pride. Fantastic support too.
It’ll be fun to be underdogs next weekend, I hope it loosens us up and we do stuff to surprise whoever we play. My guess is that Borthwick will go for attrition and I’ll be surprised if Smith gets another outing at 15. Good confidence builder against a good team today.
Brilliant! Who would have thought that this group of players would get to a World Cup semi-final? Other than when Fiji ran in the two second half tries they looked to have managed the game. The whole team contributed and I thought Farrell captained the side with a cool head and good decision making. Well done lads and well done Fiji for entertaining us throughout the tournament.
England had a comparatively easy route to the semi, and we wouldn't be there if we'd mixed it with those in the other groups. Still, Fiji are no slouches and so it was a good performance today by England with a few outstanding contributions. I agree this'll probably be as far as we get, so go for it. I'd choose France to play. What an occasion. And it'll be a good general yardstick as to where about we are in the rankings
Rugby experts - is the scrum now just a mechanism to try to engineer a penalty? The scrum can be a great spectacle but I’m sure the arcane nature of what it’s for, what people do in it, what the rules are and how it is reffed put some people off.
Out all afternoon so missed both the cricket and rugby..... Less said about the cricket the better..... Amazeballs that somehow England are in the semi finals of the rugby, who'd thunk it? Now for France SA game, really too close to call this one.... hope SA don't just go for shoving ball up shirt and using forward power as they do have some brilliant backs.... France need to be expansive and move the SA team around the pitch....
Hospital pal, back now to watch the France game. Great win for England and looking forward to the Semi's, no matter who we meet . Come on France tonight !
Alas not mate, the missus has stage 4 cancer of the liver. She previously had breast cancer twice and the 2nd time she had a mastectomy, somehow though the ****er has returned in the liver and is automatically stage 4 secondary cancer. We've seen the specialists over the last couple of months , and unfortunately it can't be cured. On Chemo drugs which will extend her time, but no way of telling how long she has as everyone reacts differently to it. Very grim ****, and I still haven't fully got my head round the situation ! Thanks anyway
