Autumn Internationals: Scotland Shock South Africa, England Still Impressive Against Samoa

Matt Banahan and chubby official

The first of the weekend’s matches was Friday night’s (Friday evening is an odd time for rugby, isn’t it?) clash between Wales and Fiji. The game itself was truly painful to watch. As it progressed, it became increasingly obvious that this particular Wales side are nothing special in the slightest, and that Fiji were going to give them a real run for their money. The whole affair was full of errors and sloppy play, with Wales visibly struggling under the intense pressure from the physical Pacific Islanders. Wales managed to put themselves in a position where they looked able to win in the second half (especially as they went into half-time 13-6 down) but Seremaia Bai kicked over a last-minute penalty, leaving the final score at 16-16. With this defeat, Wales have now lost 9 out of their last 12 tests, meaning there’s a real urgency for drastic improvements.

Thankfully, after a shoddy display last week, Ireland are finally starting to look at home in their new stadium. The Irish may have still lost to an exceptional New Zealand side (18-38), but the performance was a whole lot better than anything we’ve seen so far in this series. Brian O’Driscoll led by example and Ireland deserve respect for playing so cohesively after a couple of games that must’ve damaged their confidence. Even though it is great to see them producing some better rugby, right now, no team is realistically challenging the All Blacks.

I wouldn’t be surprised if there are some England supporters out there who are a little disappointed with England’s 26-13 win over Samoa. Of course, a win is a win, but after that victory over the Aussies, surely we can expect the English to play with a bit more attacking flair? I don’t think so. I actually think it’s naive to expect that type of display from every single game (it’s just not a realistic view). Honestly, this performance, whilst frustrating, wasn’t that much worse than the one against the Wallabies. The mistakes were a little more obvious and a couple of try-scoring opportunities were missed, but England were clearly in control of this match. They kept their composure under a highly aggressive contest and worked hard for the win. To say it should’ve been any easier would be an insult to Samoa’s ability, because they really are a very decent team.

The last of the games that I’m going to talk about is Scotland vs. South Africa. It’s funny, I highly doubt anyone would’ve expected the Scots to win this, especially after their 49-3 reality-check from New Zealand last weekend. But, Scotland are a better side than they showed against the All Blacks (we shouldn’t forget that during the summer they beat Argentina twice on their home ground), and this time round they proved themselves. The Springboks floundered in the wet weather whilst Dan Parks gave a great kicking display in this scrappy game at Murrayfield. The final score was left at 21-17, a close victory for Scotland.

Going into final weekend of the series, England can be fairly confident about facing South Africa, even though I’m expecting it to be a very tough match. The All Blacks can be more than happy about challenging a struggling Welsh side and Scotland should be suitably wary of the threat Samoa could pose.

This Saturday sees five games of international rugby, as England play South Africa (2.30pm), Australia head across the channel to play Six Nations champions France (7.45pm), Fiji and Italy battle it out (2.00pm), Scotland clash with Samoa (2.30pm) and New Zealand go to Cardiff to take on Wales (5.15pm).

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