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Wales great thinks Pivac should leave ageing stars at home for foredoomed SA tour
Wales head coach Wayne Pivac has been urged to leave his aging Wales stars at home for what’s been pitched as an unwinnable tour of South Africa this summer.
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A badly out of form Wales face the daunting task of upsetting the world champions in a three-Test series this July, a feat that proved beyond the combined might of the British & Irish Lions in 2021.
Pivac’s men failed to fire in the 2022 Guinness Six Nations, falling to a humiliating home loss to Italy in the final game of this year’s competition.
Even in a good year a victorious Test tour of South Africa is one of the sport’s most intractable assignments. Few are predicting anything but a drubbing for a Wales team down on their luck and facing heavy criticism from their fans.
Just this weekend, Dragons DoR Dean Ryan warned that Wales will face a ‘gulf’ in power when they head south in three months’ time.
“If we needed a reminder, the last couple of weeks and months have been a stark reminder,” Ryan said after his Dragons side were thumped 51 – 3 this weekend. “In the last two weeks we got an education in power… It is a reality check for us and it is a reality check for Wales going into the three-Test series in July.”
Now former Wales great Scott Gibbs has suggested that Pivac leaves their more experienced stars at home for the summer tour, including the talismanic figure of Alun Wyn Jones.
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“If you look at Alun Wyn, George North, Tipuric — all of them have had a difficult year with injuries and so on,” Gibbs told SA Rugby Mag. “Maybe it’s time to just say: ‘Listen, take the off season and rest. Let’s free up some space to see what talent we have coming forward.’
“I think that would make for an even more interesting Test series. Both sides have new faces and new identities and maybe you can blood some new rugby patterns that’ll be a little bit more exciting, rather than maybe going up against a robust selection that will be familiar to South Africa, and with Wales then trying to bring all of their injured guys who haven’t had much game-time into a Test series.”
Even if Wales are thrashed, Gibb doesn’t believe it will have much bearing on the Rugby World Cup in France in 2023. He wants to see both sides blood new players in the series.
“While it is a significant Test series this summer, it probably has no bearing [in terms of results] on how you prepare going forward with France 2023 around the corner. So I’d like to think the sentiment from both camps would be ‘let’s see some new faces, let’s freshen it up a little’.”
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Comments on RugbyPass
If rugby wants to remain interesting in the AI era then it will need to work on changing the rules. AI will reduce the tactical advantage of smart game plans, will neutralize primary attacking weapons, and will move rugby from a being a game of inches to a game of millimetres. It will be about sheer athleticism and technique,about avoiding mistakes, and about referees. Many fans will find that boring. The answer is to add creative degrees of freedom to the game. The 50-22 is an example. But we can have fun inventing others, like the right to add more players for X minutes per game, or the equivalent of the 2-point conversion in American football, the ability to call a 12-player scrum, etc. Not saying these are great ideas, but making the point that the more of these alternatives you allow, the less AI will be able to lock down high-probability strategies. This is not because AI does not have the compute power, but because it has more choices and has less data, or less-specific data. That will take time and debate, but big, positive and immediate impact could be in the area of ref/TMO assistance. The technology is easily good enough today to detect forward passes, not-straight lineouts, offside at breakdown/scrum/lineout, obstruction, early/late tackles, and a lot of other things. WR should be ultra aggressive in doing this, as it will really help in an area in which the game is really struggling. In the long run there needs to be substantial creativity applied to the rules. Without that AI (along with all of the pro innovations) will turn rugby into a bash fest.
24 Go to commentsSouth Africa rarely play Ireland and France on these tours. Mostly, England, Scotland and Wales. I wonder why
1 Go to commentsIt was a let’s-see-what-you're-made-of type of a game. The Bulls do look good when the opposition allows them to, but Munster shut them down, and they could not find a way through. Jake should be very worried about their chances in the competition.
2 Go to commentsHats off to Fabian for a very impressive journey to date. Is it as ‘uniquely unlikely’ as Rugby Pass suggests, given Anton Segner’s journey at the Blues?
1 Go to commentsSad that this was not confirmed. When administrators talk about expanding the game they evidently don’t include pathways to the top tier of rugby for teams outside of the old boys club. Rugby deserves better, and certainly Georgia does.
1 Go to commentsLions might take him on if they move on Van Rooyen but I doubt he will want to go back, might consider it a step backwards for himself. Sharks would take him on but if Plumtree goes on to win the challenge cup they will keep him on. Also sharks showing some promising signs recently. Stormers and Bulls are stable and Springboks are already filled up. Quality coach though, interesting to see where he ends up
1 Go to commentsAnd the person responsible for creating a culture of accountability is?
3 Go to commentsMore useless words from Ben Smith -Please get another team to write about. SA really dont need your input, it suck anyway.
264 Go to commentsThis disgraceful episode must result in management and coach team sackings. A new manager with worse results than previous and the coaching staff need to coached. Awful massacre led by donkeys.
1 Go to commentsInteresting article with one glaring mistake. This sentence: “And between the top four nations right now, Ireland, France, South Africa, and New Zealand…” should read: And between the top four nations right now, South Africa, Ireland, New Zealand and France…”. Get it right wistful thinkers, its not that hard.
24 Go to commentsHow did Penny get the gig anyway?
3 Go to commentsNice write up Nick and I would have agreed a week ago. However as you would know Cale & co got absolutely monstered by the Blues back row of Sotutu, Ioane and Papaliti and not all of these 3 are guaranteed a start in the Black jumper. He may need to put some kgs before stepping up, Spring tour? After the week end Joe will be a bit more restless. Will need to pick a mobile tough pack for Wales and hope England does the right thing and bashes the ABs. I like your last paragraph but I would bring Swinton, Hannigan into the 6 role and Bobby V to 8
23 Go to commentsThe Crusaders can still get in to the Play Off’s. The imminent return of outstanding captain Scott Barrett and his All Black team mate Codie Taylor will be a big boost.There are others like Tamaiti Williams too. Two home games coming up. Fellow Crusader fans get there and support these guys. I will be.
1 Go to commentsCant get more Wellington than Proctor.
2 Go to commentsWhy not let the media decide. Like how they choose the head coach. Like most of us we entrust the rugby system to choose. A rugby team includes the coaches. It's collective.
14 Go to commentsHi NIck, I have been very impressed with him and he seems a smart player who can see opportunities which Bobby V _(who must be an international 6_) doesn’t see or have the speed to take advantage of. If he continues to improve and puts on 5kgs then he could be a great 8. He is a bit taller than Keiran Reid at 1.93m and 111 kgs, so his skill set fits his body size and who knows where it will lead. I hope the spate of Achilles tendon issues have been dealt with by the S&C people. It’s been a very long time since Mark Loane and Kefu stood out at 8. The question is will we be able to hold onto him, if he does make it he will be pretty hot property. I disagree with the idea of letting them go to the Northern Hemisphere and then bring them back.
23 Go to commentsBilly Fulton 🤣🤣🤣🤣 garrrmon not even close
14 Go to commentsDoes the AI take into account refs? hahaha Seriously why not have two on field refs to avoid bias?
24 Go to commentsVern challenging this Blues side might be the edge they need to fulfill their potential. Convincing results from strong D and strong carries are hard to argue against.
1 Go to commentsLove seems to add a strong back field defense with speed to close the gap and tackle to his ability to attack, kick and pass (an accurate long pass). This sets him an edge over some of the other names - JRK in particular. Has to be said that Jordan and Stevenson have also been exposed defensively while Love has yet to face test match intensity. Spoilt for choice.
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