Blues vs Rebels - live chat & banter

Game is already underway (20 mins) but Blues are ahead 12-8. Two good tries by the Blues who have settled into their game after a series of mistakes.

 Ioane, had a fantastic run through traffic & no one wanted to tackle him. Blues drive over the line for another try. 23.56 min mark. Kick is no good. 17-8. Missing these kicks is keeping it closer than it should be.
Blues looking good though.

 Rebels with a good set of phases but ends in a dropped pass by Ellison. Ioane messed him up on that one.

 From the kick off Blues with an unbelievable play, Blues catch their own kick off run it up two forwards power it forward & West scores. 4 tries to the Blues. Have to land their kicks though. 24-11 to the Blues after 32:20 mins.

 Rebs a series of plays but both teams making mistakes. Both look like second tier teams with small mistakes from both teams. Blues defense holds.

 Rebs finally score a converted try at the break. Blues may pay for missed kicks as score is closer than it should be. 24-18.

 Blues score on the start of second half on a mistake from Rebs. Good series of passes in the backs from the Blues after a solid scrum. Conver sion missed, 29-18 to Blues.

 Rebs run a series of phases which ends in a penalty to Rebs. Going to kick for touch to get a rolling maul going. Blues stall it bug Rebs still running plays in the forwards. Finally Blues get a turn over through Parsons. Good play Blues!

 Blues defense holds again. Blues change two props - Golden Oldies coming up?

 Blues on attack, 5 meter scrum off a penalty kick. Blues throw it wide & full back scores a try cutting through the defense. Try Blues! 34-18 conversion is good 36-18 at 54:18 mins gone.

 Rebs run 11 phases & get a penalty, they will go for the scrum.

 Rebs score, Blues seemed to be a bit asleep on that one. 36-23. 67 mins gone.

 Blues were about to score but knocked in on & Rebs score a long range try. 36-30 to Blues 68 mins gone. This game is not over!

 Blues get the turnover & ran a series of plays to get close, penalty so Blues have a chance to take the lead to 9 points ahead. Kick is no good. 7 mins to go.

Rebs get a penalty go for the line out on Blues 22.  Rebs punching it up. Penalty against Blues. Rebs go for the corner. 78 mins gone. Rolling maul misfires, penalty to the Blues for peeling off. Blues very lucky.

 Blues win it, 36-30 but closer than it should have been. Congrats to the Blues, well played Rebs. Neither team looked like first tier teams, too many mistakes, missed tackles by the Rebs too many silly mistakes from the Blues.

 Hi Cloudy, I'm doing well & hope you are too Congrats on the win! Blues of the SA so they will have their hands full what with the home town refs, etc
Blues of course had a neutral ref with our mate Craig with the whistle.

 Yes, Cloudy the SA "supporters" don't rate Craig as highly as we do for some reason. Bland Bay looks like a really nice place & I am sure there would be a really good real estate deal for Craig, perhaps there already had been? 
Lander up next taking on the Brumbies, a tough ask for the Landers & they are playing down in Invercargil l in the rain so no indoor stadium. Makes it harder for them I would say.

 Blues hold on to edge Rebelsby Gregor Paul. NZ Herald

That the Blues claimed victory against the Rebels today isn't a surprise but the way they did it was.

They arrived prepared to graft and grind, to front a good side physically and slug it out for 80 minutes. But it only became that sort of game in the last 15 minutes when a few loose moments cost the Blues a big lead and left them having to be more careful than they would have liked.

It felt wrong that the Rebels were still in it that late. They'd barely played any rugby and had ridden their luck and the wayward kicking of Ihaia West to be where they were. Their lineout driving game had been a massive factor, too, but that's all they had and it shouldn't have been enough to have made things as close as they ended up being.

"It's always good to get the win," said Blues coach Tana Umaga. "It is probably a hang-up of what has been symptomatic of our game. We give away too many penalties inside our quarter, our half. We make errors inside our half and can't get out and then it makes it easier for them. Our discipline is something we have worked hard yet we are not getting any reward.

"When we got down inside their half, it was a different story. Our attack really turned it on."

As it happened: Blues v Rebels

Up until that last quarter, there hadn't been any need for the Blues to do much, if any, grafting or grinding or worry too much about their ill-discipline and unforced error count.
They just had to keep the ball, run straight and be patient. That was enough to flummox the Rebels, enough to make it one of those rare evenings when the Blues could, with some of the angst and pressure lifted early, play without inhibition.

They found some flow and rhythm until they opted to make a raft of changes. Umaga felt some of his men were tired, while there was also a need to get others on the field purely to give them a run.

The changes left the Blues out of sorts and it was as they tried to reorganise that the Rebels were able to claw their way back in. It could be argued they tried to introduce too many players too soon, as Umaga offered, but the Blues need to be able to rely on their bench to make a seamless entry and maintain standards.

Still, the fact they had to fight from as far back as they did told a story in itself.
It's a fairly preposterous state of affairs when the lowest ranked New Zealand team are able to deal to the top Australian side - look them in the eye and fear nothing.

What should really concern Sanzaar, and more specifically the Australian Rugby Union, is the ease with which the Blues were able to conjure tries. They played well enough, were moderately slick and creative, but nothing special - nothing that made everyone gasp and proclaim their rugby genius. And yet the tries kept coming.

Simple stuff brought huge gains for the Blues and even they might have been surprised how easily they were able to breach the Rebels.

They must have wondered why they were able to score a couple of times directly off first-phase possession - just pass, catch, run straight and over in the corner.

They must have felt that every time they entered the Rebels' 22 they were going to come away with points, largely because that's what happened. If West had kicked his goals and the coaches had resisted the urge to make so many replacements as early as they did, the Blues could have cruised to 50 and jumped on the plane to South Africa this morning with genuine confidence about how things might go in the Republic.

Blues 36 (J. Parsons, J. Kaino, C. Faumuina. I. West, T. Li, L. Visinia tries; I. West 2 cons; P. Francis cons) 
Rebels 30 (R. Hodge, J. Reid, C. Faingaa, S. Naivalu tries; J. Debreczeni 2 cons, 2 pens). 
Halftime: 24-18.

 "It's a fairly preposterous state of affairs when the lowest ranked New Zealand team are able to deal to the top Australian side - look them in the eye and fear nothing."
Yes, that says a lot about the quality of NZ rugby at the moment. Tough for the Blues though as it makes it very hard for them to reach the final.

 Link to article from Rugby 365
Link to rugby stuff article

 Cheers JW ! Yet another nail in Ou Maaks predictions of  Kiwi losses ...

 Blues will head to South Africa relieved and satisfiedBy Patrick McHendry NZ Herald

The Blues are scheduled to leave for their two-match tour of South Africa at 7am tomorrow and, on the evidence of this victory over the Rebels, will step on the plane with a small degree of satisfaction and a large degree of relief.

The alternative would have been hard to bear and, had the Blues lost this match to the fast-finishing Aussies, a seat next to coach Tana Umaga all the way to the Republic would not have been an attractive prospect.

According to the points table before kickoff, this was a game between the worst New Zealand team and the best Australian one, but the Blues were heavy favourites and, on a beautiful autumn evening at Eden Park, it had all looked a bit easy for the home side.

The match seemed all but over after half 60 minutes when Ihaia West scored his try thanks to Steven Luatua's catch of his re-start and Patrick Tuipulotu's charge up the middle. West did well to prop off his left foot and go through traffic to score by the posts, but it was the lead-up from the Blues' big men which paved the way, and they did so most of the night.

As it happened: Blues v Rebels

West's try was the fourth consecutive five-pointer for the Blues. They had an untidy start to the half, but otherwise were in control, although Jordy Reid's try on the stroke of halftime possibly should have set off a few alarm bells.

One of the hopes for Umaga, who has had to endure too many close finishes for his liking since taking over the franchise at the start of the season, was that his team would be able to shut out the visitors early.

They got to the first part right, thanks to their directness. The second part remains a work in progress.

Too often this season the Blues, who lead the statistics in terms of retaining possession, have pushed passes across the park in the hope that something good happens. Not this time. George Moala, back at centre in place of the injured Rene Ranger, was told to be direct, to play his natural game, and his team-mates followed the same advice.

Their first three tries were scored by forwards as the home side kept it tight, with James Parsons (making up for a bad early error), Jerome Kaino and Charlie Faumuina scoring from close to the line. West's try owed much to Luatua and Tuipulotu, plus his own footwork and reluctance to get too lateral.

Tevita Li's try in the left corner after the break was helped by Moala's directness, again, and there was more of the same in the lead-up to Lolagi Visinia's effort.

But then came the Rebels' comeback and tries from Colby Faingaa and Sefa Naivalu, the last of which denied the Blues their first winning bonus point of the season.

It was a reminder that this Blues team contain a fair bit of talent, but are still lacking a ruthless edge.