AB Record since SA SR departure...

Have removed teams like Tonga, Japan, etc. 

Here are the results...

Discuss...

When you remove the worst Ozzie team I have seen in my lifetime ...things look a lot worse. 

Who wants to bet the Kiwis won't be able to look at this without comparing themselves to others?

This post is purely to look at where the ABs are now as opposed to where they were prior to our exit from SR. 

So, calm down Kiwis , we ain't sayaing you are the worst, or that the Boks are better...we're plotting YOUR trajectory.

We can discuss the Bok trajectory separately if you like.

Well, you have to consider the fact that Europes top teams have become for more professional than what we see from the Southern Hemisphere. They play more games, more teenagers get to play pro rugby and as such Excell in the junior comps like we saw France and England dominating the youth comps. 

Before that it was New Zealand winning everything. 

Then, New Zealand traditional stacked with Pacific islanders. These guys are genetic freaks compared to the Europeans. They are built for rugby. Now, France, England and even Ireland and Wales have Pacific islander who might have played in New Zealand but decided to go to France or England. 

Australia probably have more Pacific islanders then any other team. So that traditional power base has now also been eroded away. 

Where as South Africa are gifted with really big men thanks to Dutch ancestry and who is the tallest nation in the world. 

Then take away Super comp, and lack of competition. 

So I don't think it is SA withdrawal alone. If anything, I don't think SA has anything to do with it. 

Remember the days before super rugby. Auckland was the best club in the world full of Pacific islanders. 

Also, those island nations are really small, so only so many good players that can go abroad. 

But look at Fiji, their players can have a good life in France, earn seriously good doh and still play for Fiji, beat England. 

So no, this has nothing to do with SA

Here are the records for the 3 years preceding the SA teams departing from SR...

Korn, the situation you described was already occurring long before all of this. Islanders have been playing Europe for a decent while already and the NH have become far more professional even before that. The same amount of clubs exist in Europe today as did ten and twenty years ago. 

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So true, I would also say look at the under 20 World Cup. It is not surprising that France is the top team and they will remain top as long as they can bring these players through and keep them together while winning. These guys knows how to play against other players and they know how to play together and struggle through difficult times.

No coincidence that both World Cups after 95 was stacked with u20 champs. We don’t have any at the moment and we need to sort it out quickly. 

One win and three losses against Ireland. Were the same factors….forward power and defence…the keys to Irelands win? 

Are there any implications for the Boks. In short can the Irish scrum hold against the Boks. That my friends is the question.

Not if we start with the same front row that we did on Friday.

And with Eben, Duane and RG behind them...nah, I can't see any team at the WC holding up against that.

I'm frightened just typing those names on the same page haha

The All Blacks have also received a lot of cards, they have also had to learn to cope with Red Cards as they hardly ever got them. With the new law, there has been some key red cards that cost them the games and matches. 

So you need to look at the games where they lost how many red cards they got. 

But they gave away so many penalties against us in the line out and were really lucking not to have a player sent off earlier. They drew the lions series due to a red card. Then they lost to Ireland because of a red card. NZ destroyed them in the first test and then in the 2nd test got a red card. 

When it comes to playing against South Africa, it has been harder for them to get wins. 

But I agree that they haven't been the same team

The ABs were straight-up cheating in the lineout.

It's one thing to close the space like they were continually doing but then when your captain tells the ref that the other team is lifting across the lineout...that tells you exactly what they're doing.

They tried to set the Boks up through underhanded tactics.

I'm glad the ref saw right through it.

And it was a nice bit of justice how their lineout completely fell apart in the second half.