ROUND 1

IRELAND v ENGLAND

We have decided to add this page to our site now after Round 2.

In Round 1, we only watched the one game and that was Ireland defeating England.

England played great rugby in the first half and were ahead we think 10 - 5 at half time. However, they dropped off to great Irish pressure in the second stanza.

Ireland really pummelled them in the second half and the scoreboard flattered England in the end due to a couple of easy scores towards the end of the game.

ROUND 2

We did not see Italy d Wales, although having watched Full Impact 6 Nations on Netflix, we would have loved to see the response of the new Italian coach from Argentina after that effort. Perhaps we will watch the replay during the week on Stan. We suppose we will.

ENGLAND v FRANCE

We have just finished watching this truly incredible Test match played at Twickenham and it is as a result of this match that we have decided to add this page to our site. Because we are enjoying this tournament so much, as usual, how could we not write about our impressions of truly magic rugby.

In this terrific sporting contest, France had a shocking problem holding onto the football (Gilbert) and made numerous handling errors. However, as we kept mentioning last year, that was not their main problem. Their main error was continually kicking the ball both from the scrum win and in general play. As we said last year at this time, why do you want to hand the football on a silver platter to the other side so damn easily and give up possession of the ball so easily. Since, ind doing that, which is really shite rugby, you cannot and never will build pressure. You will NEVER see the All Blacks or the excellent world champion South Africans do this. No, they win, indeed crush opponents, by building up pressure, phase after phase after phase. You will often see the All Blacks maintain possession for 20 or more phases. That’s how truly great rugby is produced in the world. On the world stage.

That is why it is rather unlikely that a Northern Hemisphere team will win the World Cup. As you said last year in 2024, this is the “premier” world rugby tournament. Except it isn’t, is it. Since South Africa and the All Blacks would crush any other these teams, with the possible exception of Ireland.

France kept dropping the ball in this match and when they did have possession they gave it away by kicking it. We are not talking here about kicking the ball to the winger as he runs down the sideline. It is truly dreadful to watch this crap. It’s crap. It’s true shite. To a person from the Southern Hemisphere.

England faded away against Ireland. So the question was could they maintain possession and pressure in this match?

France scored some magic tries in the second half, however, due to magic phase work by the English mall, especially in their own 22, we were left thinking in the last ten minutes of this game that England deserved to win this match. Because they attacked superbly well, they maintained possession with truly great ruck and mall work, they won the ball at the breakdown (Curry and Earl and co) and they were left in a situation where they had to score one last try and conversion in the last few minutes. We love France, but they did not deserve to win this game. England did.

So, with a couple of minutes to go, or maybe one minute, England went over. That was after the new kid on the block, the young big forward Finn went over five minutes beforehand. England, you really piled on the pressure superbly well in that second half.

So, we were left feeling very happy for England. They have now played three very professional, strong halves of rugby in this comp. Well done England, you really deserved that great win, one of the best games of rugby union we have seen in a long time.

SCOTLAND v IRELAND is on tonight, so we will report on this game tomorrow after we have digested it from Murrayfield.

SCOTLAND v IRELAND MURRAYFIELD

Scotland began with some serious defence of their own line against the Ireland team. This did not last though as Ireland did some great work charging the ball down from Scottish kicks, also with the assistance of huge juggernaut kicks in play from Prendergast, who like Jimmy Stynes, could play Aussie Rules (AFL). Caelen Doris was extremely effective in the first half and throughout the game. He is worth his weight in gold.

In the second half, the Scots, refreshed in mind and body began their assault, executed with excellent attacking plays, maintaining possession of the ball, and taking advantage of Irish turnovers. Ireland had a slack few moments for a while, which happens in every game of sport, since it’s all a game of momentum. All football in any code and any sport is a game of momentum as came from the mouth of the Adelaide Crows Premiership winning coach, Malcom Blight in 1997-98.

Scotland crossed the line, however the Ireland pack regained their equilibrium and began their own assaults, ably assisted by the mainstay who is Gibson-Park who provides the foundation of stability, and there was great movement of the ball by the backs so that James Lowe the man bun went over.

This was soon followed by a lovely weighted kick by Gibson-Park in the attacking 22 and Jack Conan took full advantage.

Yes, Ireland really piled on the pressure in the last 30 minutes of the game and won easily. Bonus point.

18 - 32

No amount of Tennents’ Lager will help you, fine looking Scotsmen and women.

It looked exceptionally freezing at Murrayfield and it’s always a great thing to study the crowd at Murayfield. We love Edinburgh very much, having been there a few times now. Well, here is a story about Scotland and Glasgow.

Personal History

In 1991, when we stayed with our anaesthetist best buddy in Grays in Essex at the hospital where he was working, we decided to go off and do some backpacking, even though we were very ill at the time with a large cyst in our head which we did not know about for a further ten years of our life. As we have said, this placed us in the queue at Centrelink for the first time after having to quit Articles at a law firm we working at in Brisbane. We spent the whole of the 1990s decade + another four years until 2004 on the Disability Pension and living a very strange, lonely, and peculiar life, the large cyst we were born with taking us out at the age of 24 1/2.

It was the Thursday before Good Friday to be exact when everything exploded in our head and body, On that day we were doing an inspection of documents at a neighbouring law firm in Queen Street when, walking back down the mall, we suddenly became very dizzy and fell over. Due to the immense pressure the cyst was causing in our head, it caused our spine to collapse onto our spinal cord at the C5/6. They never did an x-ray of my head, specialist after specialist (ear nose & throat, neurologist, physician) engaging in a lovely dose of medical negligence and telling us there “was is nothing wrong with you.” The ENT guy sot us to blow into a paper bag because he said “you’re just anxious”. The neurologist was particularly harsh telling me and my mother that I was malingering.

The cyst was only discovered in 1999 after I sat in my then physician’s office and demanded an MRI of my head as I said there is something wrong up there. He said you can’t have one of those, they are costly and you need evidence of something wrong. I told him, okay how about this. I know my body after all these years and I am not leaving your office until you sign the form so that I can go down the road at Wickham Terrace and have the MRI done. I am not leaving until you do that.

The MRI showed the large and very serious problem straight away and, you know what, my physician refused to see me. He referred me onto a neurosurgeon for advice, a man who had just been released from prison for Medicare fraud who told me he was not touching it. So, for the rest of 1999 I had to fight really hard to get some action and eventually an ear nose & throat guy agreed to go up my nose and operate and remove it. It was the size of between a golf ball and tennis ball, he said after the operation. After the operation, after the removal of the large cyst that was actually part of my self, having grown in the womb out of my notochord, I was basically concussed for the next four years as my brain relocated itself, until I finally came back to life.

When I recovered and moved back to Melbourne from Brisbane in 2004, that is when I ran into the Melbourne Underworld and the associated criminal and union garbage and filth, who I spent a lot of time dealing with. When we returned to Melbourne, we worked in a bottle shop in the suburb where we grew up, Beaumaris for a few years while attending the Brighton Baths where in winter we loved plunging in to the freezing cold Port Philip Bay, which we still like do in winter without having the benefit of a hot steam room to retreat into. We then retrained in the area of Mental Health and AOD (alcohol and other drugs) so that we could help others going through tough times.

So, as I have stated, I’m finishing off my fourth novel currently (you can find my books on Amazon under the name Cameron W. Cooke) and then I’m going to begin writing my memoir on my unique adult life. *

When I was in Scotland in 1991, I travelled from London - Portsmouth - Isle of Wight - Bath - Cambridge - York - Newcastle up to Edinburgh, then up to Ullapool, Inverness, and drove up to the top of the highlands and also drove around Loch Ness in a rented Fiesta. It was in a pub in Fort William that I went over to the juke box and put on Dire Straits “Brothers in Arms”. “These mist covered mountains are a home now for me but my home is the lowlands and always will be.” There was no one else in the pub, being lunch time, and the barman crossed the floor and turned the song up to full volume and gave me a wink. I spent a week in Renfrew Street in Glasgow finally holed up in a hotel sick with the flu, and that is when I decided to fly back to Australia.

The Wallabies won the World Cup in November 1999, captained by Mr Eales, only a few days before my important operation on my head to get my life back on track, so I will always remember that match played in France. We are now fortunate enough to have access to France on a regular basis, so we are looking forward to much more rugby in the South of France, particularly at our local club, Quillan-Limoux, and attending matches in Toulouse and Paris one day!

So, as Bruce Springsteen sang on the album “Lucky Town” around 1992, that, along with my beautiful wife, is “My Beautiful Reward”.

Do yaself a favour and listen to the Springsteen albums “Human Touch” and “Lucky Town”.

We also recommend the “Local Hero” movie and soundtrack by Mark Knopfler.

We played two years of rugby in Brisbane, QLD at Anglican Church Grammar School and then at the University of Queensland for one year, before reverting to playing Australian Rules football. Naturally, because we could kick very well and catch the ball, we played at full back.

AMAZON BOOKS

You can find 3 novels on Amazon.com.au

1. Ridgestone

   Young adult girl takes on the roller coaster of the coming of age journey in an outer western Australian suburb

2. The Defence Strategy

   Innocent man framed for a crime he did not commit by elitist climate change socialists, Marxists, and feminists.

   Stuck in prison where all books are banned by the female warden and then transferred to the psych ward.

   Employs the services of country lawyer James Royston who, together with his ex-bikie partner, takes on his defence at trial.

3. Symphony

   Originally published by Xlibris.

   Story of my early struggles during the 1990s on the DSP (Disability Support Pension).

PS. We will have a gander at the Italy v Wales match from Round 2.

Looking forward to Round 3.