Borthwick: 'Playing for England should be the time of your life'

It was (on air here) last year, but not this year. I haven’t seen why, my guess was that it’s because no English version comes out from the “closed off billionaires league” and they couldn’t get an english one. I think they have to get it from the UK broadcasters and maybe that market changed this year?

The quality of it wasn’t my point, purely correlation of those performances to ones at home. He is the only one over there, there was no marker for ABs to valuate from. He wasn’t a solid choice, in that you knew what you were getting, he was still more of a sensation in the All Blacks, and he was playing a different position.

Those are just direct points to counter JBs thoughts. I’m not saying they were used in any way (I think theyd have to be part of why NZR have the current eligibility rules though), this situation was simply a matter of starting at the back of the class if you’re not here. Only vets can earn sabbaticals (which is essentially what people are asking for in this case). There’s no argument this isn’t the right call.

As with the topic in the above paragraph, we could go on and on about it, but I will say I did see after the fact the final was broadcast FTA (no that I’d watch live, still have yet to watch the replay) straight off mondos website (im guessing it was a laggy pos tho), which is/was good. I also wanted to watch Brad Weber and Lester last year (start of the season) so went on line for a few (and tried to catch Max Hicks), that Brad was fabulous, Lester less so. Lester was also less that good in this international window. So I did see enough to know they are very different games, and I can tell it’s going to take him a while to get on his feet here again.

But Rivez and Havili were crap in the next game, you just got lucky it wasn’t in that game.

Better than dishing out AB Cs, with Ethan Blackadder in the team, against France.

No the Chiefs choked the life out of the Crusaders, again, they just couldn’t knock over the points. Two tries to one.

Don’t bother looking at the stats.

Those often very subtle differences in laws between countries can be critical too.

So say the FFR wouldn’t be able to say “these are the guidelines handed down by WR, we thought that would be an accurate way to put the players welfare first” as an excuse/get out of jail free card? I’m not sure how that would be applied in Britain either.

I honestly doubt there was a cover up like there was in America so I hope the bodies do not get bogged down by the legalities (because that’s what’s going to create overzealous changes). I haven’t been treating the whole courts thing seriously, as it just seems to me players are hoping WR think it’s cheaper to settle out of courts.

TBH I’m just taking say NZRs statement to mean theres no way hes going to be able to prove he’s better than the current stocks during the NPC season, but were definitely going to use him if we need to. It would be a bit much to see the likes of TUJ, McLeod, Springer, Sullivan get selected ahead of him.

I don’t like it. I think they’ve undervalued the NPC for decades now, and if it was good enough back then, it’s still good enough now to select ABs from. So I agree, he should go toe to toe with them during the NPC. Obviously there’s absolutely you would rank his current Toulon form higher than the currents squads Super Rugby form, they are all playing better than him.

The rest is opinion.

On top of that Morgan also clearly is diving at the ground and would never have enough force to clean if it wasn’t for the downward folding motion of Tizzano’s body.

That said, I obviously didn’t care. It is a shocking area of the game because it’s basically saying that’s Tizzanos ball simply because he got their first. He’s far too low himself because hes protecting against the tackled player placing the ball all the way back, so he wants to be able to reach out. As a result he’s much lower than what WR should be allowing players to get in such a contact, impossible to clean.

I wouldn’t be surprised if his mouth guard triggered and therefor the officials sanction Morgan after the fact.