'The loser today was not Italy, or Ireland. The game of rugby lost'

Dmac was woeful, head didn’t seem to be in the game…perhaps a good wake up for him and the team that there’s plenty of rugby still to come this season.

I thought Jacomb and DMac were playing completely differently to how their partnership worked in the few two rounds. Jacomb was in total control this time, Dmac was only seen wider out. I think a clear strategy around working on Jacomb role/game.

The worst was him skidding into the takclers imo.

Yes of course. One particular one was that he looked to be uncomfortable and lacking confidence when in France, judging by the way he cam across in the videos. So that was one reason why I liked the idea of him growing further closer to home (now that’s an English saying, don’t pull me up on that one too), growing a bit more as a man first, where he may have made progress in recently.

But if you’re using logic and putting two and two together, which is all I was doing after reading this article, you’ve got him wanting to return home and get himself amongst the Hurricanes stars, and now months later, ‘family’ being reported as the reason he’s decided against that now.

Sure, anything is possible though GD if that’s how you want to think in life. But back to your comment, you incorrectly assumed that if their were indeed shackles in place, that he wouldn’t have returned. Can you work out logically how this is a false statement? The simplicity of it will be quite striking when you realise.. it implies that this situation - him deciding months later to go to France - would be impossible if he returned to NZ.

Dmac probably shouldn’t have been starting at all when you’ve got someone like Scooter they tried so hard to get back (they’re hanging out for some good/fit wing stocks though?).

Wrampling didn’t know what to do, so he rose with him and Jo wasn’t fast enough to get away. I fully expected it to be a red but the ruling completely matched my perception so well done.

I didn’t watch the second half but thought Feketi’s dissalowed try was a good square up for scoring off a forward pass for their first. There was also no way Jacobson passed that ball forward, it only travelled forward about a meter despite going all the way to the sideline while running at full tilt. Great to see the loyal crowd getting incited and behind their team though.

While the two Canes midfields started the season pretty rusty, and I thought in Sullivan’s case especially, well out of form, they have started playing very well together as Peter suggested on TV last night. Still though, their is some class to come back, and if Roigard can sort out his game and actually provide some impact, and Laidlaw can get things right at 10, well that’s a very dangerous side if that front row start getting into gear. Dissapointed Kirifi didn’t quite bring the big game like Lakai did. Missing players like Rayasi and Moorby from last year for sure.

There was talk Dmac might take his sabatical next year, so MacMillan wouldn’t want to leave the club in the lurch without a proven/developed first five.

Large parts of the Saders game was great though yeah, the tight work led by Barrett and those two young halves were brilliant.

Perpetually injured seems fairer. Did he ever manage 80 mins for Ireland?

As inevitable as the passing of time…