Why the shock of England exit?

[jamiet1978]

As a new member I ask this with genuine interest and would lke to hear members honest opinion on the forum.

Given Englands exit from the Worl Cup, the media response and general comments on the forum it seems to indicate a serious disbelief that this exit was possible. Is it not fair to say that England are only the 3rd best team in Europe given their perfomance in the 6 nations, in the last 10 years they have only won it once with Wales and Ireland having won it 3 times each. The loss against Wales should only be seen as a disapointment given the Welsh injury tally to important players?

J

 

[ncurd]

May I suggest one of the many threads where we the English are eating their young?

The reasons are many fold

We were playing at home.
We've had Wales' & Australia number in recent years. Recording impressive victories against both in the last 12 months.
Welsh injuries.

Most English would also say we're 2nd best in Europe(considering we've finished 1st or 2nd in the last 5 tourbaments) and we've probably thrown away 1 or 2 ***les ourselves. But that's pretty debatable.

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

Simple:

1) We were playing at home
2) The last 2 times we met Wales and Australia, we beat them
3) We missed out on winning the last 2 6N on points difference, even then not a huge difference.
4) Wales had tons of injuries
5) We had pretty much our full squad
6) England very rarely lose 2 games back to back at Twickers

We weren't expecting to top the pool but we were expecting to beat at least 1 of Wales or Australia.

 

[ncurd]

Point of order it was points difference in the last 3 tournaments. The last 2 were pretty close but 2013 went to the last game with us on superior PD and if it wasn't for the Wales hammering gave us would of been a lot closer.

 

[ABs2011]

Three threads (EDIT: FIVE threads) now on a team that is out of the RWC. I know it's an interestimng topic, but any chance we could combine the threads? They are all essentially about the same thing...

As for the answer - the first two posts have covered it. I would just add that England were 2nd favourites to win the RWC. By definition that is essentially a "shock" I would have thought. As far as I know it has not happened before either.

 

[The Jones Boy]

This was a big shock.
I'm definitely really surprised that England didn't make it to the knockout stages.
Had Robshaw taken the kick they would still be in the tournament.
England led the game for 75% of the time.
There was only a kick in it.
England were playing at home.
England historically produce powerful packs that have the ability to strangle the opposition possession.

For Wales to take the victory coming in to the match with three big players out from injury, and then to see Welsh players dropping like flies, it was an incredible turnaround.
Lydiate has had some deserved praise but for the last 20 minutes Faletau was playing like a man possessed.
Warburton was immense when it really counted. Bigger was on song all night.

 

[PacDuran]

As a new member I ask this with genuine interest and would lke to hear members honest opinion on the forum.

Given Englands exit from the Worl Cup, the media response and general comments on the forum it seems to indicate a serious disbelief that this exit was possible. Is it not fair to say that England are only the 3rd best team in Europe given their perfomance in the 6 nations, in the last 10 years they have only won it once with Wales and Ireland having won it 3 times each. The loss against Wales should only be seen as a disapointment given the Welsh injury tally to important players?

J

I agree that England are an ordinary side and have been for a while, despite a few exceptional flurries, but the manner of the Wales defeat was so mind boggling and incredible. That's the main reason I think. Wales should have been 15 points down with 20 mins to go. Every penalty England go they should have gone of r ascrum and Wles would have been down to 14 or 13 men eventually. One of the worst chokes in the history of rugby.

 

[Colombia]

England have had a strong record at World Cups, never failed to make the QFs and had a good recent record against Australia at World Cups. They were also the home and host side who had beaten Wales in Cardiff earlier in the year.

It was a shock, almost everyone was surprized.

 

[Absolutia]

I could see this coming a mile off. This current team only ever seem a couple of games away from looking lost and have shown themselves to be toothless under real pressure. I just don't understand how anyone could have had much faith in this team, when as recently as the second warm-up against France, their impotence had returned. I've assumed that pundit etiquette was the reason that no one was speaking the obvious truth.

They can be shaky in any or all areas on any given day. They can play good enough rugby to compete in most tests, but they are seriously lacking in game management and controlled fight.

That being said, I still think that I thought we'd be getting out of the group while Wales lost out. Certainly no surprise for me though.

 

[bazz]

I knew they would go out ,the English are southern softies

 

[RedruthRFC]

+1 to most of the points above. England were strong favourites to top the pool in every market I came across and were second favourites for the tournament. Given this and the reasons explained above as to why the markets had them priced as they did, a better question would be why wouldn't anyone be shocked by England's exit?

I hope that those now indulging in a bit of after-timing were laughing all the way to the bookies last Saturday evening.

 

[KeyboardWorrier]

Reality is, the writing was on the wall at least a year before the RWC started. It's not such a surprise to see them knocked out at the pool level, but it still kinda is just because it's never happened before.

 

[jamiet1978]

Many thanks for your replies, you are all in similar agreement on the points. The specifics of each point are clear, but to put it into another context- the pre tournament hype on Englands prospects are are rather similar to Englands prospects in football. Only in Football there have been many more tournaments where England have failed expectation (World Cup and Euro), the fans are rather used to it.

One might be not too far wrong if they said that England dont do well under pressure in both Rugby and Football. They are great in qualification but when it really matters, they dont deliver against the big teams.

England 4th favourites to win Euro 2016- get your bets on


j

 

[McTallshort]

As a new member I ask this with genuine interest and would lke to hear members honest opinion on the forum.

Given Englands exit from the Worl Cup, the media response and general comments on the forum it seems to indicate a serious disbelief that this exit was possible. Is it not fair to say that England are only the 3rd best team in Europe given their perfomance in the 6 nations, in the last 10 years they have only won it once with Wales and Ireland having won it 3 times each. The loss against Wales should only be seen as a disapointment given the Welsh injury tally to important players?

J

We finished second in the 6 nations having beaten Wales in Cardiff and France in Paris so don't know where the 3rd in Europe comes from but never mind.

To me it wasn't a shock just very disappointing. We have beaten Wales and Australia in recent meetings so we could have won the group but it was obvious the selection was starting to get muddled and our performance in the warm up games showed things were not functioning and England were dipping in form as the WC got closer so as much as I thought they would raise their game or the daft backline selections would work in the end it was obvious to everyone that it would end in disappointment. So shocked no, disappointed yes.

 

[OneFansOpinion]

I'm a bit unsure where the confidence came from to be honest. I said it before the tournament and haven't been surprised at all. Let's be honest, if it wasn't for Francis getting battered by Mahler, the Wales game wouldn't even have been close.

 

[TheOvalBall]

I asked a question a while back on this forum "Is Lancaster a coach who cannot make the step up ?"

The answer was no.

So, i wasn't really surprised that England left the World Cup.

 

[McTallshort]

Many thanks for your replies, you are all in similar agreement on the points. The specifics of each point are clear, but to put it into another context- the pre tournament hype on Englands prospects are are rather similar to Englands prospects in football. Only in Football there have been many more tournaments where England have failed expectation (World Cup and Euro), the fans are rather used to it.

One might be not too far wrong if they said that England dont do well under pressure in both Rugby and Football. They are great in qualification but when it really matters, they dont deliver against the big teams.

England 4th favourites to win Euro 2016- get your bets on


j

Yes we are crap at sport and cannot hack it blah blah

Why have you posted on here?

 

[TRF_Olyy]

It's funny to see all these people coming forward and saying how obvious it was that England wouldn't make it out of the group.
Pre-world cup you had a load of people saying we'd probably make the final (weren't we 2nd favourites, after the ABs, at the bookies?) or at the very least the semi-finals. England fans seemed way more pessimistic about our chances that fans from other countries.
General consensus seemed to be that Wales would be out, and it was really just a formality as to which of England/Aus would come 1st/2nd.

Yet now everyman and his dog have, apparently, been saying it all along.

 

[LeinsterMan (NotTigsMan)]

I never said England would make the finals!!!


Mind you I am great.

 

[shtove]

It's funny to see all these people coming forward and saying how obvious it was that England wouldn't make it out of the group.
Pre-world cup you had a load of people saying we'd probably make the final (weren't we 2nd favourites, after the ABs, at the bookies?) or at the very least the semi-finals. England fans seemed way more pessimistic about our chances that fans from other countries.
General consensus seemed to be that Wales would be out, and it was really just a formality as to which of England/Aus would come 1st/2nd.

Yet now everyman and his dog have, apparently, been saying it all along.

There was a good long post on the Fiji-England thread that pointed out the Eng problems and said too late to fix. Not a prediction, but I think the earth was trembling already.