Posts by Kyle Matthews
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I agree with ScottY that one of the solutions to the lineout is to select two lineout forwards.
I wonder why Thorne hasn't been tried at #6 or #8. Given that he's a converted league player, why wasn't he converted to a position that suited his height and bulk?
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It makes no sense for the main opposition party at a time of recession to be focusing on anything other than economic issues, unless it wishes to remain in opposition.
I think you can wrangle a lot of things into making economic/financial sense.
If the first thing out of the Labour spokesperson's mouth was "In these difficult economic times the government's move to energy efficient light bulbs will put $100/year into the pockets the average family." then it's possible that the conversation wouldn't have been about 'nanny state'. It would have been 'despite this being the government telling you what to do, it makes sense in 10 different ways so let them do it'.
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I do hope that they take Cruden on the end of year tour. He was fantastic for the age graders in the final a few months ago. Be worth taking him on tour, getting him into the All Black environment and trainings, and maybe giving him a start against a lesser team.
Seems like an ideal opportunity to take 3 first-fives rather than three halfbacks where we've got a pretty settled list of talented players.
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I hadn't seen that before, and it is interesting. Still don't think it's an issue until/unless that happens.
Once it happens its too late. If people aren't allowed to compete in a particular competition, due to concerns about their gender, they should be told now, up front.
Otherwise you'll get silly suggestions like the one in the stuff story a few days ago which suggested that she would keep her gold, but that the silver would get promoted to a second gold, but that the bronze would stay in bronze. What the hell does that even mean?
If two years from now, she smashes the record, and then the athletics people invalidate it post-race, they'll look like muppets and a whole country is going to be pissed.
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But I think that the problem here is the importation of the American style right-wing idiot populism where evidence just doesn't matter.
I don't buy that.
There will always be whack jobs who froth and make no sense all over the political spectrum. And some issues have their time.
But the idea that you can't gain reasonable popular support in NZ for policies that all the evidence backs up as being good policies, shows you're not doing your job well.
If Labour had sold lightbulbs as saving us all $XXX million dollars from not having to build another dam, as well as saving us all money from buying lightbulbs that last longer and cost us craploads less in electricity, it could have stood up. They didn't sell it to start with and then when it got attacked they got timid and didn't fire any guns.
If you let people who use 'nanny state' win every time, as a party of the left you're going to lose most battles before you start. Devalue the term by pointing out how it's a crap argument and how what you're proposing makes sense.
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Yes, but the problem is also in how they are carrying the ball.
I wasn't paying close enough attention to see how the Boks were tackling other players, but I did wonder if this was a specific thing they'd decided to do with Nonu this test. When he breaks through, tacklers from the side and back attack him high and grab his arms rather than go lower and bring him down to the ground. But yes, he was clearly susceptible to it.
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And if Nonu would just stop ruining all that great running, busting, line-breaking work by not handing over the ball at the end of it then that would be great, ta.
I started by pointing out to my partner how the South Africans were tackling around his arms and helping him lose the ball by tying them up.
After he'd lost it about four times I'd stopped doing that and was swearing at him like everyone else was.
Surely we've come on from those days?
You must be new around here?
Thought to be honest, our coaches are probably the best in the world. Not sure about South African domestic coaches depth, but certainly better than what Australia or anywhere in Europe can offer as their ten best coaches.
If the current lot were to get the boot, and Deans wasn't available, lets be honest, the next four or five in line wouldn't be ideal, but would be better than almost every other country in the world could put forward. Mostly a little lacking in top level experience, but with a better base than many international coaches have in other top test playing nations.
I will have reached the end of my tether.
By which I interpret "I'll start shouting when selections are made rather than just when they start playing the actual game".
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Heh.
Can you imagine the frothing if the NZRU even looked once at bringing in a non-NZ coach to coach the ABs? There'd be blood everywhere.
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Interesting take on the Read thing; I thought he was a bit lucky not to get binned.
I think the reason for the non-binning was that it was after the whistle, hence it had no effect on the game (delaying ball, deliberate offside etc). It was simply a cheap shot.
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Half the things on that list (er, the second half) of issues are things that I liked about the Labour government. I think it's called "making some sense".
Good that they've knocked that on the head though. Wouldn't want to have something evidence based to attack the current government on.