World Cup Fever

[Professor Smarmiarty]

So it's that time - time for a world cup in a properr sport.
No diving and having a big cry on the ground. No wearing the equivalent of a tank. No having your fights where the referee can see them and thus break them up. No stopping to rest every 20 seconds.
No it's time to get your scrotum torn (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wayne_Shelford)and break your arm (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colin_Meads) and keep on playing.

So the Rugby World Cup is at hand and I'm exciting- preparing to take my sleep in the afternoon for the next month or so.
This thread is for discussing it (there are a few people on the forum who might be interested maybe??) And thought I'd give an introduction for those not keen. I defineatly recommend catching some games during the competition, particularly in the later rounds.

A bit of a breakdown for those not aware what's going on.
It starts on Friday Night (NZ time),Friday morning (UK) Saturday Night (US) though the knockout starts 8 October where I would recommend tuning in if you're not a big rugby fan, there is a lot of blowout games in the pools but the knockout stages are always close.

We start with 4 pools, 2 teams go through from each pool. I'm going to run through them and my prediction.

Pool A:
Canada
France
Japan
New Zealand
Tonga

Pool most likely to keep SMB awake during the morning hours.

NZ (World ranking 1): Resident best team in the world, play very attractive rugby full of little attacking kicks, short runs and quick offloads. Have been favourites at basically every world cup but have only won one so have a huge choking tag. Lost thier last two games before the world cup whicch will probably be good to prevent them getting too arrogant. Major weaknesses in lack of depth- their key players are Richie Mccaw and Dan Carter, if they get injured they are in trouble.
France (4): Resident crazy pants. France can be brilliant one day, terrible the next. Has a habit of knocking NZ out of world cups so NZ will be pleased to play them in the pools. Like to run from deep. Major weakness: Inconsistency.
Tonga (12): Combative, better than their ranking, great backline.

Games of the round: NZ vs Tonga (Pregame dance off of Haka vs Sipi Tau)- Also the world cup opening ceremony is before this
Samoa v France: Two teams who are just going to run at each other and anything could happen. Chance at an upset.
NZ vs France: Two ballwinning, fast, attacking teams- should be good to watch.
SMB's Prediction: NZ, France



Pool B:
Argentina,
Georgia
England
Romania
Scotland

Pool most likely to cancel the effects of Pool A

England (5): An odd team. Not as good as they used to be but often do well when written off. Have a fairly traditional setup of strong forwards to win penalties for Johnny Wilkinson to hit it over. Major weaknesses: Have a pretty good backline that they ignore. Teams which can score a lot of tries against them will put points up they can't match with penalties.
Argentina (9): A team under rebuilding. Expect little.
Scotland (7): Dire. England without the options.

Game of the round: AVOID


SMB's Prediction: England, Argentina
1
Pool C:
Australia
Ireland
Italy
Russia
United States

Most full of criminals pool.

Australia (2): The Brazil of Rugby. Ridiculously good backline who are renowned for tricky moves and cunning play. Also a fantastic young flanker (ie cheating man who wins his side penalties). Young exciting team, beat the All blacks in their last warm up game before the cup. Major weakness: Tight five are weak which could cost them in the scrum. Great backs, bad forwards- could make for exciting comedy.
Ireland: (8): Better than their ranking. True to their heritag they like to hold opponents they have tackled off the ground and straight up mug them. Always keen for a fight. Good defence.
Italy: (11): Nothing to see here.
Games of the round: Ireland vs Australia- Somewhere beaten a bare knuckled fist fight and a ballet.

COLD WAR 2- THE DEADENING- USA vs Russia

SMB's Predicition: Australia, Ireland

Pool D:
Fiji
Namibia
Samoa
South Africa
Wales

Pool most likely to cause suicides/mass hilarity.

South Africa (3): Defending champions. Have a circus clown as their coach. True to form they have selected 20 Ogres and 3 people to kick the goals. Brutal but effective. Poor form this year- got destroyed multiple times by Australia and NZ but were mostly playing B teams- key players rested but out of form.
Wales (6): Great at winning the ball on the ground. Also great at winning games they should lose, losing games they should win. Expect them to beat South Africa, lose to Samoa
Samoa (10): Typical pacific team, lots of good runners, terrible paack.
Fiji (14): Samoa but shit.

Games of the round: Samoa versus Fiji Wardancetastic
South Africa/Wales vs Samoa Upsetastic

SMB's Prediction: South Africa, Samoa


Predicting it out so everyone can know how awesome I am:


Quarters:
Australia vs Samoa- Australia
England versus France- France
South Africa versus Ireland- South Africa
New Zealand versus Argentina- New Zealand
Semis
Australia-France Australia
South Africa-New Zealand New Zealand

All blacks to win in the final.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

Now it's time for all time 15's. Starting with Austria:
Austrian
1) ArchDuke Charles (master of forward assualts)
2) Husserl (C) (experienced hooker) 3)Freud (knows how to stop the drives of the oppositions)
4) Pauli 5) Godel (they both understand about binding tight)
6) Wittgenstein 7) Franz Ferdinand... (to win the penalties)
8) Schwarzenegger (for monstrous runs)
9) Porsche (distribution and delivery) 10) Mozart 12) Haydn 13) Mahler (magical backline conduction)
11) Strauss 14) Schrodinger (for evasiness)
15) Paracelsus (backline wizard).
Only missing a good kicker.

[BloodyMage]

I don't really watch, but my friends do so no doubt I'll end up catching a few games.

[batgirl]

Having a New Zealander in my paramedic class who has hyped me up has made me very interested in seeing the World Cup this year, though I have minimal knowledge of how to play or how score is kept.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

It's pretty simple. Goal is to ground the ball over the tryline which is 5 points and then you get a kick at goal from where you scored which gives you 2 points. if you get a penalty in the field of play you can attempt to kick it over the goalposts (like a field goal but you don't take it from the middle of the field, you take it from where the penalty was- oftne on an angle) for 3 points. You can also dropkick the ball from the field of play (a drop goal) for 3 points but this is pretty difficut and doesn't happen that often.
You keep the ball till its turned over. To turn the ball over if you don't have the ball you tackle the opposition player who then has to release the ball on the ground and then both sides ram players into each other (called a scrum) and try to turn the player on the bottom of the scrum over so he (and the ball) faces their side.
That's basically most of the rules. Canada has a team, Canada-NZ could be a good game to watch.


In other news the NZ government has completely capitulated to the rugby union employing a set of draconian laws about whether you can use terms like rugby world cup to advertise your business. Generally you can't. A small few people are protested but unfortunately rugby is basically a religion in NZ.

[Professor Smarmiarty]

World cup is a gogo. Samoa war dance is viscious. It all about elbowing dudes in the face.

Israel Dagg outtrending Beliebers on twitter. Domination.