Ashton breaks Scottish hearts
1 Oct 2011
Chris Ashton scored a late try to give England a 16-12 win against Scotland in Auckland.
With three minutes remaining, England put a kickable penalty into touch and won the lineout. Their forwards set up the driving maul, before the ball was sent wide to replacement flyhalf Toby Flood, whose perfectly-timed double-skip pass put Ashton over in the right-hand corner.
It was a heart-breaking moment for the Scots, who had needed to win this game by eight points or more and deny England a bonus point in order to leapfrog their arch-rivals on the Pool C log. They now need Georgia to upset Argentina on Sunday, which is unlikely.
There may have only been one try, but this was a gripping encounter.
Scotland suffered an early setback when flyhalf Ruaridh Jackson limped off with a hamstring injury, but it proved to be a blessing. The kicking game of his replacement, Dan Parks, was ideal for the wet and windy conditions and he controlled the game well.
It was Parks who kicked a long-range penalty into the wind to give Scotland a 6-0 lead, following an earlier strike from Chris Paterson.
Jonny Wilkinson came into this match with a 50% goal-kicking success rate in the tournament and missed his first three penalty attempts. He finally found the target with his fourth, but a Parks drop goal gave Scotland a 9-3 lead at the break.
The Scots dominated the set pieces in the first half, winning four scrums against the feed (with Euan Murray embarrassing Matt Stevens) and stealing three opposition lineout throws. They also didn’t miss a single tackle in 40 minutes, while England slipped six.
When the second half kicked off, the wind had dropped and the rain had stopped. England played with a lot more urgency and their pack regained some confidence when they won a tighthead with a solid hit.
The Scots, though, briefly regained the ascendancy and almost scored when left wing Simon Danielli kicked into the England 22. Fullback Ben Foden knocked the ball back and Scotland replacement Nick de Luca failed to collect it with the tryline in sight.
Scotland then won yet another scrum penalty, which Paterson kicked to make it 12-3, but they crucially failed to deal with the restart and Wilkinson slotted a drop goal with his right foot (having missed one with his left from in front earlier in the half).
The England flyhalf added a penalty at the start of the final quarter to reduce the deficit to three, but his following attempt fell short.
It didn’t matter, though, as Ashton’s try snatched the win and set up an England-France quarter-final.
By Simon Borchardt
340 Comments
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1 Oct 2011, 11:45 am
@cane(cane)-178: They’re simple folk. They felt at home
1 Oct 2011, 11:46 am
Tier 1 – SA, NZ, AUS
Tier 2 – FRA, ENG
Tier 3 – WAL, IRE, SCO, ARG
Tier 4 – SAM, TON, FIJ, ITA
Tier 5 – the rest of the teams at the RWC
That’s a more realistic indication of the teams’ strength. On any particular day, you could reasonably expect a team from one tier below to upset a team in the tier above.
1 Oct 2011, 11:47 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-197:
yes, but a lot of those wins against us came in the ‘time of troubles’ for the boks.
1 Oct 2011, 11:48 am
@cane(cane)-178:
speaking of fabulous tourists have you been fishing with bakkies yet?
1 Oct 2011, 11:48 am
@Tartan(Tartan)-200: Actually, I can’t think of one RWC where we have struggled to make the quarters… not even in 2003 when we were clearly the 2nd best team in the pool.
1 Oct 2011, 11:48 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-202:
France occupy their own tier.
One that could be any of those, or even “tier 6″ depending on what day of the week it is, if it’s raining, what phase the moon is in, or what I ate for breakfast.
1 Oct 2011, 11:49 am
My congrats did not include the blogger Big Shite who has always been too much of a bigoted racist moron to congratulate the All Blacks after any victory that I have been online for.
1 Oct 2011, 11:49 am
@reechie maak so lank die pan warm, bakkies bring die wors…(i_love_u_bakkiesbotha)-203: the record books don’t have an asterisk or footnote for “time of troubles”.
It just says it like it is.
1 Oct 2011, 11:51 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-202:
How are England a tier above Ireland, Wales and Argentina?
1 Oct 2011, 11:51 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-202: why did Tonga a t4 team just moer a t2 team, not natural at all.
1 Oct 2011, 11:52 am
Oh dear, this chap hasn’t made too many friends…
The Samoan player who compared the World Cup to “slavery” was at the centre of another row on Saturday when he accused a referee of being racist and biased in an expletive-filled Twitter rant.
Centre Eliota Sapolu Fuimaono took to the micro-messaging site with an angry tirade against Welsh referee Nigel Owens and the International Rugby Board (IRB) after Samoa’s 13-5 loss to South Africa, which ended their quarter-final hopes.
Owens’ Facebook page was also defaced by irate and offensive messages among more than 300 comments posted by members of the public after the game.
Sapolu Fuimaono, who mentioned that he was drinking and appeared to announce his international retirement, claimed Samoa was the victim of a conspiracy and directed fire at Owens after several other contributors criticised the referee.
“I can understand the hate!! Haha good luck u racist biased prick,” tweeted the 30-year-old Sapolu Fuimaono, who plays for English club Gloucester.
“Get s.a into next round. The plan was obvious. Can’t wait 2 meet irb members in public,” he added.
The comments come after Sapolu Fuimaono was forced to apologise for comparing the World Cup to “slavery”, “apartheid” and even the “holocaust” after Samoa had only a few days to prepare for their key game against Wales, which they lost.
1 Oct 2011, 11:52 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-202:
Tier one: New Zeeland
Tier two: Australia, South Africa, England
Tier 3: Wales, Ireland, Scotland, Argentinia
France is the floating team.
1 Oct 2011, 11:53 am
Australia Russia highlights. That russian scrummie is barely taller than keo.
1 Oct 2011, 11:53 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-202:
Not convinced that Scotland are a tier above Samoa either
1 Oct 2011, 11:54 am
@chch(chch)-209:
They are consistently above them on the official IRB ratings
1 Oct 2011, 11:54 am
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-205:
2003 and 2007 were exactly the same formula – throw the match against the strongest team (France/NZ) and concentrate on the last match. We were lucky to win both games in all honesty.
1 Oct 2011, 11:55 am
@chch(chch)-209: because ENG beat them more often than not, yet any of those teams beating ENG is not unexpected. Also because ENG and FRA turnover the tier 1 teams more than anyone else.
@RL(RL)-210: did anyone expect TON to beat FRA? No. That’s why a tier 4 beating a tier 2 is completely unexpected. But you wouldn’t be too surprised if TON, FIJI or SAM beat WAL for example, one tier above them.
1 Oct 2011, 11:58 am
@Robzim(Robzim)-212:
France are tier 5?
1 Oct 2011, 11:58 am
Well done Poms, condolences Jockbok, your guys did not have enough haggis for breakfast.
1 Oct 2011, 11:58 am
France can be any tier they want.
1 Oct 2011, 12:00 pm
@>^..^< katman(katman)-213:
he is a babushka doll that escaped from the rest of the set.
1 Oct 2011, 12:00 pm
@chch(chch)-214: there are a few close calls. Scotland is one of them. They did beat SA last year, and Eng recently, whereas Sam haven’t.
But in reality Scotland are probably in their own tier with Italy and possibly Samoa.
1 Oct 2011, 12:01 pm
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-217:
So given that post apartheid NZ 33 wins SA 15 wins why are SA on the same tier as NZ ?
1 Oct 2011, 12:01 pm
@Tartan(Tartan)-206:
you forgot ‘how the boulangerie owner’s croissants came out of the oven that morning..was it overdone or under?..and was the coffer just right….’ hehehe
bet there’s a few more…
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-208:
yes sure, but the record books do show:
sa 36 – eng 0
sa 15 – eng 6
at the 2007 wc…
1 Oct 2011, 12:03 pm
@Robzim(Robzim)-212:
Indeed they are almost impossible to flush.
1 Oct 2011, 12:03 pm
@chch(chch)-223: because SA beating NZ is never a surprise. However, if you would like your own tier 1 status, feel free to claim it, NZ over the past 15 years are probably entitled to it as Robzim pointed out earlier.
1 Oct 2011, 12:05 pm
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-226:
hehe, happy to share tier 1
1 Oct 2011, 12:06 pm
Interesting how Samoans “bring the Boks down to earth” but England get a different headline.
1 Oct 2011, 12:07 pm
It is interesting though that in big competitions you would put your money on a Samoa, Tonga or Fiji upset rather than Italy. But you would think that Italy were the better side.
1 Oct 2011, 12:07 pm
@chch(chch)-229: we’ll be hoping for an Italy upset tomorrow!
1 Oct 2011, 12:08 pm
One thing this match has shown is that England’s set pieces are really misfiring. They reverted to “type” in this game for 60min and nearly lost it as a result.
1 Oct 2011, 12:11 pm
Shall we put some percentages on the quarter finals:
Ireland vs Wales – 60% Ireland win
England vs France – 63% England win
South Africa vs Australia – 54% Australia win
New Zealand vs Argentina – 90% New Zealand
Despite GHs best efforts in playing 2 games at once the ABs have never lost to Argentina
1 Oct 2011, 12:12 pm
Bugger, Kitchener won his beat. He’ll be unbearable now
1 Oct 2011, 12:13 pm
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-230:
Which will just make it easy for Wales. But ok, for the underdog
1 Oct 2011, 12:15 pm
@chch(chch)-232:
Ireland vs Wales – 50% Ireland win
England vs France – 60% England win
South Africa vs Australia – 50% Australia win
New Zealand vs Argentina – 99% New Zealand
1 Oct 2011, 12:16 pm
The way the RWC is going things could come down to who has most of their “best” 22 actually able to play in the QF/SF.
1 Oct 2011, 12:17 pm
@chch(chch)-234: no it will make it difficult for Wales – quarter against Aus.
Easier for SA – quarter against Italy.
1 Oct 2011, 12:20 pm
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-237:
It’d also give us all the delightful vision of Jamie Roberts running at, through and over Quade Cooper.
1 Oct 2011, 12:25 pm
@wooden spoon(wooden spoon)-237:
Sorry, I forgot that Aus would come 2nd.
ok, backing Italy
1 Oct 2011, 12:28 pm
Sod the congratulations malarkey.
Eng didn’t deserve to win.
1 Oct 2011, 12:29 pm
No fecking more miss nice girl
1 Oct 2011, 12:30 pm
Well then, still as before, South Africa (although without FS in the backs I doubt it), Australia and New Zealand winners please.
Any of the trio but please not a NH team. I couldn’t handle it. Chances are, quarters and semis will see SH teams beat each other up properly.
1 Oct 2011, 12:31 pm
@Dawn(Dawn)-240: England should have been disqualified for cheating.
1 Oct 2011, 12:32 pm
Lol, MacDawn.
1 Oct 2011, 12:33 pm
Now I’m in a murderous mood
1 Oct 2011, 12:34 pm
@goyougoodthing2(goyougoodthing2)-243:
at the least a citing for the head high shoulder charge.
1 Oct 2011, 12:36 pm
Kirchener replacing Steyn, wha ha ha ha ha ha what a joke.
1 Oct 2011, 12:39 pm
@goyougoodthing2(goyougoodthing2)-247: oh dear what’s the point in that?
1 Oct 2011, 12:42 pm
Just for the record.
Tier 1 are the countries that have a seat on the IRB board and have a full vote.
It has nothing to do with on field ability or performance.
Heres a question! Do you know what the voting rights are for the respective teams who fronted RWC11?
1 Oct 2011, 12:49 pm
@Brads(Brads)-249: Why does this matter?
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