15. Liam Williams: 7
Seemed almost back on form after a lengthy injury and a brief outing against Uruguay. Superb under the high ball and demonstrated his attacking flair in the second half. Unfortunate to pick up an injury.
14. George North: 5.5
Perhaps still looking a bit rusty and a long way off his best, but nevertheless carried well and seemed to improve as the game went on.
13. Scott Williams: 7
Struggled to impose himself on the game due to the problems up front but defensively sound and produced a wonderful break round the back of Sam Burgess. Another injury worry for Wales.
12. Jamie Roberts: 6
All the build up throughout last week focused on Roberts and his opposite number in Burgess, yet neither seemed to get the ball often enough to cause any real damage. Solid in defence as always.
11. Hallam Amos: 6
As with North, he didn’t really seem to get into the game often enough to leave an impact. Scrambled back to prevent an English try and had a few good moments with ball in hand.
10. Dan Biggar: 9
Announced himself as a truly world class fly-half. Imperious under the high ball and kicked well out of hand too. Eight kicks from eight off the tee including the winning penalty from the half way line. Outstanding.
9. Gareth Davies: 7
Managed the game well enough despite a few errors in his box kicking. Did well to tap and go in the second half and raise the tempo going into the last quarter of the game. Grabbed Wales’s only try too.
1. Gethin Jenkins: 5
Penalised a few too many times and was vulnerable at the scrum as he was outdone by Dan Cole. In his fourth World Cup, he still plays an important part for Wales but will need to improve going into the Fiji game.
2. Scott Baldwin: 6
A 50/50 performance at the lineout for Baldwin as the set piece suffered and his usual accuracy went amiss. Part of a front row which struggled in the scrum.
3. Tomas Francis: 5
The front row issues seemed to stem from Francis’s side of the scrum with the experience of Joe Marler proving key against the Exeter man.
4. Bradley Davies: 7
Powerful performance as he more than justified his inclusion in the starting XV ahead of Luke Charteris. Struggled after taking a knock and was replaced early in the second half.
5. Alun Wyn-Jones: 6
Not necessarily a classic performance from the big man as he struggled in the lineout, but still seemed impressive and turned out a solid display.
6. Dan Lydiate: 7
In a game where the Welsh forwards came off second best, Lydiate had a typically bruising outing with his trademark chop tackles cutting down the English line.
7. Sam Warburton: 6.5
Couldn’t seem to have any influence at the breakdown as we have come to expect from the captain, but still put in a decent shift.
8. Taulupe Faletau: 8
Did well to gather the ball back from restarts often, as well as some great carries in the later stages of the game. Rarely has a bad game and did not disappoint.
Replacements: 7
Ken Owens seemed to improve the wobbly lineout and should now be a starter for the Fiji game. Samson Lee and Aaron Jarvis steadied the scrum which was taking a beating. Luke Charteris was his usual gigantic self, whilst Justin Tipuric didn’t quite have the opportunity to demonstrate his form. Lloyd Williams did well out of position on the wing with his cross field kick setting up Wales’s late try. Rhys Priestland covered well at full-back for the injured Liam Williams, and Alex Cuthbert looked physical but barely had an influence on the game.
By Jack Hoare (@jackhoare)
Photo by: Patrick Khachfe / Onside Images
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Not sure you could say Welsh forwards came off second best they farced plenty of penalties at the breakdown
“6. Dan Lydiate: 7
In a game where the Welsh forwards came off second best”
I’ll be honest (and ok I’m English but) I take a point of each player score. It isn’t sour grapes to say Wales didn’t so much win this game as England lose it through indiscipline, poor captaincy (not the line out desicion, England should never have been in that position) and the unbelievable desicion to completely screw up the defence by taking Burgess off. Wales did well to stay in contact (snd Biggar was immense as was Farrell, the two best fly half performances of world cup so far) and England panicked. The fault lies at Robshaw for that. Against a quality team neither team will do well.
Firstly, well played Wales. You don’t win a test match by accident so fair play to them.
Reading through this I’m finding it difficult to disagree with the scores despite them being fairly low considering the result.
Wales were brilliant in the last 20 minutes, but fairly abject before that. Biggar was absolutely brilliant, Scott Williams was good I thought too.
Surprised at the clamour around Faletau’s performance. He did a great job at running kick backs but I thought he was poor in some areas. So often he tried to carry around the fringes and went backwards, halting any momentum Wales were gathering. Ignoring returning kicks did he actually make any yards?
I’m afraid it is sour grapes to keep banging this drum that England lost this game. The facts are that it was a very tightly fought contest. One defensive error in the first half let’s England in. Penalties are traded – England forcing them in the set piece, Wales forcing them at the breakdown (it is ludicrous above to say that Sam was ineffectual at the breakdown, it is one eyed in the extreme to imply that England’s breakdown penalties were simply due to their mistakes rather than Welsh pressure). So at half time we had a sort of 1-0 situation, both teams well matched – stats were pretty much 50/50 for posession, territory, etc. By the end of the match posession was 50/50, territory almost so, Wales had more gainline advantage, England more clean breaks, Wales more defenders beaten, England more missed tackles but all of these were within 5% of 50/50.
In the 2nd half Wales’ superior fitness and superior calibre of player (both mentally and in key positions) won out and we squeezed past England. In all the talk of decision making, etc. sometimes a key point is missed out – you make poor decisions when you are knackered. Wales were less knackered than England because they were fitter. We expected this and played to it. We forced penalties to keep us in touch and eventually worked the awful Brad Barrit (our centres were better than England’s) into the inevitable misstep in defence (not the first time in the game we out thought and out played him) from which we scored the try. So now it’s 1-1 and it comes down to better composure in the last 15 – again, we were superior.
When Wales continually lost matches to Aus in the dying minutes I heard loads about mental toughness, inability to see games out, a lack of quality compared to the teams who are able to do this. Well now then we have that quality and that made us the better team on the pitch on the night.
I will try and make that my last statement on this as I know it will mostly fall on deaf ears. Some Eng fans want to believe they threw it away – I’ve even heard the old “the best team lost” nonsense on this blog. Even some of the praise for Wales is in the “credit to Wales but..” format. Personally I hope when we play them next they’ll still just think it was a game they threw away. Keep under estimating us, please.
Your quite right it is sour grapes to say we lost it- you can only beat what’s in front of you.
However, it is arrogance on a level people like to say belongs to the English to say that your superior players won it.
Fair play, you won, but it was a game heartbeats from a draw or English victory. How then can your players be superior.
It was an equal contest against to well matched teams.
Sorry, it just bugs me when everyone accuses us of arrogance when everyone is susceptible to it- it’s a fans prerogative after all.
Get the chip off your shoulder. The arrogance is a tired old trope so to bring it into this is irrelevant. Our players, when it mattered most (getting the most points on the board) executed better. They made better decisions, they scored more points. They were better. They were superior on that night. That’s why they won. There is no difference between being 1 pt better and 50 pts better when just saying it as a simple measure. I’m not saying we were miles better, I’m saying that the scoreboard at the end reflected our superiority – marginal superiority if there is a need to quantify it. England didn’t get a draw because they decided not to try for one (see my comments on composure and fitness as to how I think this relates to on the night superiority). They fluffed both lineouts (the call to the front is pilloried but in the lineout 3 mins prior they lost the ball when they threw it to the middle – Charteris was snaffling their ball so maybe it wasn’t such a crazy lineout – not every throw to the front ends up with someone bundled into touch) – the 2nd fluff was Wigglesworth dropping the ball. Again, a lack of composure in a critical moment.
I’m sure this won’t change your mind one jot though. It’s arrogant for us to claim we were the superior team in a match we won (but not arrogant in the least for the losing side to claim they were not inferior). Please do let me know the criteria, when you have it, for being able to be happy that a winning team was also the better of the two teams.
can we just leave the name calling out of it
“sour grapes”, “arrogance”, “chip on shoulder” etc.. it is uneccessary
Theres no need for it Wales won therefore were the better team but the game was incredibly close and could have gone either way so yes England lost this game through poor decision making as equally as Wales won it through tenacity, commitment and mental fortitude.
England do seem to have the same mental fragility that Wales have been acused of in the past and there are several instances of us being the nearly men under Lancaster and Robshaw. 3 Six nations in a row lost on points difference and some bad losses to SA when we should have done better
Wales on the other hand seem to have come out the other side beating south africa in the Autumn irlenad in the 6N and showed really good mental fortitude to pick up their game in the last 10 minutes England on Saturday
As for that score and comment for Sam, I’ll pick any one of the effusive bits of praise he has received elsewhere for some balance – here for example is Steve James picking him in his team of the week – “7 Sam Warburton (Wales)
It is quite remarkable that so many observers, and some of them are very knowledgeable rugby folk, still do not ‘get’ Warburton’s influence upon matches. Towering performance against England.”
If Dan Biggar scores only a 9 I am looking forward to watching a game where there is a 9.5 or a 10. Especially when taken in the context of a critical world cup game at twickenham, degree of difficulty of final kick and the match situation. Surely a 10. (and I am Australian)
Surely a 10 for Biggar. Can’t think of anything he did wrong. And I am English
Hear hear. Faultless with the boot – in pens and field kicks. Try saving tackle on Robshaw (then followed by a comedy brainfart schoolboy throw to nowhere from Robshaw – since when does a backrow forward not have a clue how recycling works?). Majestic under the high ball again, Cajoled his own team over the line. Called the final play that wound the clock down. Made the world forget the name “Halfpenny” for the night. Welsh records for pts against Eng, points at Twickenham, pts in a world cup match. It’s a 10 of a performance,
Can I also add that we won that match with Rhys Priestland at 10. He was the 10 in pos (he and Biggar moved around a bit) for the move that led to the try. Great to see him getting some much needed confidence boost, especially as we will need him going forward.
Ah but it was Biggar’s excellent pass to Roberts that set the move going wasn’t it?
His ability under the high ball is amazing – reminds me of some of the incredible catches Lee Byrne used to take.
If he backs this performance up with a few similar ones, he’s going to be vying for the position of best full back in the world. I’d take him over Sexton already
I agree with you Brighty that Warburton should be higher – but for his leadership, which was immense, rather than his play – I thought he was well marshalled by the English forwards
Yes Brighty I saw that bit of play from Robshaw.
He just does dull things at the wrong time and in the wrong place.
Meanwhile the reverse camer angle shows that SW won that final penalty fair and square.
Charteris was immense in that maul, straight in on the jumper as soon as he hit the ground.
We must go with Charteris as 1st choice for Fiji and Aus
You should definitely play Charteris. Davies is solid but Charteris is evolving into a top-notch lock
Some of these make me feel I was watching a different game, which would be awkward since I was in the stadium.
Scott Williams I would give an 8, I think he was easily the best center on the field.
Bradley Davies looked poor to me, I would definitely go with Charteris moving forward. AWJ also looked a lot better to me than you’ve said, I thought he had a very good game.
I’ve no idea how anyone could claim Warburton had no influence, we dominated the breakdown and he was there time and time again bossing it! Just because he’s not getting a turnover at every ruck doesn’t mean he’s having no impact. He was an amazing leader when we needed him most, he kept his cool and lead from the front.
> with the experience of Joe Marler proving key
Are we going with that now? We’re ignoring the fact he was scrummaging sideways the entire game, and should have been penalised 5-6 times over?
England beat us in the set pieces but if you remove Marler’s illegal scrummaging I think it would have been a lot closer, so I don’t think it’s fair to say our pack struggled. We dominated the breakdown, and when we struggled in the set pieces we changed the flow of the game to suit us.
It’s disrespectful to say England lost the game rather than Wales winning it. We started off slowly, adapted, and persevered when the odds were against us.
Two points here –
1. most of the penalites were I believe on Jenkins’ side of the scrum because he kept on collapsing against Cole
2. What you call Marler scrummaging sideways, seemed to me a direct result of Francis boring in on Youngs and targeting the bind between him and Marler – a decent (buit illegal) tactic since Marler seems to have issues scrummaging with Youngs. Francis’s hips in the overhead shot I’ve seen were pointed out of the scrum, as were his lock’s. If the tighthead bores in on the hooker, the loosehead has no choice if he wantes to counter it other than to follow him in and try to get beneath him
I’m not sure Francis’ boring in was causing Marler to bore in. Sure, there were a couple of scrums where Francis didn’t push straight, but Marler never did – he did exactly the same against Fiji and got away with it then, too.
It’s to his disadvantage though, his back side gets so far away from the hooker that he’s getting next to no help from his second row.
I agree with the comments on Warburton (who shouldn’t have been penalised right at the end). He was just being an almighty nuisance at every breakdown, even if he wasn’t winning turn overs or making yards.
And as to the comments about Wales only winning because of better decision making: it’s a perfectly valid reason for winning!
Interesting Aussie view of the “cheating” English scrum here….
http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/?p=87053
I see they’re getting their scrum whines in early.
Nigel explains Player Ratings…
pic.twitter.com/iYQ2cE6wRx