Partly because Ireland draws on players from North and South of the border for the RU team so it represents a percentage of the UK population so is not a foreign team.

I watched most of that game (was interested in SBW playing as well as the other League converts)

What strikes me most about Union is how the rules stifle the best teams and bring the teams much closer – the All Blacks were so superior to the English team it was untrue and yet the score line ended up pretty close. As far as I can see that is because the rules at the breakdown make it very difficult to develop structured attacking plays

What I would say is that if those two teams were playing League, the All Blacks would have won by 50+... Union must be such a frustrating game to play if you are a talented rugby player

Britain does not include Ireland.

Ireland's RU team includes Northern Ireland
Britain includes Northern Ireland, it's quite a well known issue. There has been considerable discussion over the years.

Hope this helps.

No, Britain doesn't include Northern Ireland. The United Kingdom includes Northern Ireland.
Which discussions were you following?

It would help, but only if it was factual.

Great Britain is England, Scotland and Wales

There are some sporting teams (athletics springs to mind) which compete as Great Britain & Northern Ireland, often shortened to GB for the sake of brevity.

The UK is the United Kingdom of Great Britan and Northern Ireland.

And there is an International Rugby Team that represents both Northern and Southern Ireland. As you have so correctly identified Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom, therefore showing Ireland's Rugby Union internationals on UK television is not showing a foreign team.

Having watched the second half at work, how frustrating must it be for Hape and Ashton to see how slowly the ball is distributed out towards the wings. I should stop watching matches with League eyes really.

How would that be ?



Not sure which game you were watching, NZ started the game far better and were the more prescise team thoughout. They profited by poor England defence in the first half.



The first 30 minutes England had trouble getting their hands on the ball and NZ were successful at generating quick ball. This contradicts what you stated above. The current law interpretations actually favour the attacking team.



Now I am pretty sure you did not watch the game. England one more ball in the opposition 22 than NZ did, the last 20 minutes England were in the ascendancy. Having said that NZ were the better team and deserved to in what ended up being a very close game. As for the comment about talented players being frustrated, Jason Robinson stated on more than one occasion RU gave him more opportunity to expression than he found in RL, arguably he was the most exciting back to emerge outside the NRL.

Care factor not high other than to say Robinson would have said anything they, union, paid him to.

Because Ireland play as one and Represent Ulster.

I see the Union calculator was out on Saturday. My weekend paper reported that 70,000 were at Wales v Aus.