Day 15 - Squeaky Clean, USA vs. Australia, Standings, Team Tummy Trouble

This morning after breakfast, we had a meeting to review what Kathy had learned from speaking with the head referee yesterday. We've had difficulty understanding exactly what the refs were finding wrong with our game, since we've been penalized so extensively in our last two matches. There has been a lot of discussion regarding the use of "pillars" or "pinchers" (the people who hang out alongside the breakdown to give added protection to our scrumhalf). Many teams that we've seen have had their pillars in line with the ball (and not the last foot!) and we've done some of that as well. According to the ref, they're going to police the last foot more strictly going forward. They've also called us a lot for not going through the gate in coming into breakdowns and offsides (which is entirely our fault and a question of discipline). We were told to really watch it today and play "squeaky clean", especially because the word was already out that the Americans commit a lot of penalties. We were also told that the ref who officiated our match against Ireland will not be reffing more during this tournament.

We went into this game against Australia knowing that we needed a big win with a lot of points. We played hard and came out with a win (10-6) after some hard hits and aggressive playing. Most notably, our goal-line defense in the second half was heroic (to use Hedwig's words), showing heart and determination. Pam had a great 60m run down the sideline after a great dummy to Laura Cabrera. Overall, it was a great match to watch. I ended up not getting into the game, but had I been a fwd, I probably would have seen some time. As Baja, our replacement flyhalf, was warming up in the 65 min, I asked if she needed any help warming up and she asked "What do I need to know to play flanker"! We had used all of our fwd subs, but they hung in until the very end, especially Jamie who was such a rockstar throughout the entire match. Baja didn't get a chance to go in as flanker, but how crazy would that have been?!...playing a new position for the first time in a World Cup match?

As the final whistle blew we all felt a little deflated because we knew we hadn't scored enough points. It was a bit sad because we had played 3 good games, winning 2 of 3 against strong competitors and we're left feeling upset about it. Of course most of it is because we have high expectations of ourselves and we know what we left on the table. There were several missed opportunities and several handling errors that prevented us from finishing. I know that Kathy was disappointed with some of our decision-making which I thought wasn't too bad, despite perhaps trying to run it out on some occasions where we could have kicked.

In the van on the way back from the fields, we realized how imperfect the structure of the tournament is (in terms of who plays who and the importance of total points scored). During pool play, some teams like Canada had one really tough game (vs. NZ) and then a few blowout games (vs. Spain and Kazakhstan), compared with the US who had to play a really tough game (vs. England), but then also had to play 2 more tough games with top 8 teams (vs. Ireland and Australia). Since the tournament is based on points, a team like Canada could advance farther up in the standings due to who they played in pool play.

At firts I misunderstood Alex's comments on the point system, thinking that it didn't matter how many points we scored but in reality if we had scored more points and accrued a bonus point, we would have been in the top 4. Although the points system does stink, we had full control over whether we would have advanced. (*note, this paragraph was added a few days later as a correction.)

The current standings from the iRB official site:

1. New Zealand
2. England
3. Canada
4. France
5. Scotland
6. USA
7. Australia
8. Ireland
9. Samoa
10. Spain
11. Kazakhstan
12. South Africa

Teams 1-4 play each other, 5-8 play each other, and 9-12. Our next game will be against Australia (again!). If we beat Australia in the next game, we either play Ireland (again!) or Scotland (who we played in our January tour to the UK). The nature of this seeding also means that we're It also means that the highest we can reach is 5th.

After the match, a number of players were feeling queasy and had some stomach problems. Something had been going around and Kathy caught a piece of it yesterday and apparently it's making its way around the team. From being on past tours, it's tough to keep something like that isolated because we're around each other all day in close quarters. Thankfully we have all of tomorrow off to rest and recuperate!!!!!