The USA Eagles won a hard fought battle against Russia to improve to 1-1 on the tournament. The performance was pretty solid all around and USA appeared to be in control for most of the match. This win isn’t exactly going to boost USA to the top of the world rankings. Russia is playing in their first world cup and is ranked last. The big win boosts USA’s all time record to 3-17. But a win is a win, and hopefully they can grab another before the end of the tournament. Their next game is against Australia on Friday, then Italy September 27th. The Aussies are one of the top teams in the world and will be a huge favorite against USA. Italy is ranked in the middle of the pack for the world cup, and is likely USA’s best chance to pull off an upset.
There was no upset in Hamilton last night as New Zealand took on Japan. We got to attend the sold out match of 30,000, and caught plenty of scoring activity. Pretty much all of the scoring came from New Zealand with the game in little doubt from the start. Final score 83-7. New Zealand didn’t even have their top players on the field, as they claimed there were a few injuries from the first game. Dana spotted a handful of All Blacks sitting 5 rows behind us at halftime. She snapped a photo of Richie McCaw. He’s the captain and is coming up on his 100th match for New Zealand. That could be Sir Richie McCaw in not too long, the speculation is that he’ll get knighted if the All Blacks in the tournament. Yes…..rugby is big here.
The highlight of the game was Japan’s lone score that came in the second half with the outcome clearly decided. The All Blacks were passing the ball around confidently and moving steadily down the field, when a Japanese player cleanly picked off one of their passes and took it all the way back for a try (try is the name for a score). It looked like the equivalent of an interception turned into touchdown in football. The stadium erupted in the loudest cheers of the night. Not only were the Japan fans going bonkers celebrating that they scored on the mighty All Blacks, but the New Zealand fans were going equally as crazy. The only people in the entire stadium not cheering were the All Black stars sitting behind us.
This picture from Sports Illustrated pretty much sums up the passion New Zealand has for the Rugby World Cup. Even the sheeps have their favorites....
http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/multimedia/photo_gallery/1109/did-you-see-that-0916/content.3.html
Dude, that's like having Babe Ruth sitting behind you. He's the greatest of all time. Very cool. I got up at 4am to watch that game but went back to bed at halftime when it was like 40-0 :-)
ReplyDeleteCheers,
Jerry
It's a small country, we'll see him again. How do you want the autograph to read: 'To Jerry'?
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