For Ruck's Sake

We discuss New Zealand's dominance over Argentina and the incredibly tense battle between England and South Africa in the two semi finals. We look at the key selection masterstrokes or mistakes by Rassie and Borthwick, why Ben O'Keefe was the wrong appointment by World Rugby and how England lost after such a strong performance. We also do a deep dive into the technicalities of the decisive scrum and why the penalty was given against England as well as chat about how scrums fit into the modern game in general. We preview the final and predict who will win a record breaking fourth Rugby World Cup

We discuss what was arguably the best ever weekend of international rugby with Argentina, New Zealand, England and South Africa making it through to the semi finals. We analyse how those teams won and what the match ups are going to be like in the semis. We answer all the big questions like: Where can Ireland go from here? Why was New Zealand's defence able to shut Ireland down? Did France only lose because of poor refereeing? How will South Africa exploit England's weaknesses?

We look ahead to the Rugby World Cup quarter finals and discuss how each team got there. We chat about most of the highly debated topics from the week such as: Would Scotland have qualified if they were in a different pool? Do England have to drop one of Ford or Faz? Is it too early to rush back Dupont? Can the All Blacks stop Ireland?

We discuss all the matches from the third round of the World Cup including the epic Ireland v South Africa, Wales essentially knocking Australia out to qualify themselves and England's win over Chile. We look at the biggest talking points of the week such as did South Africa's 7-1 split backfire? Is Eddie Jones going to get sacked? Will Marcus Smith continue to play at 15? What can World Rugby do to help the Tier 2 nations be more competitive?

We discuss all the action from week two of the Rugby World Cup. We look Uruguay testing France and Portugal testing Wales and analyse how South American and European rugby has improved. We also chat about England's second win, Fiji getting a much deserved win and what's going wrong with Australia.

The Rugby World Cup has finally kicked off so we're here to discuss all the matches of week one. We look at the much anticipated opener between France and New Zealand, George Ford's dropkicking masterclass against Argentina and the epic but controversial Wales v Fiji. We discuss the key talking points from the weekend like if Wales should have had more yellow cards and if Farrell can get back in the England team. 

We look at England's loss to Fiji and discuss if England are in danger of not getting out of the pool. We chat about South Africa's record breaking win against New Zealand and if New Zealand should now be worried? We also give our World Cup predictions so listen to hear us debate who we think will be the top try-scorer, player of the tournament, breakthrough player and which team will cause the biggest upset. 

We preview how all of the big teams will do this World Cup. Will Scotland get out of their pool? Are Wales a dark horse? How will France do without Ntamack? We also discuss if England have shown any progression or not and why Faz's hearing has made a mockery of the sport.

We're back for a fourth season to start previewing the Rugby World Cup. We go through England's squad discussing the big calls Borthwick made and who we think is the best XV. Do we need three flyhalfs? Should Slade have been dropped? Are we worried about players not having much gametime? Who do we think is the most important player in the squad?

We discuss the epic Champions Cup final between La Rochelle and Leinster, where it was won and lost, if La Rochelle are the most physical team ever and if Leinster underperform. We also look at Toulon's Challenge Cup win over Glasgow and look ahead to the Premiership final. Will is conflicted but has to make a decision whether to support Saracens or Sale.

We look at the now confirmed Premiership top four and discuss how they got there and preview the Champions Cup semi finals.  Is it fair that Leinster are playing in the Aviva? Will La Rochelle be too powerful for Exeter? Will Thomas Ramos do something crazy and would a team of 15 Dupont's be better or worse than the Toulouse team? 

We're back and looking at an eventful weekend of the Premiership. We celebrate Chris Ashton's 100 tries and do a quiz of Premiership top tryscorers. We also discuss the controversial Olly Woodburn red card, why players are leaving Exeter and the race for the top four. 

We give our review of the 2023 Six Nations and discuss what we learnt about each team. We also chat about the red card issues and give out team of the tournament and player of the tournament. 

We discuss a crazy penultimate round of the Six Nations. We try and work out what went wrong for England against France, if Wales were lucky to win in Rome and Ireland's ability to handle adversity. We also look ahead to Super Saturday and discuss who has a bigger chance of an upset: England against Ireland or Wales against France.

We chat about all the  controversy leading up to the Six Nations third round with Wales in disarray and threatening to go on strike. We discuss all the drama in the matches with the two red cards and almost an epic comeback in Scotland France as well as Farrell's kicking and Italy competing against Ireland. We also look ahead to the fourth round and predict Wales to have a tough day in Rome.

We discuss an epic second round of the Six Nations. How did Ireland beat France in a potential decider and is France in trouble? How did Scotland back up their round one win for the first time ever and are England showing signs of improvement?

We look at all three fixtures of the opening round of the Six Nations. We discuss the big calls that Borthwick and Gatland will have to do make to get England and Wales back on track,  how Scotland and Italy can build on their promising starts and why Ireland are so brilliant. We look ahead to round two and the potential decider between Ireland and France.

We're joined by Gethin Bennett to help give a Welsh perspective on our Six Nations preview. We discuss how much on an impact Gatland and Borthwick will be able to have, who we think will win overall, potential breakthrough players and give predictions for the tournament.

We discuss the controversial new ruling imposed by the RFU to tackle below the waist and how we think it will affect community rugby. We also look at the England Six Nations squad and what we make of Eddie Jones' appointment as the head coach of Australia.

We give some final thoughts on Eddie Jones leaving and discuss how we think Steve Borthwick will change the England team. We talk about the competitiveness of the Premiership, Bath's rebuild and why players are leaving Exeter. We also give our thoughts on Joe Marler's latest scandal and if the RFU have taken a strong enough stance on it.

We've got some massive news to discuss with Wayne Pivac getting sacked and the return of Warren Gatland. Is Gatland risking his legacy by coming back? Can he solve the wider issues of welsh rugby? Was he the correct choice over Scott Razor Robertson? We also discuss Eddie Jones' review and whether he should go or not.

We discuss the Twickenham rematch between England and New Zealand. Is it all doom and gloom for England? Does the last 10 minutes give us hope? Should Smith have kicked it out or played on? We chat about what's going wrong with Wales, if Pivac needs to go and how Portugal have made it into the World Cup.

At the halfway point of the Autumn Nations Series we discuss the form of all of the teams so far.  We look at why Scotland failed to beat the All Blacks, how Ireland play without Sexton and is England's Smith - Farrell axis working? We also chat about the player/breakthrough/coach of the year nominations.

We discuss Wasps following Worcester into administration and the Championship and what can be done to save the Premiership. We also look at the Premiership table, the Red Roses making it to the RWC QFs and look ahead to the Autumn Internationals.   

We discuss the opening weekend of the Women's World Cup with the Red Roses getting a huge 84-19 win over Fiji. We chat about the turmoil in the Premiership with Worcester being relegated and a terrible statement from the owners as well as Wasps heading the same way. We also discuss Sale's form and Saracens' evolution from a kicking to an attacking team. Listen to find out which current player Will thinks is the best ever Premiership signing.

We discuss the unfortunate news of Worcester going into administration and the measures taken by Premiership Rugby of banning them from the league. We also go through Eddie Jones' latest England squad for a training camp this weekend and chat about who might stake a claim for the November Internationals squad.

We're back after a summer break to look ahead to the 2022/23 season. We chat about the ongoing saga at Worcester Warriors and the wider point of what changes could be made to make rugby more commercially viable. We discuss all the big signings for the Premiership and preview how we think each team will do this season. 

In our last episode of the season we review and discuss how each of the teams fared on their summer tours. Which team gained the most and who should be worried? We also give our team of the summer with some positions hotly debated over - Courtney Lawes or Peter O'Mahony at 6? Listen to find out. 

We discuss the total reversal of results and a Northern Hemisphere whitewash in the second round of the summer tests. How were England so dominant in the first half, why was the NZ v Ireland officiating so shocking and how did Ireland and Wales make history?

We're back after a short break to discuss all the matches of the first week of the summer tours. We look at what went wrong for England against Australia, for Ireland against New Zealand and how Wales outperformed all of our expectations. We also chat about what changes we'd make before the second week of fixtures.

We discuss how the Premiership semi finals were won and lost and preview the final including all of the key head to heads. Who will come out on top of the duel of the England 10s and which 8 will win the battle of physicality between Vunipola and Wiese? We also talk about the England squad with Danny Care's recall and how they'll fare against a Fabian Galthie coached french development squad disguised as the Barbarians. 

We chat about the epic La Rochelle Heineken Cup win and review where they've come from, how they got there and how they beat a 5th-star-seeking Leinster in the final. We discuss the coaching career of Ronan O'Gara and what we think he'll do next. We also preview the Premiership semi finals and the huge player match ups in them. 

We look back at the Heineken Champions and Challenge Cup semi finals and preview the finals. We discuss how competitive English clubs will be able to be in the coming years with a decreasing salary cap and we also chat about the next few World Cup selections and Rugby Australia's plan to convert league players.

We look back over the Champions and Challenge Cup quarter finals and analyse where the games were won and lost, including the dramatic penalty shootout. We chat about the best was to resolve a drawn game - penalties, golden point or a run it straight challenge. We also preview the semi finals and discuss who we think will be making it to the final.

We catch up on the Premiership action and look forward to fight for the playoffs and do a preview of the Heineken Cup quarter finals. Listed to find out who we think will come out on top of the massive  Leicester v Leinster match and why Will thinks Sale will win the competition 

We're joined by Italy and Benetton scrum half Callum Braley to look back over some of the highs of his international career including Italy's epic Six Nations win in Cardiff.  We also chat about the growth of rugby in Italy, the development of the national team and Callum's decision to retire from international rugby and move back the Premiership.  Listen to find out which of his former teammates used to be a wrestler and how difficult the Gloucester Milk Challenge really is! 

We discuss the RFU's statement, why they did it, what they mean and which coaches it hints at. We also look into Bristol's potential salary cap breach, review the past few weeks of the Premiership and look ahead to the play offs.

We're joined by our Welsh correspondent Stephen Babos to review the final week of the Six Nations and give our team of the tournament. We discuss Italy's epic win over Wales, if Wales didn't take it seriously and just treated it as AWJ's testimonial and what we make of the RFU's statement claiming England have made progress. 

We review round 4 of the Six Nations and look ahead to Super Saturday. We chat about whether an orange card should be brought in to stop games being ruined,  if France have got over any perceived issues of playing away in a hostile environment and if England can do anything to stop them winning the grandslam

We discuss all the drama from round 3 of Six Nations. The dogfight between England and Wales, France's brilliance at Murrayfield and the non-event of Ireland against a 13 man Italy. Do England still not have an attack? Do France have any weaknesses and should the contested scrums law be changed? We also look ahead to round 4 and England's "semi-final" against Ireland.

We discuss everything from round 2 of the Six Nations. The dominant forward display from France and if the result would have been different with Sexton playing, Scotland's inability to back up a win and what we made of England's new players.

Our favourite time of the year is finally here and we're back to discuss all of the drama and results from the first weekend. We chat about Scotland's record breaking back to back Calcutta Cup victory, if Eddie Jones' decision to sub off Marcus Smith was correct, how great the Irish frontrow is and if there are systemic issues in Welsh rugby. 

We're joined by Wasps and England backrower Brad Shields to discuss Wasps' recent form, his experiences growing up playing in New Zealand then moving over to England, what it was like to face the All Blacks and his drinks company - Social hard seltzers. We also do the teammates wikipedia quiz and some 'best and worst' quick-fire questions so listen to find out who in the Wasps squad is the best drinker, who has the worst rig and why Conrad Smith's nickname is 'Snakey'. 

We're back after a short break to catch up on all the results and changes in the Premiership. We discuss the player transfers, the changing salary cap and the investigation into Leicester's image rights scandal.  We also chat about the Premiership and Heineken Cup results and how viable the Heineken cup even is during covid. 

We're joined by London Irish and Australian international prop Ollie Hoskins to chat about getting called into the Wallabies camp in the Autumn. He gives us a talk-through of the emotional rollercoaster of being called up as well as what he had to do for his initiation and insight into being in an international camp. We also chat about the great form London Irish are in and Ollie does his teammates' wikipedia quiz! We also give a preview of the first round of the Champions Cup.

We have a big episode looking at the record-breaking final weekend of the Autumn Series with all of the Six Nations teams getting wins - including another dominant win over the All Blacks, this time from France and England's World Cup revenge over South Africa. We also look back at the entire Autumn Series and give our Team of the Tournament.

We discuss Ireland's third win over the All Blacks in five years and where Andy Farrell can take the team from here. We also discuss England's win over Australia with the new Smith-Faz combination, Scotland v SA and the massive performance Fiji put in against the odds in Cardiff. 

We discuss the controversies in Cardiff from the Springbok hotel's fire alarm going off to the pitch invader. Would Wales have scored or not? We also discuss all of the other Autumn Internationals including England and Ireland's dominant displays. We look ahead to the big show downs next week of England v Australia, Ireland v New Zealand and Scotland v South Africa.

We chat about the first weekend of the Autumn Internationals and particularly the thumping of Wales at home by the All Blacks. Can Wales take any positives from the match and will any team get anywhere near New Zealand during this window? We also chat about England's upcoming match against Tonga and the massive performance from the Red Roses. 

We go through the recently announced new-look England squad for the Autumn Internationals and give our thoughts on who we're looking forward to seeing and who we think has missed out. Will Eddie Jones leaving out the experience of Ford, Mako and Billy in favour of youth and Premiership form pay off? We also discuss the 71-17 thrashing of Bath at home by Saracens and what the possible issues at Bath are. 

We're joined by former Wasps and current Sale Sharks hooker Tommy Taylor to chat about the changing role of a modern hooker, what impact Alex Sanderson's coaching has had on Sale, the new goal-line dropout rule and his experiences getting called up for England. We do another Wikipedia 'facts' quiz so listen to find out which of Tommy's teammates has trained with Tottenham Hotspur, who's a hip-hop artist and if Tommy breaks the record from last week.