September 9-October 23 2011 IRB Rugby World Cup 2011 from New Zealand
TV: DirecTV PPV $ (United States) ch. 492-497
Dish Network PPV $ (United States) ch. 541
iN Demand PPV $ (United States) Various cable channels
Universal Sports (United States) DirecTV ch. 625, Sky Angel ch. 321 & OTA Digital subchannel
NBC (United States) (September 11 1PM ET/10AM PT, October 2 & 23 3PM ET/12PM PT)
Radio: RadioSport New Zealand
Grandstand Australia (Australia matches only)
Radio 2000 South Africa
TalkSport UK 48 matches excluding France vs Japan, South Africa vs Wales, Canada vs Tonga, Russia vs United States
Absolute Radio UK 7 matches
BBC Five Live UK 4 matches
Internet: universalsports.com $ (United States)
February 4-March 17 2012 Six Nations Championship: England vs France vs Ireland vs Wales vs Scotland vs Italy
TV: BBC America (United States)
Radio: BBC Five Live (UK)
==Completed==
February 18-July 9 2011 Super Rugby
TV: DirecTV ch. 490 & 491 (United States)
July 23-August 27 2011 Tri Nations: New Zealand All Blacks vs Australia Wallabies vs South Africa Springboks
TV: SKY Sports HD (New Zealand)
FOX Sports HD (Australia)
SuperSport HD (Sub-Saharan Africa)
DirecTV ch. 490 & 491 (United States)
Radio: RadioSport New Zealand, Radio 2000 South Africa & ABC Grandstand Australia
I am not sure why Scotland vs. England was not available on ppv HD. Just looked at next weekend and all 3 other QF's are in HD, England vs. France - not so much.
Australia vs South Africa
New Zealand vs Argentina
I mean, all teams in left bracket are from Northern hemisphere while all teams in right bracket are from Southern hemisphere. Is this a bizarre coincidence or a strange setup on purpose or what? Obviously it guarantees that the championship match will be between a Northern and a Southern hemisphere team.
In my opinion, it's an absolute pity that All Blacks and Argentina are playing in a quarterfinal. I was really, reeeeeeeeealllly hoping for Argentina to make it all the way to the final and meet All Blacks there to be runners up. They've built an amazingly good football team in Argentina over there. Amount of progress they've made over 10 years is astonishingly good, something to look forward to for teams like USA or Canada, or even Italy and Pacific Islanders (Fiji, Samoa, Tonga etc.). Their style of play is very different from Pacific Islanders. They are extremely well organized in defense and play grinding, physical football.
Between England vs. France, I have to pick England. France are all over the place, with very schizophrenic personality. Too inconsistent to beat England, let alone win the whole thing. I definitely don't hope for England to win it all, but would be shocked if France overcomes them.
Similarly, Springbok haven't looked exactly like defending champions they are - having had to frustratingly grind against tough oppositions like Wales and Samoa. I have to pick Australia Wallabies over Springbok.
For Ireland vs Wales, I feel the time has finally come for Wales to rise up to the occasion, and even make it to the final.
So these are my picks.
For semi finals:
Wales vs. England
New Zealand vs Australia
For final:
New Zealand vs. Wales
with the All Blacks being the champions.
All Blacks are hurting big on injuries with McCaw and especially Daniel Carter gone for the competition. But they still have depth to make up for it in my opinion, and this time having home crowd behind them should help. It's true that today in spite of demolition job of Canada they did, All Blacks were not at their best. But I give big credit to Canada for having played spirited football scoring 2 tries against All Blacks! They were motivated to show their progress against the best opposition. Today's All Blacks team was a bit hodge-podge, not with big motivation to play for anything. That's not the exact All Blacks team I hope will step up for rest of elimination, either by lineup or attitude.
Between England vs. France, I have to pick England. France are all over the place, with very schizophrenic personality. Too inconsistent to beat England, let alone win the whole thing. I definitely don't hope for England to win it all, but would be shocked if France overcomes them.
And quite shocked I am, but in a pleasant way!! Never a sorrow to see England being knocked out early! :lol:
Semi-finals are all set for weekend, to be shown LIVE on Universal Sports.
Oct. 15, 2011 4 AM Eastern/1 AM Pacific Wales vs. France
Oct. 16, 2011 4 AM Eastern/1 AM Pacific Australia vs. New Zealand
I'm sticking with my pick of Wales vs New Zealand for final, with All Blacks winning it all. France are a bit too schizophrenic for me to pick. They rode their momentum high beating England, but I feel will now run it out with anticlimax after the high.
An X-rated tackle by idiot Welshman Sam Warburton against France player, sent off!!! Straight red-card in 18th minute with Wales leading 3-0. What a *$#%head, can't believe the brutality. Could've killed the guy or paralyzed him for life. Don't attempt to look at it in replay if you recorded and happen to be reading this. It's horribly cringeworthy. Apart for the fact that the idiot has left his team down and they now have to play most of it 1 man down.
OK, so my prediction of first semi-final winner was wrong. Hope prediction for 2nd semi-final won't be wrong. :grin:
Overall, was mostly boring/defensive semi-final till ~ 55th minute - ruined by early (and deserved) red card to the Wales player. Only 1 try scored in the entire match after 55+ mins, decided by a lead of only 1 and an entire second half in which France scored only 1 field-goal. But ending couple of minutes in which Wales had possesion of football for some 20+ phases was mildly exciting.
It's quite obvious that France play boring as hell, defensive football. Even having 1 man advantage for most of match, they couldn't come close to scoring a single try. Let alone, they didn't even look like attempting to score a try. Of course, credit is due for heroic defending by down-by-1-man Wales. I hate France's ugly style, it's booooooooooring negative football. I sure hope All Blacks win tomorrow's semi-final and thrash France in Championship match.
As for Wales, I hope they at least win the 3rd place match.
Well, as expected All Blacks prove that they play football on a totally different plane than everyone else. Wallabies were brave, no shame for them in losing to such a great team. Now expecting New Zealand to thrash France next Sunday for the second time in this World Cup, and win championship. Also hoping Wales to beat Australia in the 3rd place match.
And ALL BLACKS the World Champions as per prediction, but what a horrible, anti-climactic final! Other than the one converted try France scored, there was nothing beautiful like offensive flowing football in it. Defense dominated the football. Even the try France scored was off of a stupid turnover mistake by New Zealand. New Zealand didn't score a single converted try. Their uncoverted try was bizzare, a little uncontested run off of a lineout from very close to end zone. The kicking game was horrible. Piri Weepu seemed to miss total of 4 kicks - 3 penalty goals and the conversion after try. And he had the gall to look unhappy when replacement player (name escapes me right now) stepped up to kick 4th penalty. It was that single penalty goal which was responsible for them becoming World Champions for goodness sake. If only France had kicked a goal on their single drop kick attempt OR long range penalty attempt late in the match, ALL BLACKS would've been chokers again. It's incomprehensible to think they left the margin so close and were never really able to stamp any authority on the match.
I've heard a number of complaints about the referee, that he simply wasn't willing call a number of penalties and basic offside decisions against New Zealand against a home crowd. It's certainly possible, and probably the French do have a valid reason to be upset. But I don't have any interest to go back and rewatch the thing to micro-analyze for all those small things.
Oh well, after a long wait ALL BLACKS do have what they were waiting for. But it won't be due to a long-remembered, classic match for years to come at all.
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