Coaches to blame for poor under-20 performances
Roar Guru By Rhys, 16 Jun 2012 The Crowd is a Roar Guru
- Tagged:
- Australia rugby union, David Nucifora, IRB Junior World Championships, Rugby Union, under-20s
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Another year, another failure for Australia at the Under 20 Junior World Championship. A convincing win against Scotland was followed by two totally inept performances against Argentina and France respectively.
The question is, what is our problem at under-20 level?
Is it the players, the coaches or Bad luck?
Perhaps it is a combination of all three.
It would seem ludicrous to attribute Australia’s poor results to bad luck.
For too long now we have been sending star-studded teams to this tournament, each with their sprinkling of Super Rugby players.
Often they even contain the odd player considered good enough for the Wallabies senior squad (Liam Gill being the most recent case).
Any squads of the talent we have been sending should overcome any bad luck sooner or later.
Each year we send teams with strong Super Rugby-quality players lining up in the most important positions on the field (positions like 10, nine and seven).
These squads often come up against others with little or no provincial level experience.
Yet we still we fail.
Australia may have come close on the final competition standings, but in terms of playing performance we have been way off.
It is very difficult to argue then that it is the players’ fault.
It must be the coaches.
We have had stability in the coaching set-up for this side, at least in terms of the head coach, for a number of years with David Nucifora at the helm.
Despite this stability, which sees players remain in the under-20 set-up for a few years as new players are ushered in, no success has been achieved.
It is very hard to really say that progress has been made, even in a rather transient tournament like the JWC.
It seems to me that often from my viewing, we have an under-20 side trying to play senior-type rugby.
THis is something that other teams don’t seem to do.
Rugby at under-20 level is not the same as open-age rugby.
It is more open, and quite often more adventurous quite often, with the players learning the ropes of what can and can’t be done.
Our side conversely seems much more structured than the others and perhaps, regardless of its impact later on, is not effective at under-20 level.
Given the Super Rugby talent we have brought into this tournament over the last few years, perhaps those influential players know a certain way to play and that is it.
The job of the coach is to say ‘this is how I want you to play and playing this way will bring us success’.
Quite possibly, this is where the problem lies.
Also, there appears to be a real lack of gelling between the players.
This often appears to exacerbate itself at the set-piece, a place where Australian rugby has enough problems already.
That is also the responsibility of the coach.
Arguably Australia’s poor performances are due to a combination of factors.
But looking at not only the final results but the way we play, it seems a lot of this could be resolved by more effective coaching of the players.
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June 16th 2012 @ 2:11am
bluerose said | June 16th 2012 @ 2:11am | Report comment
i watched there game against France and they simply had no answer to the French game plan, there set pieces were a mess, the scrum was awful, the lineouts were event worse, the halfback was dreadful with his game management/service and kicking and there defense was embarrassing, the whole team had no idea what to do on the field against a well coached French team, no plan A-D, poor Gill gave everything, our players look slow, unfit and soft. David Nucifora should shoulder the blame and should never coach again, France dominated and pushed our scrum all over the park.
June 16th 2012 @ 2:30am
The Werewolf said | June 16th 2012 @ 2:30am | Report comment
I agree with this article that we should not be looking to blame the young players. Frankly I am surprised at how much attention is given to the u’20 side.
At the end of the day they’re still just boys and to be fair to them we should support them and encourage them fine but if they fail I say we should leave them alone.
Win or lose it is a learning experience for them.
If the issue is poor coaching, which may or may mot be so, I am sure the feedback from the results and from the performance targets will ensure the right coaches are kept and the wrong ones are let go.
June 16th 2012 @ 3:12am
Viscount Crouchback said | June 16th 2012 @ 3:12am | Report comment
Australia produces very good young players, but not the same depth of very good young players as the likes of New Zealand, England and South Africa. Depth counts for a lot at U20 level. Liam Gill can’t do it all on his own.
But the good news for Australia is that – like Wales – you are excellent at feeding your best young players into the senior squad. And that, ultimately, is far more important than winning the JWC.
June 16th 2012 @ 3:39am
Johnno said | June 16th 2012 @ 3:39am | Report comment
–How can we be producing a lot of depth Visocunt when we are performing like we did in the under 20 world cup, and you rightly said Liam Gill is doing it on his own.
-he will be pushing for a wallaby tour by end of year by the way.
-we need a youth comp toyata cup sly like in league or a better state comp.
The super 15 academies got pushed aside of a national one which is not working it seems.
we need to attack new markets eg west sydney, adeliade,gold coast.
-and also allow more imports in super 15 coz imports bring in tv ratings and revenue and moor ethane can go into grass roots.
-5 imports allowed per soon to be 35 man squads.
June 16th 2012 @ 11:37am
Atawhai Drive said | June 16th 2012 @ 11:37am | Report comment
Johnno, reassure me that your misspelling of Viscount was not deliberate.
June 19th 2012 @ 12:35am
bennalong said | June 19th 2012 @ 12:35am | Report comment
I’ve been waiting for his response!
Cracker!
June 16th 2012 @ 3:54am
the breakdown said | June 16th 2012 @ 3:54am | Report comment
Our lack of depth is also the reason so many of our young players get fast tracked into test rugby. A blessing in disguise for the likes of Pocock and O’connor etc.
June 16th 2012 @ 6:18am
LeftArmSpinner said | June 16th 2012 @ 6:18am | Report comment
Guys, settle for s second.
David nucifora got the team a few weeks before the squad boarded the silver bullet to Africa. Hardly enough time to justify comments on fitness and set piece play. Tactics can be developed in that time.
But, at the Ned of the day, it is the players who have to deliver on the field. The basics Of rugby are a good place to start and this is the domain of the player, not the coach. Any coach has to inherit basic skills. He then puts into place a strategy and a series Of tactics. So, back to the breakdown, this is down to the players skill and judgement. The rest flows from there.
June 16th 2012 @ 5:43pm
Old Rugby Boy said | June 16th 2012 @ 5:43pm | Report comment
Us guys in Sydney’s subdistrict competitions know the main problem. Rugby Union is dying at its grass roots. You can throw all the stats you like and pretend everything is fine but it isn’t. Subbies are struggling. In the west we have lost grounds to AFL and now we are leaking players to AFL. The AFL has presented AFL as a better prospect than playing RU. The better players are being scouted by the NRL and even school boys have NRL contracts. This has an upward effect. With the better players going to other codes and staying there the ARU has only 5 years to do something about this before the standard of Australian Rugby Union is about that of Italy. If the decline is allowed to continue for another 10 years then there will 3 codes of football in Sydney, Football, RL and AR. There will not be any RU played. The AFL is already targeting the main nursery, the private schools. When the AFL wins, then goodbye RU. The loss of the best players to other codes can now be seen in the poor U20′s result. Don’t blame just the coach; blame the poor administration of this code in Australia.
June 17th 2012 @ 8:00pm
John said | June 17th 2012 @ 8:00pm | Report comment
I believe we had the players required to be more competitive at the Junior Championships, it’s just that half of them were left at home. Lads fresh out of school with no real tough rugby experience were sent to play against very experienced players from the northern hemishere. Obviously the players are not to blame, selectors/coaches are. This subject will continue to be raised every year until the coaches and selectors actually start sending the best players to get the job done, not necessarily the flashy ones but the ones who will do the work. Some of these players are so over-rated and it makes you wonder if that will continue when they come home to the real world.
June 19th 2012 @ 7:13pm
New to Rugby said | June 19th 2012 @ 7:13pm | Report comment
How true your comments are John.
I have only taken to watching rugby with any close commitment in the last 2yrs and one thing I have observed starting with the school competition, is that if a player was successful as an U15 player, he is pushed through in future selections without obvious merit … it’s almost like it would be an embarrassment to the previous selectors or Talent Squads if they weren’t selected in subsequent years. This process of “talent identification” of course gives no consideration to those boys that develop later in life both physically & mentally or the fact that a player may have peaked as a 6ft 90kg 16yr old.
I have also witnessed this systemic failing in rugby league but certainly not to the extent I have witnessed in my short time with rugby union. Following from your comments, I also believe that there were better players at the time of selection that were left behind however, I think they are victims of the system outlined above.
There would seem an obvious gap in player development in Australia if we have been “forced” to send such a young side. I know for a fact of one young lad running around in the Brisbane Premier Grade that certainly deserved a spot & I’m sure other regions of Australia could boast the same. It is not to say that some of the young players sent are not talents in their own right – I for one believe that some of them are, but they will have their time. To exclude the older players who are as equally talented & more hardened, I think, is in danger of losing them to the sport forever.
I’m all for developing a national U20 comp similiar to that of the Toyota Cup in rugby league where players would be required to compete at a high level week in week out without being thrust into competions ahead of their time. I truely believe some players identified as “players of the future” would be found wanting while others would step forward from obscurity and ultimately rise to the highest level of competition.
June 18th 2012 @ 11:58am
GregT said | June 18th 2012 @ 11:58am | Report comment
Disagree with the writer here. Playing ‘open’ rugby wasn’t the issue for these guys it was the tight stuff — a reflection of the same issues we have with the big boys. We lose the collision and have trouble asserting ourselves in tight. The French stomped us twice through the middle and the Argies were brave and took advantage of the dreadful conditions (can anyone say Scotland?) I don’t know enough about the U-20 program to make a call on the coaches but the selections seemed all over the place. The 15 that took the field seemed to vary greatly from game to game — that bench against the French on Sunday looked awfully good, including several of the best performed young players of recent years. The worry is at all levels Australia isn’t addressing the fundamental problem — not the set pieces per se, but the ability of the tight forwards to be consistently, relentlessly corrosive: to get the go forward before unleashing the inevitably talented backs.