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The Wallabies loss to England at Twickenham, even though there were extenuating circumstances, has put pressure on Ewen McKenzie to win at least three out of the next four Tests on the European tour.
Anything worse than this will mean his position as the Wallabies coach will be under pressure from advocates within Australia rugby for Jake White or, if being an Australian is now the imperative for the coaching job, Michael Cheika.
This is despite the fact Cheika has made a promising start, only, as the coach of the Waratahs.
One of the strengths, if this is the correct word, of McKenzie’s situation is the ARU can hardly afford to pay out another Wallaby coach before his contract has expired.
But continued failures by the Wallabies may create the wave of media and supporter antagonism towards McKenzie the ARU cannot resist.
But this scenario depends a great deal on the performance of the Wallabies.
Right now it is safe to say the Wallabies have gone back somewhat under McKenzie, rather than forward. And this is despite the fact that after the losing series against the British and Irish Lions, it was hard to see how the Wallabies could get much worse.
I go now to an interesting column written by Mark Ella before the Test against England.
Ella started off with the opinion the Wallabies Grand Slam “will tell us whether ARU boss Bill Pulver made the right decision to replace Robbie Deans with Ewen McKenzie as coach.”
This is the first time, as far as I can remember, an influential Australian rugby figure has raised the possibility the promotion of McKenzie to the Wallabies coaching job, a promotion he pushed hard for himself, supported by a group of former Wallabies on the ARU board, might turn out to be a mistake.
Ella justified his scepticism about McKenzie’s performance as coach by suggesting “on the evidence so far the Wallabies have gone backwards since McKenzie took over.”
He made the point McKenzie, with the 3-0 blackwash to the All Blacks, had done no better than Deans, “who struggled to beat the All Blacks”.
But Deans did have an “outstanding record” record against the Springboks, winning nine of 14 Tests, while McKenzie lost both Tests against the Springboks and “did not look competitive against them at all”.
Remember this was written before the England Test. The point can be made now that Deans’ Wallabies defeated England at Twickenham last year, while McKenzie’s team was defeated a week ago.
On Monday, Brett Harris, writing for The Australian (like Mark Ella), began his column on the loss to England with these startling opening sentences: ‘The dream is over. Australia wake up!‘
The article was given the self-explanatory headline: Time for Wallabies’ delusions to end.
Harris went through the delusions. He attacked the emphasis on refereeing mistakes. I believe Harris is wrong in this. But his main point, “the Wallabies were simply not good enough to take advantage” of an England side missing five of its Lions, is hard to argue against.
The point about the Ella and Harris articles, and their direction, is The Australian was the most strident of all the media outlets for the removal of Deans and the enthronement of McKenzie.
And the leader of this charge for a change was Wayne Smith, the voice of the Queensland rugby interests in the national sphere.
This article was written on the Wednesday before the Test against Italy at Turin. We are yet to hear what Smith thinks of the England Test and the coming Test against Italy, and the other coming Tests of what Harris is calling a “very treacherous tour”.
While it is too early, in my opinion, to start calling for McKenzie’s head, there are aspects of his coaching he must be called on to change and improve.
The nonsense of leaving the Wallabies on the field at half-time, for instance, has turned into a bad joke that is working against his team.
McKenzie’s defence of the ‘tactic’ is it helps keep the Wallabies in the moment. They have become used to losing focus during the half-time break. By leaving them on the field, so the argument runs, they remain switched on and ready to go straight into action from the second half kick-off.
Well, here is a statistic that puts the tactic into its ridiculous perspective. The Wallabies led England 13-6 at halftime and lost 20-13.
This is the first time since the third Test in New Zealand in 2010 the Wallabies have lost a Test after leading at halftime.
And here is another statistic that reveals the true reason for the second half collapses by the Wallabies.
The Test against England was the seventh time since the beginning of the 2011 season the Wallabies have been held scoreless in the second half of a Test.
What this suggests, in my view, is that being on or off the field at half-time has nothing to do with a second half performance (although I can’t see how it can improve play with the players being denied access to the toilets, showers and to some privacy for some needed ear-bashing).
The weak Wallabies play in the second half of Tests in recent years has more to do with the current lack of real match fitness by the majority of Australian players.
The Super Rugby franchises, even though they have months to prepare their teams before the season starts, just do not present really match-fit, match-hard players for the Wallaby coaches.
As Scott Allen has demonstrated very brilliantly The Roar on Tuesday (why isn’t he in the Wallaby coaching set up?), there has been little improvement in the technical aspects of the Wallabies scrumming since McKenzie, a former very good prop, has become coach.
I can’t see how McKenzie and Andrew Blades (the scrum guru) have allowed Ben Mowen at number 8 and the flankers to stop pushing virtually as soon as the scrums engage.
Some of the scrums shown by Scott Allen reveal Mowen virtually detaching to look at the opposition’s attacking set-up or to divert the Wallaby ball into a more convenient channel. Meanwhile, the Wallaby scrum is disintegrating around him.
If Scott Allen can see this, why can’t the Wallaby coaches?
The experiment of dropping James Horwill as the skipper and Will Genia as the vice-captain needs to stopped and Horwill and Genia must be reinstated.
Mowen is a more marginal player, in my view, than Horwill. And when David Pocock, Wycliff Palu and Scott Higginbotham come back there is no room in the backrow for Mowen.
And it may well be the Brumbies 2012 five-eighths combination of Christian Lealiifano and Matt Toomua (but the other way around) is a better combination than having Quade Cooper at number 10 and whoever at inside centre.
The worst aspect about McKenzie’s Wallabies is they don’t seem to be a very happy bunch. There is no joy in their game and certainly they are not providing much joy for their supporters.
Winners are grinners, as they say. So it is imperative for McKenzie and for the Wallabies to defeat Italy.
If they can do so in style, then this could lift a team that very much seems stuck in the doldrums, unfortunately.