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The appointment of John Connolly – in a blast from the past – as the mentor of Reds coach Richard Graham seems to have had an immediate impact with the selection of a Reds side to play the Rebels that finally makes some sense.
On Wednesday, about 10am, the Queensland Rugby Union issued a media release naming the Reds side to play the Rebels.
The first sentence contained the meat of the release: “Flyhalf Jake McIntyre will make his Super Rugby debut this Friday after being named in the St. George Queensland Reds starting side to take on the Melbourne Rebels at Suncorp Stadium in Ladies Round.”
McIntyre, the statement pointed out, is a number 10 by preference and experience, unlike the stand-ins (aside from the injured Quade Cooper) who have been used earlier in the season – Karmicheal Hunt, James O’Connor and Nick Frisby.
McIntyre was the starting flyhalf (when he was available) for the Brisbane City team in its winning title run in the National Rugby Championship. Another young flyhalf, Sam Greene, of the famous Brothers Club (Connolly’s bulwark), who also played for Brisbane City last year and “has been impressive for Brothers” in the Queensland Premier Rugby this year, has been named on the bench.
The statement quotes Graham as being tempted to use McIntyre “a few weeks ago … We almost gave him a debut last week”.
Perhaps. My gut feeling is that Connolly understood better than Graham that sides that aspire to win in the Super Rugby tournament must have number 10s who have some clues on how to play the position, the depth required to set the line, the judgment when to kick and when to pass, how to select runners and general game management.
Aside from Cooper, none of the number 10s used by Graham this season had much of a clue about this. And one of the reasons, aside from his dismal loss-win record in Super Rugby, why I don’t rate Graham as a coach is that he is a poor selector.
I have quoted Sir Graham Henry in the past saying that accurate selection is about 90 per cent of ensuring a winning coach.
Several other selections are interesting, too. Karmichael Hunt is being played at outside centre and Sam Kerevi moved into the inside centre position.
With the flat line defence, in the rugby league manner, becoming the rugby system, it is becoming obvious that breaks can be made in the middle of the field, by the inside centre, and that the outside centre position is becoming increasingly a defensive position.
You see this system of a runner and a stopper, first enunciated in the 1920s by the master South African coach Dr Markotter, with the Hurricanes and All Blacks combination of Ma’a Nonu and Conrad Smith.
If young McIntyre can stand flat enough and present square shoulders to the defence when making his passes, the Kerevi-Hunt combination could be very effective for the Reds. Kerevi should provide the attack, and Hunt, who has journeyman attacking skills in my opinion, should provide some defensive muscle.
James O’Connor has been moved from the wing to fullback in a direct swap with Lachie Turner. Again this is a switch that makes sense. I see this move more about trying to get some good play out of O’Connor rather than any criticism of Turner’s play this season at fullback.
Frankly, right now, O’Connor should not be selected for the Wallabies. He seems to have lost most of his pace. His defence is awful. He is not kicking goals. And he is getting injured a lot. Playing him at fullback is a last resort move to somehow get some value out of his presence on the field.
The Reds have picked a pack that has seven Test players (and a potential Test player in Jake Schatz) in it.
I blithely recorded a win for the Rebels on The Roar‘s tipping competition before the Reds side was announced. I still believe that this will happen. But I do believe that there will be more guts and effort from the Reds, now that the old bull coach Connolly has been given a licence to spruik the magic word ‘Queenslander, Queenslander’ into the receptive ears of a team that has clearly had no esprit this season.
And one of the reasons why I am going for the Rebels, despite the fact that this is an away match, lies in a media release from them, also on Wednesday but a couple of hours later, making this announcement: “RaboDirect Rebels lock in Reid for two more.”
Two more years, in fact. The Reid is Jordy Reid, the tearaway flanker, the nearest sighting of Ray Price in his rugby prime that we have seen in Australian rugby for several decades. Let’s be blunt about this, Reid plays like a leaguie. Before anyone starts to roar that this is politically incorrect and hostile to league, let me assure them that it is meant as a compliment.
Reid, anyway, is a boots and all player. He throws his body into the contact area. He is totally fearless. He has some skills in poaching turnovers.
But it is enthusiasm for the contact and his devil-may-care disregard for the consequences of his play, for himself or his opponents, that have made him a standout in the last few games for the Rebels.
The Rebels, on the strength of Reid’s abrasive play, which is matched by many others in the side, including Mitch Inman (Rod Kafer’s candidate for the Wallabies inside centre position), have won four of their last five matches. OPTA statistics tell us that this is the Rebels’ best run ever in the Super Rugby tournament.
Moreover, the 42-22 victory over the Blues equalled the Rebels’ highest points tally ever in a match, and was their second largest victory in terms of margin.
The Brumbies lead the Australian Conference on 33 points, followed by the Waratahs on 32 and the Rebels on 29. The Waratahs and the Rebels, though, have a game in hand, with the Brumbies having played 12 matches and the other two Australian sides 11 matches.
There are five teams ahead of the Brumbies in the table. The Waratahs are in seventh place and the Rebels in tenth place. These placements suggest that in all probability only one Australian team will make the Super Rugby finals this year.
And that it will be a major task for that Australian side to beat the Bulls or the Stormers for the second place conference winner. It is hard to see how an Australian or South African side can win more points than, say, the Hurricanes or, if the Hurricanes collapse, the Chiefs.
However, I would note that Marc Hinton on stuff.co.nz has power ranked all the sides for this week this way:
1 Hurricanes
2 Chief (who are playing the Hurricanes this week)
3 Bulls (who are playing the Blues
4 Rebels
5 Brumbies (who are playing a crucial match, for both teams, against the Lions)
6 Stormers
7 Highlanders (who are playing the Cheetahs)
8 Crusaders
9 Lions
10 Waratahs (I find this ranking a bit curious but they are yet to play in South Africa)
11 Force
12 Cheetahs
13 Sharks
14 Blues
15 Reds
Now all of this is theoretical. The astonishing thing about the Super Rugby tournaments over the years is that the make-up of the finals is often only known after the last match of the pool rounds is played.
But where the leading Australian sides are currently on the table means that they have to continue to win to remain in finals contention.
I expect the Waratahs to beat the Sharks, even though the Sharks played with some intensity against the Hurricanes. The Sharks, though, for all their intensity, like some of the South African sides (and the Brumbies curiously enough), have degenerated their attack down to invariable rolling mauls.
The Brumbies should have won last week against the Stormers. Christian Lealiifano missed a conversion from just about in front of the posts (why didn’t David Pocock actually dot down between the posts, in fact?).
As well as this carelessness on the part of Lealiifano and (to a much lesser extent) Pocock, the Brumbies conceded 18 penalties under the refereeing eye of the South African Stuart Berry. This is an extraordinary number of penalties to concede when the Brumbies scored more tries than the Stormers and have a good penalty ratio of 10-7 conceded each match.
The referee for the Brumbies-Lions match at Johannesburg is the South African Jaco Peyper.
Put it this way, if the Brumbies concede another 18 penalties again in this match, they will surely lose to an enthusiastic Lions side that is averaging about 90 metres more in carries a match than the Brumbies, more passes made (120 to 116) and clean breaks made (7.1 to 5.9).
The Lions are a dangerous opponent, especially at home, because they are an oxymoronic running-the-ball South African side.