Australia’s Matt Giteau slides in to gather up a loose ball during the Australia v France Rugby Union test at ANZ Stadium, Sydney, Saturday, June 27, 2009. (AAP Image/Dean Lewins)
The defining moment of the Australia (22) v France (6) Test at the ANZ Stadium came not long after half-time when France intercepted a pass deep inside their own territory (as they did to win the first Test against the All Blacks) and a certain try under the Wallaby posts was on.
The referee Dave Pearson, who missed knock-ons galore in the first half, immediately ruled an off-side. Matt Giteau kicked the penalty. Instead of the scoreline being 10 – 10, it had now stretched out for the Wallabies to 13 – 3.
Three more penalties to Giteau in quick succession, all in relatively easy positions, and the Wallabies and Giteau were up to 22 points for the match.
There was no way a French side that notably tired towards the end of the match (a consequence no doubt of their tough two Tests in New Zealand) was going to come back from this position.
To their credit, though, and a testimony to the fact that this is a very good French squad, they fought on, did not concede any more points in the last quarter of the match and came very close to scoring themselves.
Pearson’s decision was effectively a 10-point turnaround.
It seemed to me watching the replay that Luke Burgess had his hands on the ball before the French player made his run into the Wallaby line. Burgess’s rather laboured, harbour-bridge pass allowed an easy run on to the ball for the interception.
With the scoreline at 10 – 10 France would probably have lifted from their tiredness to run hard at the Wallabies and drive harder into the rucks and mauls. And if this had happened, who knows what the final result might have been.
Even with all the ensuing penalties, the scoreline would have been Australia 19 – France 13 for the last quarter of the match. France would at least have been within a converted try to win the Test.
This is, of course, all speculation.
The Wallaby defence was tremendous throughout the match. Early on a charge down allowed France to flood the Wallaby line. But somehow the scrambled defensive line held.
And in the second half, there were times when France threatened only to be cut down by a defence that would not give up a try.
Outstanding for the Wallabies was George Smith. He made tackles, one of them quite late for which he was penalised, and snaffled the ball in his hits time and time again.
Robbie Deans, who knows something about how good a loose forward can be through coaching Richie McCaw, called Smith a ‘one-man band’ at the breakdown.
He is a freakishly good player who is carrying the Wallabies at the break-down. He doesn’t seem to get injured and while this is so the Wallabies have one of the best, if not the best ‘fetcher’ in world rugby.
The Wallaby set pieces, especially the lineout, looked strong. The scrum is definitely better than last year, although occasionally it buckles. It does put more pressure than in the past on the opposing scrum now, though.
The back three are developing Deans’ Crusader game of running the ball back from kicks, where possible, with some profit. It is this pace and work rate of the back three, and their general accuracy in the lines they run, that is rightly keeping Lote Tuqiri out of the team.
Where Tuqiri often complained about not getting the ball, and leaving his wing (something Deans does not like) to look for work, the current back three are getting many touches – and, more importantly, doing something creative with the ball on many occasions.
The other great improvement is the developing combination of the five-eighths, Giteau and Berrick Barnes.
Deans has always preferred the traditional New Zealand system of two five-eights rather than the Australian system of two centres. The two five-eights, as they showed in the first and only try of the Test, offer running, passing and kicking options that are difficult for defences to contain.
So the Wallabies have had four matches in their 2009 campaign. The Barbarians match was a romp that didn’t tell us a great deal, other than that James O’Connor is a terrific talent.
The two Tests against the Italians (who gave the All Blacks a very hard match winning the possession and position statistics and keeping the home side to only 3 tries) showed that the pack was at least competitive and that the back three has the speed and systems to challenge staunch defensive lines.
The Test against a strong French side showed that the pack can stand up to brutes. There is a growing fluency about the play of the Wallabies which was not reflected in the try statistics.
Overall, one can say that Matt Giteau (with his aspirations to be the leading five-eighths in world rugby) and the Wallabies (with their eyes on the Tri-Nations and the Bledisloe Cup) are right on target.
Justin
Guest
Greg - Interesting point. I would like to know what role the assistant referees are given regarding offside. With all refs miked up surely it is or should be the responsibility of the ARs to determine off-side, much like in soccer. As I say I am not sure if it already happens, but if not then why not? They are in the perfect position to do it and have little else to worry about for the most part. They are the logical guardians of off-side IMO.
Greg Russell
Roar Guru
Sky NZ's Reunion (TV) show analyzed the Traille off-side decision closely (on Tuesday night). It was agreed that he probably was just on-side, but that he was made to look off-side because the defenders around him were about a metre further back, rather than everyone being right on the off-side line together. Dave Rennie (Manawatu, NZ U20 and ex-Wellington coach) said that as a coach he would expect this to be called off-side, because that's what happens when one person in the defensive line is ahead of the rest. So in a sense Rennie was excusing referee Pearson, and instead was blaming this decision on Traille's teammates for being lazy in not improving their defensive position right up to the allowable limit. Rennie has a point. Referees have so much to do that it's hard to expect them to constantly be looking at where the hindmost feet in a ruck are. Rather, they just quickly look at whether everyone is in a defensive line, and then get back to the myriad other things they have to be looking out for. The other thing is the time it took between the ball emerging (when the defensive line is allowed to break) and Burgess passing it. Those with good medium-term memories may recall an incident in this year's S14, where Lachlan Turner intercepted a pass from Blues halfback Taniela Moa just before half-time (at Eden Park). Turner too was actually on-side, but as with Traille-Burgess, he was made to look off-side by the slowness of Moa's pickup and pass. NSW went on to win that game, but the denial of Turner's legitimate try cost NSW a 4-try bonus point. Now that I think about it, NSW missed the S14 semis by 1 point ...
Knives Out
Guest
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Darryl
Guest
As a Wallaby supporter, what concerns me is the AB's are usually on fire about this time in between world cups. Have they finally worked out how to peak at the right time? Also, I'm expecting the Wallabies to bring out a few set moves from controlled rucks and set pieces in the TN's - I reckon they've kept a few up their sleeves during the warm ups. Oh and Spiro can you please stop making up ridiculous reasons why the Wallabies were lucky to win just to satisfy your fragile kiwi ego, and can you also please stop using the word "ensemble" or atleast use something different. Try a thesaurus.
AndyS
Guest
As my Kiwi mate once so eloquently put it (I won't mention before which game), form is largely irrelevant come trans-Tasman time. Two teams will run out, and then God knows...
Stash
Guest
Rucker - with regards to the Tri-Nations, I believe that the Kiwis are more concerned about the current All Black's form than any perceived ascension of the Wallabies. Normally, I would suggest that 3 weeks between games is a bad thing, perhaps not so for NZ this year...ha and they will be better off with some of their key player returning back from injury. It doesn't seem that long ago that the ABs were written off (2008) and they won TN, Bledsloie and a Grand Slam - the ABs surely have enough history on their side for the Wallabies and the Boks to be cautious (the Boks were very gloriously vocal last year after their win in Dunedin - and we all know that ended in the wooden spin for them). But saying all that - the Wallabies do look to be improving (but perhaps they needed too) - it should be a cracker TN.
retired rucker
Guest
Seems to be alot of our NZ bretheren of the opinion that we ausys reckon weve got the AB's stiched up. What would give them that impression? I think there's a bit of mistaken reading between the lines. My comments have been along the lines of their(wallas) are looking competive and I'm looking forward to the TN's. Go you good things. By the way my Kiwi mates aren't giving me any ods anymore and some of them are flat out refusung to have a friendly punt with me. May I start reading between the lines?????
Stash
Guest
Giteau looks like he's made of rubber! But then so did Dan Carter... And surely Mortlock is held together by cellotape, a piece of string and superglue... (he just keeps going like an energiser battery)
Stash
Guest
That was not the same French team that played against the ABs - so the high-fives seem premature. Saying that Smith was excellent - yet he seemed forever to be by himself, where was his support and shouldn't that lead to more go-forward against a tired team? Deans experimental team of youngsters (2nd test Italy) showed that some of the emerging talent have real potential (and some do not). This looked decidedly like Henry's AB teams of rotational players. You would have to say that we all learned that it is more important to cover the top talent than merely having a second team. Tumekeheke is quite right - more concern should be given to covering key players. New Zealand has shown what can happen to a team's momentum, confidence and ability without these key players.
mIckeym
Guest
Back to the Frenchie being offside or not... Now, my limited experience only goes as far as coaching/refereeing U8's, but we have been lucky enough over the past 4 months to have had the ARU run coaches/referees sessions for the club each month, concentrating on Mini's. One of the things the ARU boys covered early on was ruck and maul - laws and the practicalities of teaching 7 year olds what they should be doing. Their explanation of when a ruck ends was "when the ball leaves the ruck". "How do we know when a ball has left the ruck?" we asked. "Is it when a player puts their hands on the ball ready to pass?" "It only leaves the ruck when a bird can shit on it." was their reply. "As long as the ball is on the ground, it is still in the ruck, even if the halfback has his hands on it. It is only out when it comes off the ground, or out past the hindmost foot of the hindmost player in the ruck (in other words when a bird can see it to shit on it)." Based on that - I reckon he was indeed offside.
Tumekeheke
Guest
Australia are looking the goods, but I don't think everybody should be counting the AB's out yet, I mean they are missing at least 5 frontline players, with at least 2 of them being arguably the best in their respective positions (Mcaw, Carter). How would the Wallabies cope if Giteau, Mortlock, Smith and another couple of forwards were missing.... probably fairly similar to New Zealand at the moment.
ThelmaWrites
Guest
Oops, while I was composing my reply, Bennalong and Sam Taulelei had meantime posted ahead. Now I have more things to think about. I hope I can sleep. Gentlemen, it's midnight!
ThelmaWrites
Guest
Peter K Aha! So that's how it works, I mean, your take on how it should work. I've been struggling for a year now with this subject, The New Look. I gave my daughter, DaniE who posts here occasionally, Matt Burke's autobiography, "A Rugby Life" for her birthday. On pages 50 and 51, he describes how difficult it was to adjust to Greg Smith's "sequence of plays". (The book is in KL with DaniE and I'm relying on my notes; some of the words are in shorthand.).."A scrum here, work to a point here, after putting on a move...." xxx "That was a pretty regimented approach, and a lot of people in the game had problems with it - in line with the traditional belief that the way to play rugby was to let it flow, to PLAY WHAT'S IN FRONT OF YOU (my caps)..." xxx sequence 1, sequence 2, etc. Two years later it became the norm in rugby - but I think that with NSW in particular, Greg Smith hammered a good thing too much, too early." To get a handle about what you said, I relate it somewhat to American gridiron, where a particular coach might dictate the first 5 plays, and then the quarterback makes the rest of the calls, except when the coach sends specific instructions again. (Of course, this is for the offence, but the defense would have their plays too.) That helps me understand the drills. I'm grateful. I'll certainly think about your reply.
Sam Taulelei
Guest
Huh, can you try and explain this again Bennalong. Your first line is standard drift defence and then calls for a shift to man on man when the ball carrier is directly in front of you with support from your teammate pushing up from your inside shoulder to cover the offload or wrap the ball up. I'm still waiting for the part that is different with this system to the previous one or any other defensive systems practiced by opposition teams.
bennalong
Guest
Peter K. They have patterns but they're expected to shelve them if they don't adequately address what's in front. In Deans' scheme you move out, ie. tackle the guy one out from the guy in front and opposite. But if the guy in front is 'right in front', you take him, and your guy inside will either help you put him down or loop around to cover the off-load. For good players it's generally what's intuitively best instead of the book of rules. The Deans method contracts the defensive line inward which, among other advantages, allows a quicker counter-attack See what I came up wth, thinking about this as a simplicity, on a paralell thread.
Peter K
Guest
Thelma - I agree. We are showing a bit of hubris. The real test will be the boks and the AB's. Especially the away games. I do not get this 'play whats in front of you'in terms of defense. They must have patterns to cover the inside pass, the angle run, the ball passed wide. So what it must be is they have the ideal response to certain situations and then when the situation occurs everyone goes where they should. This is different to being programmed since that is a set of responses more than 1 set of steps ahead.
ThelmaWrites
Guest
Oops, that should be "sceptical". I wonder why the Spell Checker didn't pick it up.
ThelmaWrites
Guest
Gentlemen, let's not get too smug. This French team did not play to the same level as they'd played in NZ, as Jools-USA noted in another thread. They were either very tired from the NZ segment, or had already gotten the scalp they prized, or both. As Spiro has noted, they really showed fatigue in the second half: a lot of Gallic shrugs and a really slow walk to the line outs. I was disappointed, as I'd hope they'd subject the Wallabies to the same intensity they'd given the All Blacks. The 3 Nations is just around the corner. What I consider very positive is the way that the Wallas are beginning to play on the same WAVE LENGTH. They're not really playing "what's in front of you" (can someone please think up a better term, it's getting trite from over-use), individually that is. Instead, one or a few make that judgment, but the whole pack sniffs it in the air, and they hunt as one. Remarkable. As Berrick Barnes said in the SMH today, there were some players who were skeptical at first, but not any more. I too was skeptical. I just hope my new appreciation is well-founded.
Working Class Rugger
Guest
Peter K Ratu Nasiganyavi. I'd like to see him get a run in the centre at 6'5' and 125kg he'd make an impact.
Peter K
Guest
retired rucker - Yes ratanga or something. He is contracted to the Waratahs and Hickey was too stupid to use him. He is earmarked for the wing. However he is too slow for wing at that level so 13 as you suggest would be far better. Or even 6 or 8. Hickey has no idea about backline play.