- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
The new interpretation of the breakdown laws promises to rewind Super Rugby back to the days when tries were the norm, rather than the exception. It’s exciting stuff, despite the risk that the pendulum will swing back too far and we’ll get a return to the bad old days of basketball scores.
Remember the 2004 final?
Brumbies 47 – Crusaders 38. A great result for Australian fans, but a ridiculous score in a final.
Either way though, you could be forgiven for those times in 2009 when you switched over to the rugby league – after all, even some of us for whom rugby is a job still couldn’t resist the temptation to turn over to a game where the object was to actually retain the ball and score a try.
The Storm, the Dragons and the Eels were particularly difficult to resist and it was hard not to daydream about an Inglis, a Folau or a Hayne playing rugby.
Luckily it appears that we might get a reprieve this year and get to see some of our own quality stars carving up the park, off the back of high-quality, front-foot ball from the breakdown.
And there’s no shortage of excitement machines.
So as you flip on the box on Friday evening and strap in for the first games of the 2010 Super 14 season, here are a few guys who should get your blood pumping for a change.
In the Blues vs Hurricanes game on Friday, check out the Isaia Toeava versus Conrad Smith battle at outside centre. Toeava is a previous IRB U19 Player of the Year and is an excellent Sevens player, with all the attributes that implies – speed, evasion, strength and the ability to set up an outside man.
Smith on the other hand is the Prince Of Centres – balanced, tall, strong, with great vision.
As you might expect from a guy who is an admitted barrister, Smith is also wicked smart, and given that these two are both chasing the All Blacks 13 jersey, it should be a battle royale.
Later in the evening the Force take on the Brumbies in Perth and both have a couple of new guys pushing for higher honours.
Pococks and Giteaus aside, the players to watch are Force backrower Matt Hodgson and Brumbies winger Francis Fainifo. Hodgson was picked for the Wallabies against the Barbarians last year before injury cruelled him for the rest of the international program.
Although he will be lining up at 6, he is equally at home on either side of the scrum, and with George Smith having just announced his international retirement, you can bet that Hodgson will be ready to remind the selectors of his presence. He has a huge engine, a dynamite shoulder and will cause the Brumbies no end of trouble at in the loose.
Franky Fainifo will be another beneficiary of the breakdown interpretation, and playing on the end of a backline including Giteau, Mortlock and Ashley-Cooper is an ideal place for him to show off his searing pace.
Fainifo has got jet-shoes of the first order and proved it by running down Bryan Habana last year at Canberra Stadium, as well as flabbergasting Wallaby wing Peter Hynes against the Reds. If he gets into space, look out.
The first of the Saturday games, Cheetahs vs Bulls, wouldn’t traditionally be seen as an exciting fixture, especially since the Bulls have lost Bryan Habana to the Stormers.
But there are still guys on the park who can take advantage of a gap when it comes.
For the Cheetahs, established Bok wing Jongi Nokwe is backed up by rising star Lionel Mapoe, who was recently described by Boks coach Pieter de Villiers as “one of the tallest, fastest and strongest wings in the country”.
Mapoe was a star at both U21 and Sevens levels for South Africa, and will run away from the Bulls if his flankers Heinrich Brussow and Juan Smith can recycle some quick ball and get it out wide quickly.
For the Bulls, Morne Steyn should ensure that their traditional field position game continues to a large degree, although they have proven that they can and will score tries when the occasion demands.
The player most likely to benefit from the quick recycle and front foot ball under the new law is not a back, but the awesomely athletic Bulls number 8, Pierre Spies. Spies has unbelievable pace for a number 8 and if he can time his runs well off phase play, he will tear the Cheetahs apart with some devastating running.
How good an athlete is Spies?
Ask Ryan Vrede from Keo.co.za. “Spies is 6’4”, weighs 111kg and power cleans 135kg. He dead lifts 240kg. He bench presses 165kg. Only mildly impressed? Wait, here’s some more. He is able to do pull-ups with a 50kg weight between his legs. He can launch his body 1.4m onto a raised platform, sprints for 835m before slowing on a repeated sprint-ability test and has a body-fat percentage of 6.5.”
Oh yeah … and he can run the hundred in 10.7 secs. Ivan Drago anyone? Look out Cheetahs.
Game 4 is Crusaders vs Highlanders and the Highlanders haven’t won in Christchurch for a while, but their fullback Israel Dagg will give them every chance to turn that record around.
He was picked for NPC side Hawkes Bay whilst still at school, and also had a glittering Sevens career, which whet his appetite for running in open space. He knows a thing or two about pace too, having won a NZ cricket high schools pace bowling competition, whipping one down at a respectable 143kmh.
Expect Dagg to test the Crusaders defence and also retain his “Coolest Name In The Super 14” title (Runner up? Lions centre Doppies la Grange).
Dagg’s Hawkes Bay teammate Zac Guildford is the man to watch on the Crusaders side. A rookie inclusion in last years All Black squad to the north, Guildford made his test debut after 13 tries in the NPC for Hawkes Bay. You might remember him as the player whose father tragically died in the stands immediately after watching him win the U20’s world title with the NZ team in 2009.
Despite the awful setback his rugby has continued to get better and better. He is one of the quickest players in NZ rugby, and his battle with his buddy Israel Dagg will keep the turnstiles ticking over.
The Reds vs Waratahs match will be the traditional trench warfare that we have come to expect from these sides and although the Reds have been down for a while, they always have a chance against the Tahs. Helping their chances under the new laws will be quicksilver Wallaby half Will Genia.
The spaces created around the fringes by the new law interpretation are tailor made for Genia, who loves a snipe, and if the Waratahs aren’t careful, he will carve them up. Speaking of bench press prowess, Genia beats out even Pierre Spies with a massive lift of 172kg, or 204% of his own body weight.
Freakshow.
For the Waratahs, a declaration of intent has been made with the selection of former All Black Sosene Anesi at fullback. There were several options – Drew Mitchell, Kurtley Beale, Daniel Halangahu – but the selection of the counter-attacking specialist Anesi makes it look likely that the Waratahs will run the ball at the Reds.
Anesi broke his neck at C6/C7 tackling Ma’a Nonu in 2007, but has returned to full fitness and can foot it with the best, so watch out when he runs it back from the Reds kicking game.
The Lions and the Stormers go head to head in Jo’burg and it is hard to get excited about this one. The Lions have very few stars and should struggle to put the Stormers away. The flies in the ointment though, come in the form of the unpredictable Carlos Spencer at flyhalf, and USA captain Todd Clever who is likely to figure off the bench if he doesn’t start.
Spencer loves to take on the line and play tricks, and being back on the hard southern hemisphere fields should suit his style a lot more than the heavy northern pitches.
Clever is a pure athlete who can run really, really fast for a big man and doesn’t mind the hits either. YouTube highlights of his career and off-season training regime make compelling viewing, particularly the bit where he tows a VW Beetle on a rope single handed. (For the trivia heads, the man steering the Beetle is former Waratahs hooker Mark Crick).
The Stormers have gained Bryan Habana who will obviously be a handful for the Lions, but the other threats come from former Lions centre Jacque Fourie and Sevens master Fabian Juries. With Fourie making his trademark busts up the middle and Juries and Habana on his shoulders, the Stormers have the potential to be pretty exciting.
Juries, particularly, could be anything. Google him and watch his try against the Bulls from last year where he beats about 9 players on his way to the touchdown.
Last years finalists the Chiefs travel to Durban to take on the Sharks and with both sides having a preference for running the ball, there should be a good spectacle.
Although the Chiefs have a brilliant back three, the player to look at for mine is halfback Brendan Leonard.
If the breakdown speeds up and opens up as we expect it will, then Leonard is the ideal man to take advantage of it at set his supports away. Leonard loves a dart with ball in hand, and is terribly hard to put down once he has made the half break.
Incidentally, Leonard and Sitiveni Sivivatu both hail from the little North Island dairy town of Morrinsville, (population 6000) so watch out for the “Morrinsville Sports Club Sucker” backline move.
For the Sharks, it appears that Ruan Pienaar will move back to his customary position of flyhalf after playing most of the Currie Cup at halfback, allowing Rory Kockott to resume the starting halfback spot. Kockott is a belligerent customer and, pitted against our other player-to-watch Brendon Leonard, will cause no end of problems for the Chiefs.
Leonard vs Kockott will be worth the price of your Foxtel subscription.
So there they are – the players to watch for Round 1 of the Super 14 for 2010. Let’s hope that they all get some ball in hand to show what they’ve got, and that the new law interpretation is enough to return the excitement to rugby.