In a shameless and blatant teaser for next week’s column for The Roar, last Friday I had the pleasure and the privilege of chatting with Rugby World Cup-winning and former Springbok coach Jake White.
In amongst a series of candid and frank responses, White mentioned something that stayed with me all weekend, and indeed was in the back of my head as I sat down to observe how the Wallabies would bounce back after the previous week’s shock loss to Samoa.
Simply, he stated, “I suppose in rugby you’re never going to get everybody happy.”
After a week of quality hand-wringing and Oh-my-God-ing from Wallaby supporters, and ranging in ferocity from moderate annoyance to full-blown blood-letting and “sack the lot of them, they’re bloody hopeless”, many a curious set of Australian eyes would be on the opening Tri-Nations clash against South Africa.
Wallaby coach Robbie Deans had made the changes most thought were required and essentially, we would be watching the First XV again.
If the biggest casualty/scapegoat of the Samoan loss was Matt Giteau, then that was quickly justified in just the first minute of play.
From a penalty and lineout in their own half, the Wallaby backline was set deep and wide. With Quade Cooper’s first two touches, he ran toward the line with three decoy supports in close proximity; firstly, it was James Horwill, Rob Simmons, and David Pocock stationed off each hip, then the next run he fired a pass to Kurtley Beale neatly between Pat McCabe and Digby Ioane on his outside, with Ben Alexander on the inside.
This is not a criticism of Giteau’s game, but those two plays so superbly contrasted the attacking preference of him and Cooper so effectively well. For starters, I can’t recall Giteau taking on the line with close supports the previous week.
Secondly, and most tellingly, whereas Cooper has the passing game to allow the ball to beat the man, Giteau nowadays almost always prefers to run toward the gap he’s trying to position a runner through, rather than passing into the space.
In those opening minutes, there was just so much to like, and so much that hadn’t happened in the previous game. True, the Springboks weren’t defending with the same line speed and bone-shattering intensity with which the Samoans rocked the Australians, but it appeared that the Wallabies were playing more intensely at the breakdown, with more patience in attack, and with so much more time to sum up the situation in front of them.
Happy days felt like they were just about to arrive.
Ben Alexander’s try – and I remain convinced there’s an inside centre trapped in that prop’s body – looked even better when you went through the elements in reverse. Firstly, it was really no surprise that he would be the support runner to score the try; he seems to have a happy knack of doing that.
Impressive, though, was how Alexander veered back to the outside after Rocky Elsom had beautifully drawn firstly Deon Stegmann and then Flip van der Merwe into the tackle before offloading. Elsom found himself in space thanks to the unexpected second and first receivers Stephen Moore and McCabe, who took the quick pass from Will Genia.
Genia was one of many Wallabies arriving in numbers as James O’Connor took the ball into the ruck, after perfectly shoving Lwazi Mvovo out of the contact, and having altered his support run to take in Beale’s outside pass and sum up the impending traffic.
Beale had added another forty or so metres to Cooper’s initial step and run-like-he-stole-something dash, if you’ll pardon the expression.
But what did it all start from? Elsom’s clever shovel out the back, after a brilliant Ben McCalman steal at the ruck. Every time I re-watched that play on Sunday morning, it just got better and better.
Just a minute later, from the restart, Genia never even looked at what Cooper might have been assembling on the open side; instead, his eyes locked onto the mouth-watering prospect of taking on prop Werner Kruger and ‘Boks captain John Smit down the short side.
He and Ioane took off, quickly developed the overlap, and from 85m and a cracking left-foot step, Ioane was crossing himself in celebration.
“Happy days for the Wallabies!” Greg Martin exclaimed, quickly picking up on my theme for this week.
It was hard to believe this had all happened in the first ten minutes, and on a heavy track, after Sydney had endured rain so heavy and constant that Noah himself might have been making preparations.
Any game in which you’ve secured the bonus point before the 50th minute has been born out of a dominant performance, and for everything the Wallabies did wrong the previous week, they did right on Saturday night.
McCabe and Adam Ashley-Cooper look like they’ve been playing in the centres together for decades and not just the two outings in the last ten days. Their combined unit defence and line speed was outstanding, and in attack they complimented each other magnificently.
At the breakdown, so enthralled was I watching McCalman and Elsom in tandem that I barely noticed Pocock, which after re-watching the game on Sunday morning and seeing Pocock’s impact, was rather surprising.
The tight five were great in the middle and performed quite well against a decent Springbok scrum. And of course, Genia, Cooper, Beale and O’Connor need no more superlatives than they’ve already received.
So I guess the question is Roarers, are we happier now?
Yes, there’s still room for improvement, no question. But after all the doom and gloom the previous week, this was almost the perfect response.
I think we’re entitled to be satisfied again.
vaguely
Roar Pro
It's hard to pin down the 10-12 combo, the main problem being 12. But because of this 12 has more depth. If we say Deans wont pick Gits we need to look at who he might pick: 10: Cooper, JOC, Beale 12: McCabe, Faingaa, AAC, JOC, Barnes, Gerrard Looking at that, there is no real need for Giteau. Let's have a look at one of the most played replays after the Samoa game: Mark Gerrard geting smashed after Gits closed down the space and threw him a hospital pass. THis sums up the way Giteau plays these days. Now have a lok how much space the backs have with Cooper at the helm, look how good AAC played when his space wasn't closed down, now watch a brumbies replay and see Giteau make him look pedestrian.
LeftArmSpinner
Roar Guru
I thought the closest McCabe got was 13, but I bow to your greater knowledge of all things Brumbies. When I wrote the comment about Bernie, I was aware of your point. Au contraire, I counter it with this: Deans has one playmaker, Cooper. If he is not around, others such as Beale and O'Connor will takeover but Cooper is the ordained as the Archbishop fly half. Bernie had three......two of them Novices still learning and building confidence and the other thinking that he was an Archbishop and should be there all the time, despite refusing to or being unable to adjust his playing style to run straighter and take on/commit the defensive line. For the record, I marvel at Giteau's work ethic but why doesn't he take the obvious advice???? I was watching the boys from the hood (Cooper, Beale and O'Connor,) warming up before the game. the equivalent of the Cricketers' "Julios" The three of them were playing "no lookie" passes. All could hit the man, with flat passes on either side. they clearly enjoy themselves and play that way too. Young, Brash, Arrogant and full of confidence. Just what you want in a rugby player, but not necessarily in a daughter's boyfriend's or a son in law!!!!! I am very jealous about your Jake White interview......and cant wait to hear the outcomes, particularly the roles Bernie, Gregan and Eddie will have. an interesting choice of personnel. Not sure about it, given that Gregan, Bernie and Jones were part of the cause of the eventual problems with player power. Give me a Robbie Deans style over Eddie any day........
Coxinator
Guest
To be honest I never thought Eales was a spectacular athlete but rather did the best he was able to and with intelligence. Simmons rarely gets penalised, gets turned over, dominated at the tackle, throws a stupid pass, drops a lineout or mouths off. To be honest there've been a few Eales-types going round in club rugby for years, but are often judged as "not having enough mongrel". However, in my view you need balance and that's what Eales/McCall and Horwill/Simmons offer.
Glenn Condell
Guest
'Larkham was injured and Barnes stepped up rather well from memory. We got knocked out , because England played like Samoa a week ago and dominated at the breakdown. The backs held up well.' Disagree. My memory of that game is that yes, we were underpowered up front but still within a kick of victory - what we did not have was midfield direction. Both Barnes and Giteau were anonymous, even though Barnes had been v good in the previous game (v Wales?) Sure some good defence monstered them so they had excuses but I feel we'd have won that game had Larkham been in the saddle. We needed a conductor behind a retreating pack and Larkham knew all about that. When we had chances there was no-one to take the line on and create something.
Brett McKay
Guest
EG, I've worked out what it was - Alexander and Kepu found themselves on the wrong side as they approached a scrum, and swapped well before it was formed. I obviously just picked up on them swapping, but they were actually just correcting themselves...
Emric
Guest
Methysticum. This Australian team is not new its the same team the All Blacks beat time and again last year. It's effectively the same team that the Hurricanes blew away in Parmy early this year. If I was you I wouldn't be over confident about the chances of the Australian team when going up against a country which can field 2 All Black teams of equal or better quality to it. Remember that Bok side which was just beaten had 3 real springbox players in the rest were either new, very new or being trialed - and they didn't lose that badly considering it was a 3rd rate team playing the "second" best team in the world As for the depth of Australian Rugby we already know how thats played out
PeterK
Guest
Eales was a far far superior player at 22. Simmons is closer to Mumm in style and ability than to Eales at the same age. TommyM I did get the point of cattledogs post. In essence saying Simmons was very similar to Eales at that age. Also he tried to use that to justify why Simmons does not have to have aggression, mongrel. The fact is Simmons job is in tight and he is NOT effective in rucks or mauls. His lineout work is good though.
TommyM
Guest
Agree with pretty much all of this Stinger, although interestingly Hodgson had the hgihest workrate of any Wallaby in the game (albeit only over 15min). He certainly gives his all.... http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/austins-tn1-match-review-and-statistics/
TommyM
Guest
Didn't Cooper actually 'steal' his OWN laptop from his ex-girlfriend's house who refused to give it back to him?
TommyM
Guest
If we can all agree on one thing, it would surely be that Giteau can never again play at 10 for the Wallabies if we want it to function to score tries. Again, nothing against the guy, he's just not a 10. JOC, Barnes or Beale at 10 would all be preferable to minimise the disruption if Cooper goes down. Fingers crossed that doesn't happen.
TommyM
Guest
You shouldn't be surprised Cattledog. If you read PeterK's responses, he usually misses the point, jumping on a supposed inaccuracy or inconsistency without seemingly actually properly reading or understanding the post he's responding to. Wish 'The Roar' had a function where you could elect to selectively not see posts from selected posters! There's an idea for you Spiro...!
roarr
Guest
I agree 100% with Harry. With so much creativity (Beale, JOC, Cooper, Digby, Genia) there is NO need for ball players in the midfield. All we need is hard running, hard tackling, no-nonsense players who arent expected to come up with the winning play in every match. Players that dont necessarily want all the lime-light but are happy to be role-players in a potentially very good backline. For me, this includes McCabe, Faingia and AAC (maybe delitt, harris etc if we get desperate). Barnes and giteau should only be in the squad to cover for a cooper injury and the consequent reshuffle that will need to take place.
Cattledog
Guest
Brett, we must be happier with this performance but as Rickety and others have mentioned, there's still a number of litmus tests to go. Whilst I thought Elsom lifted in this game, and as Warrenexpatnz knows, I'm still not a fan of him with the captainsy. I have been critical of his captainsy in the past and continue to be. He looks a lot better with the likes of Horwill, Pocock and Genia in close support. He still flounders, however, without these guys which for my mind, doesn't auger well for the hard games, as was shown against Samoa. Like many other posters, I think he would perform better relieved of this burden. I was also at a loss in the game last Saturday when Australia had proved they could score tries (unlike in the Samoan game) and we had a very comfortable lead, he opted to kick for goal rather than at this stage kick for touch and keep the pressure on. Some may think this to be the best option, however, there needs to be decisions made whereby pressure is maintained at the appropriate times. He can't seem to think laterally when need be. I have no doubt if fit, Rocky will be retained as captain as Robbie Deans doesn't appear to want to change, especially after the public anointing he gave him. I only hope we can maintain a strong support base for him as I fear, if left to his own devices, he may just crash and burn.
Jerry
Guest
John Eales was 21 when the Wallabies won the World Cup in 91, meaning he was the same age as Simmons in that classic Bledisloe series in 1992. I think it's safe to say 22 year old Eales was a far better player than Simmons is now.
Cattledog
Guest
Should have known some would miss the point, thought you were smarter than that PeterK. How long have you watched John Eales? How long have you watched Rob Simmons? I will guarantee I've watched BOTH a lot more than you! Ability...the power to do or act... It would only be the really stupid who would construe what I said into saying Simmons is equal to John Eales at his best. If the cap fits... Having watched both from youngsters, there are quite a lot of similarities. Simmons is 22, and very similar to a 22 YO John Eales. Let's compare apples with apples eh, instead of the ludicrous rant about overhyping, rose coloured glasses and comparing a young Simmons with John Eales in his prime, as you have obviously done.
Christorm
Guest
Heading in the right direction. Opposition was sub par, when they next play a full strength Springboks team in South Africa will be a true gauge of their progress. One thing it did show was Australia's player depth is non- existent. Be interesting to see what the AB's will do to the Springboks this weekend. The AB's will still have top tier players on the rested list for this game. Looking forward to the AB's v. Wallabies game. Should be a cracker! -- Comment left via The Roar's iPhone app. Download The Roar's iPhone App in the App Store here.
McGee
Guest
Haha never a truer word spoken* *written
PeterK
Guest
hahahahah cattledog what a laugh. Talking about OVERHYPING a player. Sure can tell you wear rose coloured glasses. Eales may have been our best player ever at least our best lock ever. Now you say Simmons has the same ability as Eales, what over the top crap.
The Other Reds Fan.
Guest
Brett, Ben Lucas should have been in instead of Giteau.
Cattledog
Guest
Mo, I've been trying to put my finger on it but I think you have summed it up extremely well. Rob Simmons DOES have a John Eales demeanour and ability about him. He doesn't have to be the bully or the in your face guy...just go about his business efficiently and effectively. You've hit the nail on the proverbial head.