Lions loss in Dunedin yet another lesson in match awareness

In today’s professional, video-heavy environment, it’s fair to assume the Lions coaching staff and players would have seen plenty of the Highlanders leading into Saturday’s Round 13 Super Rugby clash.

If so, they would have seen how the Highlanders butchered the end-game against the Force earlier in the season. They would surely have made a mental note, should they find themselves in the same situation, to do things differently.

The Highlanders were finishing all over the top of a gallant, 13-man Force in Round 5, and required a converted try in the last few minutes to win. Via a combination of stout Force defence and an inexplicable lack of urgency, the Highlanders made very heavy weather of it, lacking the organisation and composure to create what seemed a certain winning try near the posts.

Instead, they worked the ball free to the left-hand side to outflank the undermanned defence and score in the corner, leaving Hayden Parker with the most difficult of kicks to win the game.

To give himself a better angle, Parker took the ball back beyond the 22, and this looked to have paid off when his conversion attempt looked to be sailing between the uprights. The strategy backfired when the kick fell short of the crossbar, consigning the Highlanders to losing a match they had every right to win.

On Saturday the Lions found themselves on the same pitch, in a very similar situation. Admittedly they were against a full 15, not 13, but the Highlanders were completely out of gas off the back of their South Africa trip and the Lions, with all the momentum, had the game at their mercy.

The final few minutes were spent hard on the Highlanders goal-line, with the Lions this time the team requiring a converted try to win. They zeroed in on the posts with close contact pick and drives, but were repelled each time by a gutsy, sometimes infringing ‘no-gaps’ defence.

They also looked to be close to scoring up against the left upright, with the TMO surely only just failing to find sufficient justification for awarding a try. Too many times the Lions resorted to one-out attack, with player after player taking their turn at peeling off the back of the ruck only to be rejected by a willing defence.

One can only wonder how, in the flow of any game, sides find it relatively easy to pick up close-in metres off the pick and drive, yet once within sight of the goal-line forward progress becomes much harder. While defences automatically steel up, attackers often play too conservatively in the name of getting organised, which gives the defence that same amount of time to get better organised as well.

With the general quality of goal-kicking seemingly improving with each season and the Lions already having achieved victories this season off their boot, perhaps scoring next to the posts wasn’t seen as essential.

And to be fair, tries are often difficult enough to come by as it is without expecting sides to get too cute about exactly where on the field they score them.

But how much use is a try in the corner to a side requiring seven points to win? Surely there must be an attitude and discernible team strategy in place to ensure that the conversion attempt is realistically achievable, instead of relying on a miracle kick from the sideline.

What puzzled most about the Lions is that, under the shadows of the goalposts and pressing for the kill, they were granted penalty advantage and thus had an extra opportunity up their sleeve had they chosen to be more assertive and daring in going for the try.

But seemingly without a strategy nor sufficient consciousness as to what was required, they moved the ball to the left, where Courtnall Skosan was on hand to finish. Skosan inexplicably displayed little awareness of the situation, diving over and planting the ball where there seemed to be an opportunity to bring the ball in towards the posts.

As a result, replacement Elton Jantjies was entrusted with the miracle kick to win the match. Like Parker in Round 5, he chose to take the ball well back beyond the 22 to open up the angle. And just like Parker before him, Jantjies kicked accurately but suffered for the extra angle sought, and the ball dropped agonisingly short.

He cut a disconsolate figure afterwards, but too much was asked of Jantjies to win the match. Earlier in the half, starting fly-half Marnitz Boshoff, lauded for dead-eye kicking throughout the season, missed other far more kickable conversions which cost the Lions more dearly.

Professionalism has bought many facets which are obvious advancements over rugby from previous generations – conditioning, nutrition and forward ball skills being some of the more notable. But despite the emergence of sports psychologists and plenty of time provided for development of individual mental strength and discussion of team tactics, there remains a lack of situational awareness on the part of many players.

Professionalism has certainly not made today’s players any smarter than their predecessors. Too many players seemingly play out matches without any acute understanding of what is required at a certain point in time.

It is the same reason why we see some players repeatedly return kicks from the back with another kick when a fractured line offers a counterattacking opportunity, or vice versa. These players get by on their physical attributes but are the poorer for lacking ‘game smarts’.

Ahead of the Dunedin match on Saturday, the New Zealand Warriors toweled up the Canberra Raiders in an NRL match at Auckland’s Eden Park. Behind by 54-6, the Raiders received an attacking scrum in the final minute from which they could mount a final attempt at salvaging some credibility.

As the scrum took time to form, Warriors halfback Shaun Johnson could be seen imploring all his side to stay strong and dig in for a final defensive set. What Johnson was acutely aware of was that his side had, in one fell swoop, made up a massive -47 points differential and turned it into a +1.

In such an even competition with intense competition for finals places, points differential will almost certainly be a telling factor in determining the finalists. Johnson was clearly on top of this.

From the scrum, where Johnson was the only Warrior defending with any real intensity, a kick was stabbed through and the Raiders scored a soft try.

The Warriors duly gathered behind the goal-line, outwardly tired but happy with their day’s work and their morale-boosting win. Johnson alone stood out, visibly upset at the try being allowed, seemingly the only player aware of the possible implications later in the season.

My point? Johnson, in addition to being a rare, electric talent, has football awareness in spades.

If a couple more of the Lions players had the same, they could well have left Dunedin with a treasured away win to their credit, instead of coming away frustratingly empty handed.