In 1927, Professor Thomas Parnell of the University of Queensland in Brisbane wished to demonstrate to students that some substances that appear to be solid, are in fact, very-high-viscosity fluids.
Parnell poured a heated sample of pitch into a sealed funnel and allowed it to settle for three years. In 1930, the seal at the neck of the funnel was cut, allowing the pitch to start flowing.
A glass dome covered the funnel and it was placed on display outside a lecture theatre.
During the course of the interminable experiment, single droplets form and fall over the period of about a decade, which, if last night is any indication, is apparently about the length of an Australia vs France rugby Test match.
Boring doesn’t begin to describe it.
Dull? Perhaps. Ho-hum? Maybe. Irksome? Definitely. Certainly it was slow, tedious, tiresome, uninteresting and wearisome.
This of course is a terrible shame for the Wallabies because you can only play the side that is lined up in front of you.
One might want to play a scintillating, physical, fast-moving, memorable Test match which will endure for years and have the anoraks frothing in decades hence, but if the opposition can’t handle, won’t tackle, and doesn’t really want to play, then it takes a bit of the fizz out of things.
The Wallabies scored seven tries to two, winning 50-23, which is a comprehensive drubbing in anyone’s language. The problem is that they were hardly tested for any of it. Folau waltzed over in the 19th minute as though he was playing backyard touch.
Hooper, Cummins, Beale and McCabe also made the simplest of work of finding the tryline, with Beale laughing surprisedly like a schoolboy who has stolen a cooling pie off a windowsill, and McCabe having the good grace to at least look at little embarrassed about the ease with which he added to his Test tally.
Indeed, the most golden moment of this Test match was tarnished a little by the inept French performance. 25 years after his father David played his last Test against France, Sam Carter made his debut for the Wallabies after several strong games for the Brumbies in Super Rugby, and was a deserved man of the match with a tireless effort, including a game high 18 tackles.
The shame of it was that Carter was given no better than a provincial strength team upon which to demonstrate his undoubted quality.
His response during the aftermatch interview said it all. “Link picked me for my workrate, so I just went out and did what I was told to do”.
Astute observers would have realised the truth behind the innocent comment, that not only did Carter do as he was told, but more importantly, he was allowed to do as he was told.
The All Blacks, Springboks and England would not have given the rookie such latitude in his first outing.
The French were poor. Not quite as poor as the English of 1998 who were trounced 76 points to nil in an 11-try Brisbane towelling, or the awful Welsh of 1991, who were whipped at Ballymore 12 tries to none, but certainly not a French side of recognisable Test standard. There was no indication that they would pose any real threat to an Australian side which was in third gear for most of the match.
The reasons are sad and several.
Experienced players Fulgence Ouedraogo, Frederic Michalak and Wesley Fofana might have been reasonably expected to carry this French side to some sort of parity, but instead were rarely sighted and of questionable influence.
The situation was aggravated by the surprising omission of one of the world’s great sixes in Thierry Dusatoir, and of the powerful running number eight Louis Picamoles, both of whom might have been expected to cause trouble for the Wallabies through the 10 and 12 channels.
Not surprisingly, the French found it hard to make inroads into the Australian defence, running for just 450 metres in total. Australia, by contrast, ran for 685, aided by the French distaste for defence, as they missed a massive 13 tackles during the match.
With the ball, France were just as fractured. There was no evidence of any ability to close up, play phases, build pressure.
The French are known for their attacking flair, but there was no sign of this either. Simply put, Les Bleus played little rugby of any stripe – defensive, conservative, positive or otherwise – and questions must be asked of the strategic nous of coach Philippe Saint-Andre.
Whereas the French were like a piece of dry white toast – plain and uninteresting – watching Craig Joubert referee was like walking barefoot over an endless floor covered with a thousand pieces of Lego. Could Joubert be any more painful?
Steve Walsh is abrasive, patronising and officious, but he has one saving grace which places him above every other referee in the pantheon, and that is that he makes decisions. On several occasions, when faced with the option of going upstairs or just awarding the try, Walsh backs his instinct and gives the try, most often giving benefit of the doubt to the attacking team.
Joubert is the Bizzarro-Walsh who does the opposite. When faced with the choice of awarding a try or going upstairs, Joubert almost always opts out and lets the video guy do the hard yards. Don’t ever ask him to a movie or to dinner, because when it comes to making a decision, he is so dithery it is staggering.
The pinnacle came last night when Joubert referred the late try to Morgan Parra.
After an age of backwards and forwards, and endless replays, Joubert was clearly heard to say “Well, I saw a part of the ball touch the line, so it is a try”. Less charitable reviewers would ask why the bloody hell he didn’t just award it in the first place then, but as I say, they would be the less charitable.
Of course, the real horror in all of this was that it followed just minutes after New Zealand and England had fought themselves to a standstill in a Test match of rare quality at Eden Park. This Test was physical, fast, skilful and tense, going right down to the wire, before the All Blacks snatched a cruel win 20-15 courtesy of a Conrad Smith try.
On that form, and given the doubts over the likes of McCaw, Nonu, Read, Smith et al to get through unscathed to next year’s World Cup, England must be firming in the betting.
By contrast, France have allowed us to see almost nothing of what this Australian team might be able to do in a real Test match, and after Saturday’s snorefest, they also show no signs of filling stadiums in the next few weeks.
For Australian rugby fans faced with the prospect of a repeat performance in Melbourne next week, just remember, there’s also a drop of pitch slowly dripping out of a beaker at Queensland University. Not quite as entertaining perhaps, but not far off.
OldManEmu
Guest
Andrew Logan, the Quade Cooper of Australian Rugby journos. Who knew?
Bones506
Roar Guru
I think you watched a replay of an old game or wrote this to generate comments - which you have. The aim of writing seems to be to create controversy and generate hits. Don't let facts or a quality performance get in the way of the truth or getting your stats up. I watched some brilliant, attacking rugby on sat night Had the ABs won in such a fashion would yolu praise them?
sheek
Roar Guru
Yeah, all cool. I would have gone with AAC, but no problem with Hooper either.
RobC
Roar Guru
It is as you called it, Double Agent. However, I had the same thoughts as sheek. I think Hooper will need a lot of help, especially when (i) the going gets tough (ii) terms need to be dictated (iii) he needs to get people to gel
Hal V
Guest
Craig Joubert apparently believes that patrons of Test rugby watch matches to be constantly enthralled with his dreary interventionist refereeing.Often he stands so close to the rucks that the attacking team's half back might well conclude that Craig is impatiently waiting to take the first pass ! I entirely agree with your comments Andrew Logan about Craig holding up the game for several minutes to no good purpose before delivering his ponderous diagnosis to the effect that he had seen that Morgan Parra had grounded part of the ball on the line "so I am going to award the try"- so why go to the replay and waste still more bloody time? Craig was also loudly determined to rule that Kurandrani's skillful deflection was definitely a forward pass and to disallow Australia's try but at the last minute was fortunately pulled up by the replay ref who urged Craig to take a longer look at the video replay. As far as the strength of the French team is concerned all of the players from both sides who competed in the French 14 final will be reinforcing their national side for the second test next weekend. This will certainly not be a walk in the park for the Wallabies. Aux armes citoyens!!
Zero Gain
Guest
Find one comment where a Wallaby fan has said that, except in jest.
sheek
Roar Guru
Hooper's elevation is far from a 'fait accompli' mainly because McKenzie refused post-test to confirm Hooper as the captain for the next test. It was convenient to pass the captaincy baton to him after Moore was injured. However, I wouldn't be calling Hooper a certainty for captain next test. In actual fact, I think there is a better reason to name AAC as captain. It will be interesting to see how this pans out during the week.
soapit
Guest
mate that really takes this to quite a weird place that you would come on the roar to tell strangers from the internet that you are/were imagining them as youngish teenagers reading lingerie catalogues in front of the rugby. i'm really starting to become uncomfortable with you using me in your imagination at all even if it does somehow make you feel better about england losing in so many sports it attempts. i dont really want to be a part of this sort of thing and maybe you should stop sharing so much of yourself as well
expathack
Guest
Toomua weak link on defence?????
expathack
Guest
That's just a flat out bizarre opinion to hold. Being part of some kind of roar "in-crowd" should give no shelter from getting called out. Particularly when you're writing such obvious dribble. It's also somewhat ironic that you're claiming a founder of this site should be somehow immune to critcsm. Seems to me the whole purpose of roar, and a lot of new media in general, is to provide a platform for all to comment on journalistic opinion. Rather than just take the words of a privileged few as unassailable diktat.
expathack
Guest
To be fair, Toomua wasn't the clearcut form inside back in SR last year. He probably shared that honour with another bloke Deans refused to select.
Double Agent
Guest
Rob C. Hooper was the Vice Captain. When Moore went off he was the Captain. Moore is out. Hooper will be the Captain. Why is this so difficult to understand?
Double Agent
Guest
4th string side? You are really stretching it there!
ChrisT
Guest
You don't think there was some kind of moral victory for the English there? Really? They took nothing from what was a pretty good performance from a largely second and third (actually and fourth) string side at Eden Park. Think you'll find it's not just England followers that think they did. More importantly, Lancaster and his team are claiming no moral victory themselves - they're genuinely racked off they let that slip.
expathack
Guest
Mike You're right Wallabies did win 5 in a row under Deans, 2011 saw a six game streak which included wins over rugby powerhouses USA and Russia. Unfortunately that streak came to an end against Ireland. You might remember that one. It was the game in which your idol Robbie selected Ben McCalman at number 7. And came up with the genius idea of having a rookie inside centre do crash ball after crash ball straight into the arms of the two best choke tacklers in the game, O'Connell and O'Brien Also interesting to note that you see no difference between the selection policies of Deans and Link in terms of picking on "form" Particularly in light of the fact that one of Australia's best over the last few games has been Matt Toomua at IC. You know that bloke? The one who was probably the form Australian fly half in super rugby last year. Yet Deans chose to ignore him in favour of picking a kid with zero experience and an attitude problem at 5/8. Not only that but he also put him alongside a guy at inside centre who not only had consistently proven he was not up to that level in that position, but was also just three games back from a broken neck. Australia also lost their last three matches first up, including horror shows against Scotland and Samoa. If you can't see any change in the team now, compared to the last couple of years you are blind. We're not world beaters by any means but at least they're guys in form playing with some heart and flair. Which is a welcome change.
RobC
Roar Guru
Its not that easy. If he starts as Captain next week (22yo), he will be the most inexperienced Captain ever in professional Oz Rugby. Also most inexperienced in at least 30 years in Rugby history. The only one close to him is Mark Ella (23), who's captaincy was dropped for Andrew Slack. Average age for first captaincy is around 27 yo. Some examples: - Eales 26yo - Poidevin, Gregan, Mowen 28yo - George Smith 27 Im a big fan of Hooper, and believe he is going to be one of the best players and leaders ever. But starting him too early may not good be for him, or WBs. I don't want him to be Ella'd or for that matter, Genia'd. If he's given the job, I think he will need strong 'supporting structures' til Moore recovers.
ChrisT
Guest
Well, you see what you want to see I guess - but I've never watched a game of anything that bored me for 75 minutes. Then again, if you're sitting there watching any proper Test match waiting for S15 space and time with intensity dropped down several notches, well, you're not watching a proper Test match. Shame you missed the Wallabies game - I think you'd have liked that one .....
ChrisT
Guest
In the way that a real contest is
JimmyB
Guest
Well I apologise, your post can be misconstrued though.
ChrisT
Guest
It's worse than a six year olds birthday party. Gordon Bray has always sounded like an over excited and over awed schoolboy (the 'voice of rugby' .....really?) but this current fascination is worse than that same party of six year olds discovering the word 'fart'. Cringe worthy barely covers it.