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Michael Cheika’s Wallabies have suffered their first loss, defeated by 29 to 26 at the hands of the French in a fiercely contested game at Stade Français on Sunday morning.
No doubt some of you will be lighting your torches, picking up your pitchforks and joining the angry mob outside the Camp Wallaby preparing to overthrow Cheika should we suffer another loss or heaven forbid two on tour.
But before we put his head atop a stake next to John Connolly, Robbie Deans and Ewen McKenzie, let’s step inside the local tavern, order a pint and have a good old fashioned yarn about rugby.
Following the victory over Wales, writer Spiro Zavos penned an article entitled 10 out of 10 for the Wallabies against Wales while colleague Scott Allen’s musings the same week started The Wallabies take three steps backwards.
This brings us to the obvious question – who is right?
The position of their international team in the dubious IRB World Rankings in no way reflects the French affinity for the game of rugby.
This is the very same nation who lost to an All Blacks team, often called the best that has ever played, in the last World Cup final by just one single point. They have made it past the pool stage more times than any other team except for New Zealand, whom they equal – having done so in six out of seven tournaments.
So let’s drop the pretense that the French are somehow second-tier. They are a proud rugby nation and over the course of history, are the best to have never hoisted the William Webb Ellis trophy by a large margin
They are a challenge fit for any opponent and the discussions should really be about how the Wallaby squad stacked up.
There is no denying it, Australia’s fundamentals were abysmal for the supposed third or fourth best team in the world. When Fox Sports showed the stats at half time, they were worse in every error-related area than the French.
Bernard Foley had an absolute shocker, the worst of his Test career to date and Israel Folau was out of sorts, dropping at least as many balls as in his entire Test campaign for 2014 thus far.
Tevita Kuridrani was yet solid yet quiet and his partner in the centres was MIA.
The only stand out contribution in the backline came from Adam Ashley-Cooper, who reminded us again why he continues to be selected in a team wealthy in wingers. Joe Tomane showed an ability to play Test rugby that we have not seen before.
Tomane’s performance was by no means perfect, but for the first time in his career he looked like the kind of player who could stay in the Wallabies for a very long time.
However, in a twist which none of us expected, the routinely underwhelming Wallaby forward pack showed some real signs of life on Sunday morning.
The second row has long been the squad’s biggest weakness and James Horwill has recently been very ordinary in my opinion. Yet he and lock partner Rob Simmons stepped up and brought the kind of mongrel that we have been so desperately lacking in recent years.
They were simply brutal in defense and both improved considerably in the set piece and general play. I am going to call that a flicker of the magic we saw from Cheika at the Waratahs with Kane Douglas and Jacques Potgeiter, both of whom reached new and lofty heights under his mentorship.
The starting front-row, Sekope Kepu and James Slipper too performed exceptionally. The outstanding (save from one absent replay for a TMO review of a charge on Sa’ia Fainga) broadcast, in particular the overhead angles showed just how brutal the attempt by the French scrum to shift Australia was and yet the starting five were more or less on par.
One can only hope that Cheika will find a way to bring the two Bens, Robinson and Alexander, up to Test standard as their scrummaging left much to be desired. Their ball running – though frequent – was very clumsy.
The Wallabies tend to play a more expansive game in the final ten minutes and while I have no statistic to support it, I suspect that the reserve props account for far more than their fair share of handling errors in this crucial period. I would like to see them redirected to rucking and defense to avoid these mistakes.
So, back to my original question. Who is right, Scott or Spiro?
Well, at the risk of sounding like a fence-sitter, my opinion is that they both are. If you read their write-ups with any degree of regularity you will know that Spiro is a rugby historian and romantic. He loves the spirit and the soul of the game, his response to the French victory this week makes that very clear.
Scott, on the other hand – though he loves the game equally – is much more clinical. His technical analysis is second to none and his comments on the Wales test are entirely justified and I expect and would respect nothing less than equal criticism this week.
In short, they are weighing the Wallabies on two different sets of scales.
Technically flawed as the Wallabies last two performances may be, it is clear that the winds of change are swirling around the team and the attitude in attack and defense which has been missing, some might say since the 2003 World Cup, is finally sneaking out of the players.
The Wallabies played the game in a positive spirit, with enthusiasm and ambition and class. So profound is the effect that despite the conditions, the crowd and the French TV producers being against them – as well as a referee who is completely unsympathetic to the Australian style of play – they managed to come within three points of a French outfit who are formidable at any time, let alone at home.
And yes, there are problems, but these are a matter of team coordination. Realistically, what else should we expect from a team who has been adopting new patterns in every facet and had only four weeks to adapt to their new coach?
The other huge positive is that Cheika is showing the in-game decision making that was so painfully missing with predecessor Ewen McKenzie.
Bringing on Rob Horne in the cameo role of kamikaze centre to front the behemoth Mathieu Bastareaud was in itself an important mental victory for the Wallalbies, but what the coach did next was the masterstroke.
Having used Horne to wear down Bastereud, which I am pretty sure translated to English means ‘Big Bastard’ he then matched him with the fleet-footed Quade Cooper who ran rings around the tiring giant.
This was key to the effectiveness of Cooper’s final 10 minutes.
The question then becomes not whether Cheika can ‘fix’ the Wallabies as he has already done what his predecessors could not and broken the mindset of old. The questions becomes whether he can appease Scott and lift his technical coaching to the demands of the top level.
Cheika’s seasons with Leinster and the Waratahs – where he won the Heineken Cup and Super Rugby tournament – make him the only person to do so. Both stints started poorly, with his teams experiencing losses in the early rounds before rebounding to win the biggest prize on offer.
When you introduce a new coach, it is all a matter of risk and reward. The coach can try to take one-step backwards and two forward and maintain a winning record or take five backwards and get a run up and carry momentum to build a team which peaks at the right time by sacrificing early in the season.
To me, the way he talked throughout the 2014 Waratahs’ season, makes it clear he opts for the second approach.
At the Test level – the highest standard of the game – no one should expect that a coach would take on a team as challenging as the Wallabies and immediately establish dominance on the world stage.
But, if I am reading it right, and we afford Cheika the same luxury of having time to adapt to Test-pace as we would any player new to the elite tier, we might just end up with a team hitting their stride in time for the Rugby World Cup next year.
What we have in front of us is an unusual coaching talent. His existing record already makes him one of a kind and if we as the voice and the fans of rugby make the effort to promote and support him, rather than live in fear or failure, his career might just blossom enough to outlast the ARU’s hair trigger and blossom into something extremely valuable.
This article is therefore my appeal to you, the gathering angry mob of Australian fans. Please lay down your pitchforks and snuff out your torches. Ot’s less than 12 months to the World Cup and it’s time to drop the idea of anyone other than the incumbent holding the reigns and simply support him – and most importantly the team – with everything we’ve got.
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.