SPIRO: Brilliant Wallabies boot England out of World Cup

You live by the scrum. You die by the scrum. This was England’s fate in losing to a brilliant Wallabies side, 33-13 at Fortress Twickenham (for Australia!).

England were scrummed into the Twickenham turf and out of the match. And, essentially, booted out of the 2015 Rugby World Cup even though they have one match, against Uruguay, yet to play.

England, along with co-host Wales in 1991, become only the second team ever to host a World Cup and not make the finals. And they join France (from the 2007 World Cup) as the only sole host nation not to make the final in eight tournaments.

This was one of the Wallabies’ greatest victories in a World Cup, a tournament the side has already won twice. New Zealand journalists, who know a thing or two about these matters, are already touting the Wallabies, on the strength of this outstanding victory, as the favourites now to win their third Webb Ellis trophy.

You would have to say that on this performance, which reduced Fortress Twickenham to a rubble of lost England dreams, was the best all-round display of total rugby in the 2015 World Cup. So far, of course. But so convincing were the Wallabies that I would make the fearless prediction that they will beat Wales at Twickenham next week.

If this happens, they will go into the finals as an unbeaten team. So far, in seven World Cups, the winner of the Webb Ellis trophy has won all seven of their matches.

As Sun-Tzu, the legendary Chinese general, is supposed to have said, “All battles are won before the battle is fought”.

And this is the truth about the Wallabies’ performance. When Michael Cheika was unexpectedly elevated to the job of coaching the Wallabies around this time last year, he inherited a team which, along with many off-field problems, had one major weakness on the field – a shonky scrum that could hardly push over a sand castle.

England exploited this shonky scrum syndrome at Twickenham a year ago, literally scrumming the Wallabies into defeat.

Move forward a year. We are at Twickenham again. This time it is the most important pool round match in Rugby World Cup history. Either England, the host nation, or Australia was going to loss the match. The loss would certainly mean the end of England in the tournament.

And a loss by the Wallabies would probably have seen them out of the tournament. If they somehow had then defeated Wales by enough points or whatever, the Wallabies would have gone into the finals down the route that leads to New Zealand in the semi-final, at the earliest.

When the Wallabies beat Wales (see my fearless prediction) they get into the side of the finals draw that means they meet the All Blacks (still the favourite to win the tournament, in my opinion) in the final, if these teams get that far.

So this was shoot-out at the last saloon stuff.

In place of the fastest gun in the West, England brandished its superiority in the scrums. The England players, their coaches and the English media made no secret of the fact that England was going to use its presumed domination in the scrums to destroy any hopes of the Wallabies backs carving out a famous victory.

What is more, the host nation had somehow contrived to arrange for the most severe scrum critic, the former French policeman Romain Poite, to be the match referee.

Poite is famous or infamous (depending on which side you are supporting) for making a quick judgment about the strongest scrumming side, and then giving that side all the scrum penalties. Generally this judgment was ballasted by a prior belief about which side had the better scrum. In this case, Poite has made it clear in previous Tests that he considers the Wallabies to be hopeless scrummagers.

Just what England wanted, you would think, given their presumption about the power of their eight.

Here we come to Cheika. Instead of somehow trying to cover up the Wallabies’ scrum weakness with cunning tricks and sly play (think Al Baxter and Benn Robinson), he confronted it. He appointed a scrumming guru, the Pumas’ strong man prop Mario Ledesma. Ledesma was under instructions to make the Wallabies scrum a competitive force.

England, on the other hand, became complacent about its scrumming superiority. They tolerated, possibly encouraged Joe Marler, a bovver-boy type prop with an appropriate mohawk, the hair design equivalent of a tattoo, to scrum in on angle, illegally.

This illegal scrumming was picked up by Jonathan Kaplan in a tweet during England’s win over Fiji. During that match the Fiji scrum, against all predictions, got on top of the England pack in several decisive scrums.

All this prompted Bob Dwyer, who has status in the UK as a former winning Rugby World Cup coach (Australia 1991), to write articles and hit the media trail with complaints about Marler’s scrumming technique, or lack of technique.

The Roar and other sports blogs did the right thing, too, by showing rugbycam photos of Marler boring in, illegally, in scrums against Fiji.

Now we come to the 48th minute of the Wallabies-England ‘Pool of Death’ decider. The Wallabies win a short-arm penalty from a scrum about 35 metres out from England’s posts. Stephen Moore, confident of the Ledesma drills, orders another scrum, rather than take a tap kick.

This was a moment of truth for the Wallabies. Could the scrum hold and give the Wallabies some front ball for the backs to use?

The Wallabies eight shoved England off the ball. Penalty to the Wallabies! Man of the match Bernard Foley, who had one of the great games for a Wallabies No.10, right up there with Mark Ella and Stephen Larkham at their best, calmly kicked the penalty. Australia 20-3 England.

Game over?

England didn’t think so. For the next 10 minutes England started to think and play positively. For the first time, they kicked off short to retrieve the ball. They got width on their attacks, once almost conceding an interception by Foley, who was illegally blocked by Dan Cole (which went unpunished).

Pause here for moment. Dwyer has always argued that teams should start attacking from the beginning of the match, not when they are behind with time running out. I agree with this. But England teams through the ages have the same gameplan: win through playing with the courage of their restrictions.

Play it tight, prey on errors and kick the goals. The problem with this style is that when England get behind they find it difficult to change gears to racing speed. It is not their usual speed. They are uncomfortable with it. And so it proved in this match. Even when they had momentum between the 60- and 70-minute marks, they lacked any real fluency.

And it was very dependent on a referee giving England a plethora of kickable penalties. This did not happen against the Wallabies. And the reason why it did not happen is that England’s main source of penalties, the scrum, was turned off by the resolute play of the Wallabies pack.

Anyway, the short kick-off worked to start a hoped-for surging comeback. George Ford, who should have been in the starting XV, then created space for Anthony Watson and the flier went across for a try. A conversion from Owen Farrell pulled the score line to 20-10.

Then the Wallabies conceded another penalty. Again, as he has all tournament, Farrell banged over the kick. The score line was now 20-13. With England rampant and the crowd suddenly finding its voice, it was game on.

We are now in the 68th minute. England have a scrum on their 30-metre mark. Romain Poite tells the two packs, “It’s been a long time no scrums. Take care”.

There is a tremendous struggle after the feed. Finally, the two packs collapse to the ground. Poite looks at the mess of bodies. He decides he can’t make a decision. He orders a re-set. In previous games, it is virtually certain Poite would have given a penalty to England.

“Great scrum!” a Wallabies forward yells.

The next scrum England scramble the ball out to Watson, on the blindside wing. The intention is to set up a one-on-one contest between the England flier and Foley, hidden out on the wing.

But the pressure from the Wallabies scrum has shoved England backwards and sideways. The ball is shovelled to Watson under pressure. The winger’s kick slides off his boot into touch on the full.

The Wallabies win the lineout and run an intricate backline play. Backs are in motion all over the place in a Larkham special. The England backs are confused. Sam Burgess takes the ball-runner Foley high with a swinging arm. The ball is spilled. Farrell puts his shoulder into Matt Giteau, coming into the line as a dummy runner.

There are bodies lying around on the ground, with Giteau doubled up in pain.

The TMO South African Shaun Veldsman and referee Poite go through the video replays. It is possible that both England players will be given a yellow card.

But in the end Burgess is allowed to stay on the field, after one final replay to ensure the accuracy of the decision. Farrell, though, is given a yellow card. England have to play the last nine minutes with 14 men.

Foley, as he has throughout the match, converts the penalty. Australia 23-13 England. And now it is really game over.

That pressure scrum, although it did not create a penalty for the Wallabies, did stop England’s momentum. And in a sense, it was in this case a poison rather than a dagger for England’s hopes.

The really decisive scrum came earlier in the 34th minute of the match.

The Wallabies have a scrum in their own half. They are leading 10-3. The scrum goes down. The Wallabies are going forward. But Poite looks unconvinced. His arm looks as though it is going to give the penalty to England. Then he switches and awards the penalty to the Wallabies.

Marler is the culprit. The assisant referee has spotted him boring in and then collapsing to the ground. The Kaplan and Dwyer double-play has paid off for the Wallabies.

From a lineout inside England’s half, the Wallabies do their first Larkham special. The ball is driven forward to the middle of the field. On the replay, you can see Foley calling his forwards to drive it to the left while he starts to position himself for a burst towards the right and wide, very wide blindside.

Foley makes his run. He is trailed by Kurtley Beale. A slick inside pass. A Beale burst. Back again to Foley. An inside step confusing the cover defence. Try! With the conversion, the Wallabies go into a 17-3 lead which in retrospect is the winning of the match.

More importantly, Poite is finally convinced that the dominant scrum in the match is owned by the Wallabies. From this point on, England struggled at scrum time. Later in the match, just before England’s resurgence, Marler is warned by Poite about boring-in. This means a yellow card if he does it again. He is subbed.

The point here is that Wayne Smith reported in The Australian on Saturday that England had “appealed to World Rugby’s referee boss Joel Jutge for reassurance that all is well with their scrum technique after former Wallabies coach Bob Dwyer accused their loosehead Joe Marler of illegal tactics.”

I have never heard of this sort of appeal being made during a Rugby World Cup and wonder about its propriety. Presumably Marler was given a clean bill of health by Jutge, a Frenchman like Poite, because he continued scrumming (illegally) against the Wallabies as he had against Wales.

This appeal by England, along with Poite’s predetermined belief that the Wallabies scrum could not contest with England’s, probably was enough early on for them to get away with their boring-in tactics. But once Poite (and his assistants) saw with their own eyes what was happening, England’s illegal game was up.

So England’s scrum, which began with a bang by forcing two penalties early on (when Poite was still in his anti-Wallabies scrum mode), ended with a whimper as the enforcer was forced from the field because the Wallabies had convinced even Poite that they had England’s measure at scrum time.

This huge scrum credibility victory will pay off for the Wallabies as the tournament continues. Wales, for instance, will now be under the cosh at scrum time in the eyes of the match referee Frenchman Jerome Garces.

The point here is that the Wales scrum had problems with England and Fiji.

So many aspects of the Wallabies play, aside from their scrum strength, were admirable throughout the match. They opened up confidently by passing the ball along the back line, under their posts, before making a clearing kick.

The value of this tactic is that it forces the opposition to continue their chase, after the initial ruck. And it allows the backs to get a touch of the ball, bringing them into the game. As a youngster in New Zealand we were always told to move the ball along the line immediately so that the backs ‘get a feel of the leather’, in this case the white Gilbert hi-tech plastic.

Michael Hooper chased the clearing kick and put a huge tackle on Farrell. The ball spilled loose and we had the first scrum of the match.

The commentators wondered why Farrell didn’t kick the usual England up-an-under. I think England went into the match with the intention of using their back four, all speedsters, to run back kicks. But Hooper’s smashing tackle on Farrell seemingly dissuaded him from this tactic for the rest of the match.

Hooper’s speed was something England had anticipated, obviously, but they didn’t expect him to be quite as fast as he was.

The way the Wallabies used the David Pocock and Michael Hooper combination was brilliant. Pocock was used at the back of the lineout for hard runs into the middle of the field and to force turnovers (four by my count) before the ball went wide.

Hooper was used as a second outside centre. He often zeroed in on runners from his wide positioning, blind-siding them with crashing tackles. He was used, too, in a lineout for a driving maul.

This combination of attacking fetchers in the middle of the field and out wide proved to be impossible for England to unlock. They made some breaks, occasionally in close and occasionally out wide. But wherever the break was made, the Wallabies, in their scramble back to cover, invariably had either Pocock or Hooper to slow down the attack, and often stifle it completely.

The attention to detail in the Wallabies’ gameplan was a credit to Cheika and his coaching staff, Larkham, Nathan Grey and Ledesma. This gameplan should be kept as one of the great defining documents on Australian rugby.

England’s full back Mike Brown was devastating running the ball against Fiji and Wales. He is a left-foot punter of the ball. But attention to detail time: the Wallabies kicked to the corner where he had to use his right boot.

In the first minute of the game, Brown put a foot into touch from this side of the field. He was obviously concerned about how he could position himself to make an effective but very difficult left-foot kick.

I counted only one Wallabies kick to Brown’s left-foot side. As a consequence, Brown’s running and kicking game was thwarted.

Cheika excelled, too, with his selection nous. Beale came on and played a blinder, on the wing. He chased the kick-offs. He ran the line for the inside-pass try superbly. He was full of energy and aggression. His play was a reminder that he did not play in the semi-final in 2011 Rugby World Cup against the All Blacks. He had been in superb form in that tournament and his loss was a big blow to Robbie Deans’ Wallabies.

Now he looks like he will and should start as a winger against Wales in place of the injured Rob Horne.

The Wallabies second row, Kane Douglas and Rob Simmonds, were (and I have to confess to being wrong on this) a formidable combination in the lineouts and pushing in the scrums.

Matt Giteau, another ring-in by Cheika (and again I have to acknowledge being wrong here), was the cool head who made a telling tackle, the incisive break, the great kick out of defence when it was particularly needed.

The nature of tournaments is that great days like this one by the Wallabies need to be followed by further great days. So all eyes will be on the Wallabies next weekend when they play Wales for the right to be the top team in their pool.

England, in my opinion, lost their match to Wales, rather than Wales winning it.

There can be no doubt, though, that the Wallabies thrashed England in their victory. In my view, this makes Fortress Twickenham their ground for the rest of the tournament.

For England, there is only despair. The players negotiated a rather generous bonus of $14 million for themselves if they won the World Cup. This was twice what other countries are offering their players. The All Blacks, for instance, stand to pocket $150,000 (NZ) if they win the Webb Ellis trophy.

The generous payment was offered by the RFU to the England players to avoid a repeat of the great row that erupted before the 2011 World Cup which saw some England players threatening to boycott the official send-off dinner.

There is also the fact that England revealed bully-boy arrogance in the lead-up to the tournament and this special match. England players talked openly, Ben Youngs specifically, about how they were going to overwhelm the Wallabies in the opening 20 minutes. Danny Cipriani, a rugby idiot off the field and sometimes on it, claimed that no Wallabies player could make the England team.

There was no respect from England for the Wallabies or Australian rugby. The contrast with the low-keyed statements of Cheika and Moore was obvious.

England played like a side that expected to monster the easily monstered Wallabies. When the Wallabies played a brilliant opening 40 minutes, the winning of the game, England had nothing much to fire at them to kill off their challenge.

There is some irony that New Zealand rugby writers are now using the ‘c’ word, ‘choke’, in describing how England failed to react positively to the enormous pressure that came from playing in a knock-out pool round match.

The 33-13 scoreline is the biggest Wallabies win at Twickenham against England. We can expect this ‘choking’ analysis to be used for several more tournaments from New Zealand and Australian journalists who have had a gutful of those denigrating the Wallabies and the All Blacks as all show and no hard edge teams.

And those Wallabies supporters who have kept the faith in hard times will now, for a couple of weeks at least, have a spring in their step as they wander around London in their gold colours.

At the 2007 Rugby World Cup, one of the saddest sights you could ever see was finals week in Paris with thousands of Wallabies and All Blacks supporters trudging the streets, or drinking grumpily at the bars, as they watched England and South African supporters parading triumphantly throughout the city.

These supporters had purchased tickets to the finals and had made non-negotiable bookings in hotels.

There was some consolation for some of them that they could flog off their final ticket to England or Springboks supporters for money that actually paid for their trip.

Now it will be the England supporters trying to flog off their finals tickets. They should get plenty of buyers, actually. The UK economy might lose billions of pounds (about three billion according to professor Alex Edmans of the London Business School) but who cares.

The biggest crowd at the tournament so far, as well as the biggest crowd ever to watch a Rugby World Cup match, attended the Ireland versus Romania match at Wembley. Your eyes are fooling you. That statistic is correct. It will remain a great pub sports quiz question for some years to come.

But what it actually reveals, is that there are enough well supported teams – France, Ireland, South Africa, New Zealand, Argentina and Australia – with good chances of making the final, to keep up the high crowd numbers at the ground.

And if Japan makes the finals for the first time, there may be viewing records for the finals series set, even without England being in contention.

If all this comes to pass, it will give some pleasure to some of us in the southern hemisphere. Last Rugby World Cup, Steve Tew, the CEO of New Zealand Rugby Union, insisted that unless World Rugby was more accomodating about paying for the losses of New Zealand and Australian rugby, the All Blacks would have to consider not participating in the 2015 World Cup.

The ineffable Stephen Jones wrote a column saying, in effect, forget the All Blacks and the Wallabies, a new team like Spain would fill Twickenham if they weren’t in the tournament.

This arrogance to the tremendous contribution the Wallabies and the All Blacks have made to the Rugby World Cup makes the following despairing article from The Daily Telegraph (UK) writer Jonathan Liew delicious reading for those of us from Down Under. It was written prior to the Wallabies versus England match.

“Dear holy God, loving Yahweh, merciful Allah, fragrant Krishna, might Thor, benevolent Ra: not the Australians. Not them, not now, not in our own tournament.

“Not on prime-time television, not at Twickenham, a short ride from west London theme pubs and backpacker bars that will surely fill with gleeful, gloating expat Aussies in the event of a Wallabies triumph.

“Not the loud crowing, not the scornful rodomontades, and for heaven’s please not the ‘Oi. oi, oi’ song. The indignity may well too much to bear.”

Cheika-mate, mate!