Is the northern hemisphere reclaiming rugby superiority?

Last weekend, England defeated the Wallabies 44-40, Ireland narrowly lost to South Africa 13-19, and the All Blacks thrashed Wales 46-6.

The combined win-loss outcomes in the three series in Australia, South Africa and New Zealand saw the southern hemisphere teams win five Tests to the four won by the northern hemisphere sides.

This outcome suggests a turn of the tide.

Given the Rugby World Cup 2015 semi-finals were contested by the four southern powers – the Wallabies, Pumas, Springboks and All Blacks – the thinking was that between them, England, Ireland and Wales might scrape up one victory, two at most, against their formidable opponents.

As it happens, England white-washed the Wallabies 3-0, winning as many Tests in one series as they had won in Australia in the modern era. And Ireland were extremely unlucky not to achieve a shamrock green-wash result against the Springboks.

Ireland won the first Test of the series, despite the fact that they played with 14 men for a long period of the match.

In the second Test at Ellis Park, Ireland had a 16-point lead at halftime. The addition of fresh legs to the Springboks in the second 40, mainly from in-form Lions players who play most of their rugby at altitude, allowed the home side to storm back to a victory.

In the third Test, Ireland put on over 20 phases of play inside the Springboks’ 22 in the last seconds of play, in a desperate effort to score a try and give themselves the chance of winning the series with the conversion.

Johnny Sexton, Ireland’s formidable number 10, did not make the tour. It is in the realms of speculation, of course, but Sexton’s ability to drive Ireland to close victories could have been a decisive factor in leading his side to a historic victory.

Wales, despite the 3-0 series blackwash, had their moments against the New Zealand. In the first Test, Wales led at halftime, an outcome that rarely happens to the All Blacks. In the second Test, the halftime score was 10-10.

In the third Test the All Blacks, with Beauden Barrett in blistering form at number 10, unleashed their all-court game, and the visitors – missing players of the quality and power of George North, who had had a storming first Test – were over-run with break-outs from all parts of the field.

The quality of play by the northern hemisphere sides was a surprise, given the pessimism about their chances expressed by the British media.

The UK Daily Telegraph‘s Mick Cleary, for instance, wrote an opinion piece earlier this year asking “Is this the worst Six Nations ever?”

His answer: “Watching Ireland-France was an exercise in slow torture”, while Scotland vs England at Murrayfield “was not a thing of beauty either”.

Sean Coppack, in The Guardian, made the argument, seemingly in answer to the question posed by Mick Cleary, that the play in the 2016 Six Nations tournament was inferior to that in the 2012 Six Nations tournament, when the northern hemisphere sides did better in Rugby World Cup 2011 than they did in Rugby World Cup 2015:

A comparison of the official statistics from that tournament four years ago with this year’s edition makes shocking reading and highlights a lack of technical quality on show in northern hemisphere rugby at present…

During Wales 27-23 victory over Scotland, both sides ended an astonishing 93 per cent of possessions with a kick… Northern hemisphere teams have never used the off-load with the frequency of the All Blacks… Ireland are the worst exponents having completed only five offloads through the opening three rounds of the tournament at an average of less than two per game.

Now Ireland are so euphoric over their South African tour (and why wouldn’t they be?) that their outstanding lock Iain Henderson reckons they can beat the All Blacks later this year.

Why the turnaround?

Mick Cleary made the further point in his article about the poor play in the 2016 Six Nations tournament that the players were exhausted: “The physical after-effects of the World Cup have not been flushed from the system in some cases. Teams such as England… are feeling their way under new management.”

This is a palpable point. The northern teams endured a particularly poor 2015 Rugby World Cup tournament, all of them, and this must have had an impact on them mentally and physically.

Six month later, although they had played championship rugby from then on, the scars had healed and there was new energy and personnel to carry them through their southern hemisphere tours.

Ireland, for instance, had a new defence coach, Andy Farrell, one of the coaching casualties from England’s dire 2015 Rugby World Cup tournament.

Ireland’s Joe Schmidt had the chance to regroup with his playing group and strategic approach. His side’s abrasive, ball-in-hand game caught the Springboks by surprise, especially in the first Test.

As Paul Rees of The Guardian pointed out: “Ireland, like England and Wales, will have the advantage in the first Test of being better prepared with the southern hemisphere nations not having played an international since the World Cup. Jones and the Wales head coach, Warren Gatland, are returning to their homelands, which in the case of the former should be fun.”

Ireland were helped throughout the series by the harsh truth that the Springboks are in a re-building era, on and off the field.

There is a new coaching staff, with Allister Coetzee holding the poisoned chalice of head coach. The ANC is insisting on a quota of black and coloured players, which is driving many experienced players overseas where their play deteriorates under the 30-plus games regime.

Despite this, the SARU str still allowing overseas players to come back and play for the Springboks as a sort of consolation prize for leaving Super Rugby.

The Springboks are getting the worse of both worlds under this system. Coach Coetzee is virtually forced to use players who should be discarded, or want to be discarded, in his so-called re-building program.

A South African friend, knowledgeable in rugby going back many decades, sent me this email before the third Test that sums up some of the local frustration with the rugby politics: “Coetzee is not my idea of a good coach, but I suppose one has to have some sympathy for him. The job of Boks coach makes being a soccer coach in Europe enviable, because when they (the soccer coaches) get fired they have been earning real money not rands.

“Coetzee must play Jaco Kriel in Port Elizabeth and send [Francois] Louw and [Duane] Vermeulen back to Europe. Both look jaded and detached from the local political nonsense.”

For the past month or so, The Roar has been documenting how Eddie Jones used his knowledge of the Australian rugby world to create the plans to defeat the Wallabies.

Integral in these plans was using Australian rugby know-how to destroy the Wallabies. Jones himself was a former Brumbies and Wallabies coach. He brought in Glen Ella to help him with skills training.

There was the added advantage with this appointment, too, that Jones was playing to the Randwick ‘Galloping Green’ power base. It was noticeable, for instance, that Bob Dwyer, usually out-spoken with his attacks on visiting teams and coaches, was unusually quiet about England.

There was the regulatory Dwyer attack (justified, too) on England’s illegal scrumming, but that was about it.

Australian rugby agrees that Jones out-coached Michael Cheika, on and off the field. The off-field battles were fought and won by Jones alone, but he was materially helped with the on-field battles by Australian know-how from Ella, George Smith, Andrew Johns and (according to sources close to the England camp) Phillip ‘Chook’ Fowler.

Fowler is one of the unknown (to the public) great rugby gurus in Australia. He prepares gameplans for coaches around the world, worked with Ewen McKenzie when the Queensland Reds won their only Super Rugby title in 2011, worked a lot for Eddie Jones in Japan, and was on England’s triumphant 3-0 whitewash tour.

My feeling is that all the southern hemisphere coaching experience and know-how being invested in the northern hemisphere teams is changing the dynamics of the power blocs.

South African rugby is becoming far less formidable than it has been, even in the recent past.

Australian rugby is following the same path, if the performance of the Australian Super Rugby teams and the Wallabies this year is any test.

And there is one other indicator that could be a sign of the new times.

Fairfax’s perceptive Paul Cully wrote a fascinating article headed: “New order: The ten most influential players in world rugby today”.

Cully’s fabulous ten were: 1. Kieran Read (NZ) 2. Owen Farrell (England) 3. Aaron Smith (NZ) 4. David Pocock (Australia) 5. Dylan Hartley (England) 6. Ben Smith (NZ) 7. Toby Faletau (Wales) 8. Brodie Retallick (NZ) 9. Maro Itoje (England) 10. Israel Folau (Australia).

New Zealand has four players on the list, England has three, Australia two and Wales one. There are no South African players.

This is a new order of players. Is it also a new order of their teams?