Australia’s super rugby rut against New Zealand teams continues, with the Blues beating the Waratahs away from home by three points at Brookvale.
Final score:
Waratahs 21
Blues 24
The Waratahs host the Lions Saturday night at Brookvale Oval. Join The Roar for live scores and a blog of the match, starting from 7:45pm AEST.
This is a battle of the underdogs. Since the start of the year, the fans of New South Wales and Auckland Rugby have resigned themselves to another lacklustre performance from their respective coaches.
Tana Umaga took over from an unsuccessful Sir John Kirwan with the promise of a fresh new start from an outsider.
However, the Blues continue to flounder. Their win-loss record is only slightly better than the Sunwolves.
Daryl Gibson is first Kiwi Waratah coach. Everyone expected him to sprinkle his magic Kiwi dust on the New South Welshmen after taking over from trophy winning Michael Cheika. In the first two years he delivered bulldust.
This year, he introduced a swath of new players, instilled a simple and effective playing model backed by a superb set piece.
Do not let their disastrous results against the Lions deceived you. They are playing well and continue to improve.
Today, the Blues has a chance to defeat the Waratahs. Whilst they have lost many games, they lose by small margins. In one case, they beat the Lions in Ellis Park by three points. They can do it again today.
A Blues win in Brookvale will be vote of confidence for Tana Umaga. A bad loss may the first nail the coffin of his coaching tenture.
Likewise, Gibson is also under the microscope and is desperate to be the first Aussie team to beat a New Zealand opponent.
Prediction
This match will be close. In the end, Waratahs to win. For Blues to triumph, they need to maintain possession and use an array of attacking options. The Lions showed the way.
Mark
Guest
How'd he do that? He was on the sidelines watching Ruru!
Uncle Eric
Guest
Same old tired and plainly overused mantra RTT. Have you thought about having sex and travelling??
michael gardiner
Guest
Rugby Union has this problem, if things go wrong like ,Rugby League is more popular, or the game is in trouble, what do we do , we look for a silver bullet . We bought Israel Folau ( at a high cost ) to show up Rugby League but all we have done is show the world we are weak in bowing to Israels demands , like he believes he is a fullback, so he is given that position when everyone knows he is a winger. Now the latest silver bullet is Twiggy, what a joke, the so called "world Rugby series " was another version of "world championship wrestling " , only in Perth it was a case of a team of Fijians of aging men obliviously obese , playing a team of amateurs from Perth. Stop this circus Twiggy the game is in big trouble already . Go spend your money on the juniors or something because your supporters are going to be very disappointed when this circus comes crashing down. Then the game may never recover to its former glory.
Old Bugger
Guest
Congrats on the gutsy effort displayed by the Blues. Fancy that aye cos no-one, gave them a chance???
Tim flakelar
Guest
Good comment RobC, the speed of the game was awesome, the same scenario happens with all teams needing a miracle play with a few minutes to play trailing by a surmountable last miracle pass or kick, KBs kick missed by that much after tahs not able to breach the blues massive defence effort on their own line. The game was lost in retrospect in the first few plays with that schoolboy passing move from the sidelines 0-7 in the blink of an eye. What the heck was that ?
Tycoch
Guest
That was what I thought as well
Baz
Guest
So this situation will continue for the next 10 years if we sit on our hands and do nothing. The Kiwi's are possibly victims of their own success. Should we leave the ARU and its obvious Tahs, Reds focus to Super Rugby and embrace Twiggy's alternate competition with the Brumbies and Rebels? And maybe the South Africans need to do a similar thing.
tim flakelar
Roar Rookie
aside from the negative comments i enjoyed the game, i thought it was as predicted, close game; terrible start to gift the blues a meat pie, but overall it was a thrilling game, Izzy 2 attacking catches off Foleys restart were fantastic, & plenty of tackles beaten by Iz, what the f is the agenda for forcing this guy out of oz rugby ? they are stuffed without him. The defence was outstanding to tackle Nayavoro out of the game. Kepu played strong; the usual ozzie ostrich slow to the cleanout was evident again & again. What might have eluded a lot of punters was the blues have lost by only a few points to quality opposition, i.e. all 4 kiwi teams & a rising Jaguares, they dont have Barretts or Smiths but they played strongly.
Ex force fan
Guest
They need to ban foreign imports because they will not have enough eligible players to pick Wallabies from. What about you allow foreign imports and then sign off on Twiggy's marque ex Aussie players to help improve the IPRC sides. Twiggy pay to bring potential Wallabies e.g. Fardy home, the IPRC gets better, you do not need to cut another team and you have enough eligible players to pick a Wallaby side. However Clyne does not do win-wins, his speciality is lose-lose transactions.
Ex force fan
Guest
That would be as dumb as cutting the Force. Do you really want to destroy rugby in another state where there is no Twiggy?
Brisvegas
Guest
RTT there is a Super Rugby streak then now Happy? ??
Rhys Bosley
Guest
It was a reference to David Lord’s latest article, if you haven’t read it you may have missed the point.
Mzilikazi
Guest
"Rico was clearly not held for what should’ve been second try." Yes, agree with your comment....poor call by ref...could have gone to TMO.
Nobrain
Roar Guru
We will see if the players back him up. The only advantage DH has is that the RCH will be more competitive this year. But if Jaguares manages to get to playoff it will mean more travel and minutes in the field for many players, so they will be very tire and more injured by the end of the year. How confusing it will be for these players to have two coaches training different things?
StuM
Guest
Just saying.. "Imbecile", not "embecile", you imbecile.. ?
The Neutral View From Sweden
Roar Guru
Has Hourcade signed a new contract yet? I reckon if the Jags form continues combined with the right picks from Europe, Los Pumas could be really competitive this year. Wales and Scotland can be in for rude awakenings in June and the Wallabies might take over the wooden spoon.
Malo
Guest
Why pay them ?
Malo
Guest
They are not professionals just kissers
Carlos the Argie
Guest
Wait until Hourcade gets hold of them! Don't be too hasty!
Malo
Guest
This is as good as it gets from so called. Professionals . Jokes