The poor crowd last week at Bruce Stadium was not down to the weather. They didn’t all go skiing. They just stayed away.
The Brumbies faithful are not afraid of the cold weather, or the traffic. We’ve put up with all of that since day one.
It’s down to more sinister circumstances.
Hark back to the days of the George Gregan death stare and his management of referees. No doubt who was driving the bus in those days.
Currently there is aimless leadership – although Tom Cusack would make a great captain. He showed us last week that he is getting more and more comfortable in his role and all of a sudden acted as a great link man, so it’s no surprise he scored a try and set up another. Hopefully, he and Joe Powell can form that same sort of combo that Gregan had with Owen Finegan, back in the day.
Under Rod Macqueen, sublime handling skills and running lines had the team playing like a well-rehearsed orchestra. But then, back then, most coaches were still coaching to the ARU playbook. Along comes the internet and suddenly there is a plethora of coaching resources online, gurus everywhere and each with his own theory, like Eddie Jones wanting it to look more like rugby league.
I always think about one of the lunar landings when, after a flawless touchdown, the astronaut was heard to say “just like the drills”.
How many times had they practiced that routine? Who knows, but I would guess it was until they could probably do it blindfolded.
How many times should you do a drill? As many as necessary to make the skill second nature.
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The old coaching books had a drill called ‘no mistakes’, which players hated because it was boring and slow and repetitive. But when you coach at a club that has blokes playing from different backgrounds, schools and standards, you have to find a common denominator and if that common denominator is a low one, you have to lift the bar – and that only comes from drills. A rising tide lifts all boats!
You don’t earn the right to play the instinctive game until your instincts are properly honed, and that only comes from growing muscle memory through boring, repetitive drilling. Robbie Deans did Aussie rugby a slight disservice by talking about playing what’s in front of you, because it led to players going out there and chucking it around.
People like the Ella brothers or Quade Cooper could chuck it around with gay abandon, but they had massive natural talents – most of us mere mortals get whatever talent we have from working at it.
Deans’ ethos was founded on the fact the people he was used to coaching had all the skills because they had done the drills. After all, what is so different between the psyches of Aussies and Kiwis that the latter can change gears and put their foot on the gas at around minute 60? Why is there such a different mindset among all the Aussie franchises?
As for the Brumbies, I’m pretty sure that Laurie Fisher and Peter Ryan are pretty hard taskmasters, so who is the culprit in the backline?
We have to get better and the backs need to do a lot of running-straight and catch-pass drills. Most of all, everyone needs to be more effective at protecting the ball going into contact, and learning to be more patient and play the phases. We seem to run out of patience for grinding it out and putting together more than about five phases. That is where you win – by grinding the opposition down.
The frustration that can slowly build at not being able to force a turnover saps energy, and creates a certain mindset. It can force an otherwise good team to start taking chances and making mistakes.
On the flipside, if you are playing against a mistake-prone team, you know that all you have to do is wait patiently for a few phases. It’s a whole different attitude and the one the Kiwis seem to adopt more often than not.
Kicking to exit your rear lines is all very well, but you have to have a plan for it and be able to execute. Even if a kicking duel ensues, the endgame should be that you achieve a net gain when the ball finally goes into touch, or you bend the defensive line and find holes.
Good teams learn how to grind it up the middle until they have earned the right to go wide and use the edges. The team making the most mistakes is also likely to be the team that the referee focusses on, possibly unfairly – it’s just human nature and, believe it or not, refs are humans too!
So c’mon Aussie, lift your game – drill, drill, drill and then drill some more. But more importantly, get into the mindset of thinking your way through a game. A gameplan or structure should just be the framework that the team needs to adapt or improvise a little – that’s where the championship moments come from.
Hoy
Roar Guru
Coaching. Coaching. Coaching. We don't have great ones at the moment. Trouble is, as someone else said, this is at least a 10 year fix really... The youngsters coming through have missed good coaching, with good, national drills. When I grew up, we had the great "No Mistakes Drills"... over and over. But you only had to say "Inside ball" and we all knew what to do. "Outside ball", and off we went... "Cut one, in". Boom. You can't say that now. Noone knows them. I am sure they were national directives at the time, and I can't for the live of me think why we moved away from them.
Hoy
Roar Guru
Kenyan's train at altitude don't they? Makes a hell of a difference in blood O2 use etc. Their bodies are used to operating at lower levels of O2. So when they get to lower altitudes, they can go faster, longer, because of higher levels of blood O2. Isn't that right? Genetics help as well obviously.
Hoy
Roar Guru
I want to know if we see it and don't care, or can't fix itdffH
gatesy
Roar Guru
Nobody is suggesting that all you do is drills, and how do you know what happens at every Rugby club in Australia. A good coach learns how to plan his sessions. Even if you only have a 90 minute session you can fit all the components in and as for the drills, these should also be planned, based on the areas that the coach thinks need the most work - not just a random pattern. I have been to many Rugby clubs, at schools, club and womens level and I don't think I have seen one that just did drills for a full session. You work on structures and weaknesses.
Angus Kennedy
Guest
I read (in newspaper letters) and heard exactly the same comments in the 70's and 80's when very young. We were told that we were not as dedicated or as hungry as the previous generation. Older peoplr always told us we were good for nothing compared to them. There is a Monty Python sketch that covers this. The World is always changing and we always look at the past through rose tinted glasses. If anything, today's players are able to focus more completely on rugby and their performance levels reflect this. I think the 2018 Wallabies would easily defeat the great teams from the pre-professional era. It has nothing to do with character or hunger.
woodart
Guest
and all the games of touch, fantastic training for ball skills.
MA
Guest
Your article is 100% incorrect. Go to any club around Australia and all you will see is drill, drill, drill. We are drill stuff left right and centre. Our problem is that we think training drills is training rugby. It is absolutely not. Drills are what you use to correct techniques identified when you train game play/strategies/structures. They should only be a very small component of a training session. What we see over and over again in Australian Rugby at all levels is players who have no idea what the purpose of their effort on the rugby field. Watch NZ teams. They know what is happening at all times in every situation on any part of the field. This frees them up to deliver on the basic skills of the game as nothing is a surprise. Watch Australian teams and you will see they are just playing random rugby and trying to make a game out of a whole bunch of drills. A classic example is go and watch a junior training session and you will see coaches doing ruck drills over and over again. Then go and watch that same team play a game and you will see there is 2/3's of the team in the ruck. How can you clean a ruck out when there are 6-8 kids from each team in the ruck? What the coach should be training is defensive and attack structures and game play so the kids know that they have to keep width across the field and not get sucked in to the ball. Once you have successful trained the structure and it is delivered in a game you will find it is very easy then to drill cleaning out a ruck. NZ teams learn game play and then drills to successful deliver the strategy. This is what we should be doing.
Ed
Guest
Absolutely. Ella, his brothers and mates played at school and after school all the time. They would have been trying to beat each other, so their skills would have developed from these intense sessions. Rugbypass.com had an article last month about the number of matches NZ schoolboys play compared to ours. When our lads finish school, they have had far fewer competitive matches than their NZ counterparts.
jameswm
Guest
No arguments on talent being very relevant. I have this discussion with people on athletics. Why are the Kenyans so good at 800-1500? Everyone trains hard and is equally fit, they're just faster. Our faster 400 runners kid themselves they can make it at 400. Kenya's use that speed to run 800-1500. Equal fitness, so speed wins. Talent.
Fionn
Guest
No way would Latham or Horan (or even Mortlock) have thrown passes of the quality that Folau and then Foley threw. We haven't had many outside centres with fantastic passing games. Horan's passing game was good though.
Ray
Guest
When the full Brumbies backrow is available then Cusack doesn't start, but he deserves to, based on his efforts so far. The real weakness is in the inside backs and there are no real options for me after I lost faith in Godwin. Therefore I would seriously think about Cusack at 12, in a similar role to Hodge for the rebels. Cusack has good hands and offloads etc from the sevens days, my only worry is that I like the 12 to be able to seriously kick when in trouble. Dargenville is another option for 12 but Cusack looks like the better player longterm. JJH is too small to play at 12 lomgterm in Super rugby and should try his hand at 5/8 at the club level. I know Gitteau was small, but he was the exception, not the rule.
PeterK
Roar Guru
Larkham and Gregan did pass in front agree, a lot better than Foley or Genia / Phipps but no better than QC. Horan didn't , nor did Herbert , or Morltock. Forwards now pass more than they did then especially tight 5 forwards.
Fionn
Guest
So you need a bloke who is good in a highlights reel but who does very little clearing out and has a very low work-rate? Okay.
rugger
Guest
He would make the squads of at least some of the teams. Whether he would make the 15 or 23 is a different question. Says its all....not even guaranteed spot on the bench and talked of as captain. Grit is not per-requisite for being captain - smarts, calmness and athleticism and for mine lacks later in spades similar to Tahs No.8. Jed Hollway is what you need as No.6 or 8
Fionn
Guest
Folau jogged after the ball thinking it would go out. I don't think Latham would have made that mistake. But yeah, if he had then he would either have passed or tried to run it. I think the referees are also playing longer advantages, and the ball would be in play more as it is easier to retain possession again and again. Watching some games from the early 2000s the passes are definitely out in front. I mean, it's easier when you have Gregan, Larkham, Horan (Even Gits and Flatley) as the main distributors. Go and watch some of the matches of the 2010 tour to South Africa. There you'll see some brilliant passing to the front of the man. Forward ball skills have definitely improved though.
PeterK
Roar Guru
Latham would not have booted the ball at all, there were 3 players close to tackling Folau, it would have been charged down. IMO Latham would have tried to run it and stay on his feet waiting for support to get there. On handling it is better now than ever before. There are less scrums and the ball is in play more than ever before. I looked at old games and the play is at slower speed and the ball was still being passed to the man and not in front. Also I have noticed the wallaby players are passing in front more over the last 2 years but yes from a low base.
PeterK
Roar Guru
just reinforces how poor the skills and technical coaching across all levels in australia is.
Fionn
Guest
Doesn't change the fact that while the Kiwis pass in front of the man and at chest height almost all of the time the Australians' passes are often behind or to the man, not in front, and are often head height. A halfback with an inaccurate pass has been in the Wallabies' 23 for a lot of the past 5 years, we have a fullback with a slow and inaccurate kicking game (and no vision for kicking), before him we had a fullback that was suspect under the high ball. Our incumbent flyhalf of about 5 years struggles to pass long, and often passes forward as a result. The lack of skill in the play in which Folau threw an abysmal non spin pass into the ground to Foley, who threw an equally abysmal non spin pass into the ground to Beale was pathetic for supposedly three of the most talented players in Australia. 10 years ago Latham would have picked it up and booted it 50m. If he had passed it to Larkham it would have been straight to him and Larkham's pass to Giteau would have been straight to him.
Ralph
Roar Guru
Right from the horse's mouth.
RTT
Guest
The difference is the pressure on attack from rush defence in the modern game. Even the crusaders when under pressure last week looked like they couldn’t pass and catch The early days of professionalism and the amateur there wasn’t the organisation in defence and so players attacking appeared more skillful. In saying that there were many people in he early days of the pro era saying the exact same things about the lack of skill and I’m sure every generation has claimed to have been the more skillful. The fact is the ballnisnin play more, there are more completed passes and less knock ons in the modern game. That’s a statistical fact.