Brumbies deny Waratahs in thriller

You are spot on. Hanigan had a blinder. Credit where it is due.

Unlucky for Waratahs to lose that one. Credit to Brumbies though, especially to young halfback Fines having a crack at the tired defence for the match winning try. The talk of the battle of the young tens is interesting. Lolesio is a fine young talent, as is Harrison, and it was disappointing to see Lolesio injured before half time. Hope it isn’t a long injury. I thought the Brumbies reserve 10, Bayley Kuenzle, did well coming on. Better than his 30 seconds they gave him in the previous game. That sort of treatment by coaching staff has the Waratah Mack Mason all over it, and his extremely poor treatment by coaching staff. At the moment looking at Wallaby 10’s, you probably have James O’Connor and Matt Toomua the two in line, however they are not true 10’s. We like to play people out of position at the top level. I hope Rennie stops this. Kurtley Beale played 10,12 and 15... Did he master any.? Hodge... Wing, centre, fullback? Did he master any? How about grooming people to play in their rightful position. Good story too on rugby.com.au about Will Harrison and good mate Ben Donaldson.. both played together since they were young. Donaldson is another good young 10 coming thru. Bottom line is there are a lot of good young players coming thru. Harry Wilson and Fraser McReight from the Reds are future Wallabies in my opinion. Hopefully thru good coaching, all the good young talent will get opportunities to lift Australian Rugby out of the doldrums. I have no doubt these young blokes will....

Hooker can't see the line out as well as a lock. Back jumper is in the best position to call as he can see the entire line out in front of him, see where best opposition jumpers are and where they are focusing their lifts. Even if the hooker calls, there is still plenty of excuse to miss a throw. He doesn't throw to a target, he throws to where a target is going to be. So you can still have the following: - poor lift/jump not getting jumper to expected height; - slow lift/jump not getting the jumper to the expected height at the expected time; - jumper moving one step too far, too close and not going up where expected; - hooker misjudging expected timing or expected position. We did a session with Matt Cockbain a few years back, he was trying to get me to throw to the back, but rather than me throw on the cue of the jumper, the jumper jump on the cue of my throwing, which is what you do at elite level. We could never get it to work because I'd throw, and the jumper would fail to consistently get in the air to take the throw in time. We'd either have to slow the throw, or drop the height making it more contestable.

Agreed Wally. Muirhead was awesome. KHunt has been especially good in both of his games since returning from injury and if I’m not mistaken he only played 20 mins last week. He always seems to be able to impact the game in some shape or form.

Why not a hooker...they are the man throwing the ball to the target. No excuse for a miss throw.

Broke his leg in the summer off-season. Was getting starts for the Brumby Runners, but may not be back to his best yet, as his best last year was better than Cusack and Miller this season.

Not necessarily, it just tends to be a lock with jumping being a primary duty of the position. Ben Mowen was the lineout general for the Brumbies from blindside/number 8, then I'm fairly sure Fardy was over Carter, before he headed overseas. Higginbotham was a solid lineout leader from 6/8 too.

No big conspiracy theory, just giving the big man raps on a good game. But, considering how baron WB lock stocks are he may yet get a run. LSL is doing plenty around the park so he would be my other front runner currently. If all Simmons did was make sure the l/out ran (and a stable scrum) I'd be happy enough for him to be there tbh. Its such a fundamental platform of the game, it can decide if a team wins or loses. Look at the reds/brumbies change of fortunes over the w/end with the l/out finally firing for the reds, and stuttering for the brumbies.

The Brumbies know how to win better, for sure. I thought we controlled it ok until that penalty against Simmons that gave up the field position. Much improved breakdown work by the Tahs.

OK Numpty I can concede that he showed up in the tackle and occasionally in the breakdown. Maybe you are suggesting he is going to do a Sharpe? ie come under pressure and step up at the end of his career? He has played in the Wallabies on and off for 10 years based on his ability in the lineout. Best game I have seen him play in a very long time.

You played in the 2nd row so you're an expert? Guess multiple coaches are just all wrong. It's hilarious you say, at least Carter is a worker. Which is exactly what Simmons has been. Which is why he's made 43 tackles in the first 3 games (with only 4 misses for about 91%). Also line out ability is a huge part of a lock. Would you disregard how a prop scrummages?

The brumbies were terrible at scrum and line out and muirhead apart the backs had a quiet game. Says a lot that the tahs couldn't beat them. Sorry to those of you from NSW but the brumbies will not play this badly again and will win super rugby AU at a canter.

SMI all the pts you make can be true AND he can still have had a good game. Just because he isn't a generational player does not mean that he can't play out of his skin occasionally. You did not provide a tidbit of evidence in your response about the saturday night game - this was the pt of my comment. I didn't say he is the best player out of all 30 blokes on the field "indefinitely", I said he was one of the best players on the night - big difference.

The Tahs didn’t score enough points. They should have put us to the sword. Reminded me of the 2018 AFL final. We had a perfect chance for victory but then just played too passively and let them back into the game.

In sport you create your own luck. He kicked with the intention of having his player score off the high ball. Not denying it was lucky or Harrison’s assistance. But in tennis if you try and hit a winner down the line, it hits the net tape (as going down the line takes it over the higher part of the net) and it dribbles over for a winner, it’s still a winner.

James our set piece has been poor all season when Neville is out. The Tahs dominated our scrum in march too. We are just getting no power from the second row. Hanigan and especially Simmons read out line out all day long. It was a really impressive bit of technical skill from Simmons. But I’m concerned the Tahs didn’t manage to win with so much good ball.

Yep. Hard to see how they could lose given all of that. Especially too post Lolesio being injured.

HJH likes the tough stuff. He puts on a big hit every week and puts his hand up for tough carries all game long. He’s a rugby player. If he gets his scrumming nailed down, he’ll play tests for a long time

I thought Short was very inaccurate early but I was impressed with him later on. Brums did a lot of scrapping of ball and he cleaned up a lot of good stuff. Super pleased with Horton (even if he’s SU) - lineout immaculate, scrum dominant, went long minutes and that ad libbing for his try was outstanding

Is what I thought too. Scrum dominance continued but suddenly penalties went the other way