Any doubt about who should be playing at number 7 for the Wallabies this season has been erased by the Waratahs’ comprehensive 45-12 rout of the Reds in the gathering rain on Saturday evening.
When I wrote this article only three weeks ago, things were looking pretty rosy for the men from Queensland. They were on a three-match unbeaten run and sitting atop the Super Rugby Australia table after beating the Western Force.
But since the bye week in Round 4, their tournament has begun to unravel. They lost (unluckily) to a last-minute penalty against the Brumbies, and over the weekend they were unable to prevent their most bitter interstate rivals scoring at will in a remarkable first half at the Sydney Cricket Ground.
The Waratahs scored five tries in the first period. When the rain poured down out of a blackening sky after halftime, it came as a merciful relief for the Queenslanders. Otherwise the Tahs might have racked up a cricket score.
What has changed in the passage between the unbeaten initial run and the post-bye collapse? The steady drip-drip of question-marks about the Reds’ defence, which I’d raised in the original iteration of 2020 Super Rugby back in March, became a raging torrent on Saturday evening.
It was as if a dam had finally burst. Where the Reds conceded eight tries in their first three Super Rugby AU games, they’ve shipped nine in two matches since. The Reds have now conceded four more tries than any other team in the competition – including the Force, who have won no games at all so far.
The coaches had picked Fraser McReight at number 7 and moved Liam Wright to blindside for the first three matches, but they dropped McReight to the bench, started Angus Scott-Young at 6 and moved Wright back to the openside flank in Round 5 and 6.
Liam Wright. (Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images)
It has not worked, especially on the defensive side of the ball. Poor Angus Scott-Young managed to look better as an emergency second-rower against the Force than he did as a blindside flanker on Saturday evening. The Queensland back row was a mess from beginning to end.
The problems started with the Reds’ failure to secure their own lineout ball, despite an average advantage of two inches per man in the back five forwards, and the absence of lineout leader Rob Simmons from the opposition pack.
As against the Force, the Reds chose to deploy Wright at the front/middle of the line:
At this lineout, turned over by Ned Hanigan, Wright is the target with both Scott-Young and Harry Wilson knitted tightly around him. All three back-rowers are therefore grouped towards the front end of the line, When the ball is spun out to the far touch-line, there is no back-row cover folding in behind the line of backs:
The two Queensland forwards closest to the play when James Ramm makes his break are locks Angus Blyth and Lukhan Salakaia-Loto. The back row is nowhere to be seen.
The effect is compounded by the Reds backs operating a rush defence. The physical demands are far higher than they are in a drift or in an up-and-out system. There are two waves of defence, the backs attack that much further upfield, and there is a premium placed on forwards who can run well enough to cover the space they leave in behind. It is exhausting aerobic work.
At an average of nine kilos per man heavier than their opponents, the Reds’ forwards never looked likely to be able to manage those spaces:
This is the Waratahs’ first try of the game. The Queensland backs rush upfield, there is a bounce pass from Karmichael Hunt out to Ramm out on the left to slow things down, but even then, after Ramm makes the bust, the forward cover is paper-thin:
Wilson at least overtakes Salakaia-Loto, but gets nowhere near enough to stop the final offloading sequence between Ramm, Hunt and scrumhalf Jake Gordon.
For the Waratahs second try, defensive negligence bordered on the criminal (at 1:20 in the above highlights clip). The referee has already awarded a penalty advantage, and Gordon makes no secret of his desire to take a quick tap:
Reds halfback Scott Malolua (who should be Gordon’s mirror on this play) has his back turned, and all three back-rowers are out of shot on the right side of the field. Only hooker Brandon Paenga-Amosa is alert to the danger, and his chances of stopping Gordon one-on-one are somewhere between slim and none. ‘Slim is outta town’ at that moment.
Meanwhile, the Reds persisted in calling long lineouts with both Wright and Wilson bunched towards the front:
When the ball is turned over, it results in some truly bizarre back-row positioning after a couple more phases:
Wright and Scott-Young are in the middle of a ragged Reds defensive line, while Wilson is corner-flagging in the backfield against the long kick 30 metres behind them!
All three were caught on the wrong side of the ruck for the Waratahs’ third try of the game (at 1:44 on the highlights reel). The crucial moment is visible from the wider shot:
There are two sky blue outside backs (Jack Maddocks and Ramm), two back-rowers (Lachie Swinton and Jack Dempsey) and a hooker (the lively Tom Horton) opposed on the short side by only three Reds defenders: lock Angus Blyth, scrumhalf Malolua and replacement back Jack Hardy. It is an unequal contest with all of the Queensland back row so far away from the scene.
The next New South Wales score (at 2:17) was an even more direct exploitation of the disjointed Reds back row. Wright is competing in the air, which was fine with Fraser McReight standing alongside James O’Connor against the Force. But Scott-Young does not even lay a finger on Gordon after he bursts between two front-rowers around the end of the lineout.
The balance in the back five forwards, which Queensland had in the first three rounds of the competition, has been unequivocally lost.
It had the effect of playing Michael Hooper into the game in quite spectacular fashion, and dispelling any remaining doubts about his right to a starting spot in the first Wallabies side to be picked by Dave Rennie:
Hooper ruled the open spaces on both sides of the ball with almost no serious opposition. In this instance, with Scott-Young taking himself out of the play with a late shot on Maddocks, Wilson corner-flagging and Wright trudging back in midfield, Hooper has no opponent at the first ruck:
Defensively, Hooper won five turnovers and was miles ahead of the Queensland back row in all the important moments:
As Hunter Paisami breaks down the left side-line, Hooper is more than 20 metres ahead of the nearest back-row support for the Reds, Wilson:
He even has time to make a second, and decisive, play on the ball before the next man (Scott-Young) arrives.
Even in more structured scenarios at the ruck, the task of removing Hooper was often left to the Queensland backs:
Wilson carries, but Bryce Hegarty makes a poor attempt at cleaning out Hooper and another ball is lost.
The most symbolic moment of all arrived after another Reds’ break down the right in the second half:
Hooper has time to organise the defence as Alex Mafi thunders down the right touchline, make a tackle, get up again and recover the loose ball, all before the first Reds forward arrives on the scene. That forward is not one of Hooper’s back-row opponents, but second-rower Angus Blyth. It was as neat a capsule of the game as any other.
Summary
Every coach in the game looks for winning formulas in selection. Once they have found it, they tend to stick to it through thick and thin. Few voluntarily change course again.
Brad Thorn found a winning formula by shifting Lukhan Salakaia-Loto to the second row, and Lukhan is now rewarding that faith with some substantial performances in his natural position. However, Thorn has rowed back on the other success story, which involved Liam Wright moving to number 6 and the introduction of the outstanding young number 7 in Australian rugby, Fraser McReight.
It is no coincidence that a significant performance drop-off occurred against the Waratahs, a side the Reds had already beaten earlier in the competition. Whenever the Reds lost the ball, their back row was conspicuously unable to cover the many holes left by their rushing backline defence.
The Reds never adapted. They never called shorter lineouts to get more defenders out into midfield, they never switched from the back-line rush to a more conservative pattern, and they failed to get McReight out on to the field until it was all far too late.
In the process, they gave Michael Hooper the run of an open field and he made hay, with or without the ball, whether the sun was shining or not. It was no coincidence that Jack Dempsey and Ned Hanigan had their best games in the sky blue for some time, either.
Michael Hooper. (Photo by Bradley Kanaris/Getty Images)
In the process, they have probably also squashed for good any challenge their captain Liam Wright might have presented to Hooper for the Wallabies number 7 jersey. I believe Wright’s challenge for the number 6 shirt is still very much alive, and that Harry Wilson will be in the squad as reserve number 8.
But the message is clear: it is high time that Thorn stopped cutting off his own nose to spite his face. Or for that matter, quits looking a gift horse in the mouth, to check for imaginary imperfections. Play Fraser McReight from the start, and watch him go.
Cattledog
Roar Guru
I don't agree Nic, but we'll never know. That following week did prove to be a watershed for the Reds... Be an interesting match up this Saturday with the Brumbies. Certainly rather be in the Reds position than the Waratahs...
GJ
Roar Rookie
I'd love to see the number of reserves reduced and requiring more players to do the full 80, which would lead to smaller players like league, but until they do that then the SA approach is statistically the best way to play. Jones has said as much recently. So selections should follow that. SA also won the rugby championship last year don't forget, with the same team approach. Sarries embody that approach as do Exeter and increasingly Wasps who have started winning again. Arguably, the reds improvements down to that as well. Have to agree to disagree on Sarries v Crusaders, suspect the result would be similar to England v ABs given Sarries most of England team at that time. The stats are very clear most point scoring comes from a set-piece as the first play, D, turover/winning contact, line breaks, time in opposition 22, a good kicker and back three that is very good under the high ball. I come from a league background and only found rugby because I did senior high school at a GPS school so I'm a big fan of high skill, ball in hand play but that only works if you win your lineout, scrum and get the ball back at breakdown and having a dry pitch vs Europe pretty important. I'm such a ball in hand purist that I'd make penalties and drop goals 1 point, stop the clock on scrums and short arm mandatory tap if too many scrum break ups. So I don't enjoy suggesting this approach but the bottom line for Australian rugby is that they need to start winning even if it's not pretty. That means a different approach to team selection and scrapping the OS player rules because they don't have the quality athletes like league or AFL do and need to get the best squad on the pitch. They should consider having loose relationships with some English and French teams for rotations/sabbaticals. No bad thing for more senior guys to leave a couple of years earlier as it makes way for junior talent. Once they start winning again and can get some cash into the pathways and take player share from league and AFL then can worry about style, but that is a good 5-7 years away and need to win now.
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
Have to agree to disagree at this point. SA were the exception that proved the rule, and England played a small B/R with two open sides in it. The entire model of building your ball-carriers up to ever more ground-breaking sizes is both simplistic and misguided. Incidentally it's also myopic because it doesn't accord with the momentum towards greater focus on player welfare. Ever bigger collisions do not a professional future make. Fortunately the trends in the game (even in the Premiership) are moving away from that. Wales won the 2019 6N selecting two, sometimes even three open-sides. New Zealand beat a bigger Springbok side with Cane and Savea in their B/R. Leinster have found no problems beating their English Prem opponents who pursue the model you suggest over the past few seasons, and we play a fluid wide-ranging game. I see Saracens as an outlier. Their players and coaches have to be respected for what they have achieved, but their financial model has become redundant now the Prem Rugby has found the guts to act over the salary cap breaches. At one point last season they had stockpiled four players who were good international full-backs (or better) - Liam Williams, Alex Goode, Sean Maitland and Elliott Daly. Same at second row. That should not be possible. Take away the financial basis for that quality, and you take away all the arguments for the playing approach with it. And I don't think that Sarries would have beaten Crusaders last year either, Crusaders are a very complete side.
GJ
Roar Rookie
Yes but balanced for what? I’d say balanced for win percentages. Itoji is a freakish athlete with a big vertical leap so he makes up for that and probably most athletic lock and back row in the world on the pure explosiveness tests. So I would say balance is what would give me the highest collection of factors that correlate with wins. you can get them from the rugby stat companies. if interested they show that most scoring opportunities come from set-piece being the first phase, then high win correlators are contact wins/tackles missed/tackles broken, how good your goal kicker is and the probability of scoring is higher if you are in opposition 22 so that means your kicking game needs to be good and D wise you need a full back and wingers who are ideally tall and can catch the high ball etc. like IZzy was. Can go on as there are a few others. With that you’d want to select 4 jumpers, a hooker who can throw, scrum ability before mobility in the props, best goal kicker, tall full back and wingers or otherwise great vertical leap etc. If you apply those filters it’s hard to include hooper in the team. Wallabies haven’t selected on that basis before and they’ve had a losing record for a long time. They need to do something different to change that. I could be completely wrong but it at least has a method that works in other contexts.
GJ
Roar Rookie
Maybe but the Heineken final is the most lucrative club comp title in world rugby and that Sarries team probably would have done the Crusaders as good as they are. So that is the game that you play your best team and there were plenty of others where that was the lineup. That’s also in a more forward dominant game than super rugby. That’s also why the wallabies selectors tried to get him on contract just before the rwc so he could play. Skelton got moved on to free up salary cap, some good young locks coming through the pathway and because he was an OS player. Coaches here like to give locals preference and Sarries has a year of relegation to do next year and likely that their two young locks will be in the England training squad. Finances an issue for most clubs but Sarries has a great pathways programme and invests. As do Leicester, Bristol and Exeter. Aussie teams could learn a lot. League and AFL far better at it and better coaching programmes too. I think SA proved my point on size though as it’s back 3 is huge, albeit Kolisi 6,2 and then Louw was 6,3 off the bench. Same for the England rwc team. The game is so D heavy now that you need guys who can break tackles and win the contact and very hard to win if your lineout is less than 85% so better to play 4 jumpers. One of the reasons the Reds have been up and down. I think only 60% against the Tahs last week. If it’s not Loto then a player of similar stature so that those criteria are hit. Only strategy that has beaten that is the higher total passing game pushing the ball to the edges and back again that Jones popularised with Japan. But that doesn’t work if the day is wet or if precision is off on the day as it’s harder to get right consistently. Suspect Rennie will select more on the percentages style of play outlined above than previous regime. Crazy not to build the team around factors that correlate with wins like lineout, scrum, d/impact etc.
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
Maybe it helps that it is very much a new team, developing together, under Rod Penney?
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
Yes Skelton improved hugely at Allianz Park, but Itoje and Kruis were always the first cabs off the rank in the second row, esp with the emergence of Ben Earl at 7. If Skelton was a true first choice my guess would be he’d still be at Sarries now. Instead he’s gone to France. You have a very Sarries perspective on B/R don’t you? No genuine open-sides at all! I wrote several articles on why the Loto experiment at 6 was doomed to fail, which you can find my back catalogue if you’re interested. The Sarries B/R philosophy of three big number 8’s does not work at Test level (which is much quicker in thought and deed then even EPCR). I don’t really want to spend too much time kicking a man when he’s down, but you were able to accumulate big expensive bodies because you ignored the salary cap. While the Sarries playing culture is undoubtedly strong, the financial model based on trading at a huge deficit is weak. The Exeter model is much better and more sustainable, so I wish them all the best :happy:
timber
Guest
I think you're misrepresenting the size advantage a tad. The England forward pack were noticeably lighter and shorter than the ABs but England dominated. Itoji is 195 cm lock which is uncommonly short by standards that have been around for 30 years or so. The Bok forwards are consistently bigger than the ABs but the Boks have struggled to compete a with the ABs over the last decade or so, including RWC 2019. You need balance in any team, size is generally an advantage all things being equal, but not to the detriment of speed, skill and work rate which players like Hooper and Itoji have in abundance.
Muglair
Roar Rookie
Always strange reading the diverse comments about Hooper. One of the few Australian players recognised globally as world class. A tremendous all round footballer (and there are not many in this country) with a big engine, huge stamina and durability and hits well above his weight carrying the ball or defending. There are some good 7s coming through and I would be surprised if he is still a starter in 2023, although you will not find me betting on that. None of them have his all round game, and the supposed limitations on back row balance are disappearing under the number of 6s and 8s coming through at the moment. When the day comes to overlook him, it will be tough day at the selection table.
Muglair
Roar Rookie
He does have that lanky build and my first reaction when he came to the Tahs was that he was way too small. Japan may be a better place to develop as a 6, speed of leg and thought as well as football experience are probably what held him back. Also seems a lot more confident in contact this year. One pleasure age brings is the patience to watch players develop over several years. Except for the last couple .... :unhappy: Maybe they will only be backs :silly:
GJ
Roar Rookie
Just respectful disagreement Nicholas. The bottom line is wins and they haven't had a winning record for years. The arguments you make a more of the same. I'm a season ticket holder at Saracens. In the Heineken final Skelton started with Itoji on the flank and Skelton and Kruis at lock. McCall made Skelton loose 15kg and smarten up. He was voted players player of the year so way off base there. Not sure you can say that the Loto experiment failed the way that Cheika chopped and changed the side and Loto's personal issues. The selection is based on what works statistically, tall for the line out and large for D/impact wins and ball running. Those factors correlate well with win percentage. Similar to McMahon could slot others there but that is what works to win games.
GJ
Roar Rookie
Phil, no disrepect to Nicholas but I've no idea who he is as I've lived in the UK for a long time so I just judge what he says, which I don't agree with. The main issue he misses is that, as the world cup proved, the large number of replacements players means that players are bigger than ever before and set-piece, D, line breaks/turnovers and kicking is what statistically makes the big difference in win percentage. Hooper doesn't fit that. Taller and bigger players make the difference. That's a big part of why du toit is the best back rower in the world. That is why the smarter play is to select players on that basis. Would slot in several others in ahead of Hooper on that basis too and he wouldn't make the squad if you went for a win percentage approach. Unfortunately, he is just too small to have the impact of others. If they followed Eddie Jones' approach and reduced the number of replacements and more players had to play the full 80 then that would change things but that isn't happening any time soon.
Guess
Roar Rookie
I see now. I just hoped to read more about the other tahs but that's my expectations. Btw that last gif, though wasn't game defining, is very illustrative of the difference between the tahs of that game and the usual tahs. Usually they are nowhere near to support hooper(or other player). He can organise all he likes but without them being there in time his effort often goes to waste. Not arguing or anything, just interesting to notice those things. It may seem obvious that team work is important, yet it's often missing, for some reason.
Loosey
Roar Rookie
Ahem, RWC Final 2015? Hooper was keeping Pocock out of the jersey when he wasn't injured or on a sabbatical so I don't understand your point.
Waxhead
Roar Rookie
@Nick No worries - it's very seldom we disagree on anything :silly: :thumbup:
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
Reasonable summary - thanks. I used Hooper to illustrate the main point of the first half of the article: that the Reds B/R were quite often not where they should be!
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
Yes and Swinton does have the advantage that nobody else in Australia can play the position in exactly the way he does, which puts him in a kind of selectorial 'niche'. :laughing:
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
He's always been in the top half dozen in SR to the best of my knowledge. It's true that's he's easier to remove than guys like Marx and Pocock, who have that super-stability over the ball. That can be balanced against the fact that he has better speed than they do, and can compete at a wider range of rucks where his cleanout opponent is often a back.
Paul D
Roar Rookie
:laughing: :laughing: :laughing:
Nicholas Bishop
Expert
Can’t agree Waxy – Hooper was plenty good enough for the ABs, and he’s just as good as Sam Cane at breakdown time, prob as good as Richie in the second half of his career (i.e. post concussions).