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Opinion

Which Split Enz song sums up the Super Rugby semi-final?

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Roar Rookie
10th June, 2022
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Leading into the semi-final between the Crusaders and the Chiefs on Friday, I am divided between my heart, which always wants the mighty Waikato-based side to soar and my head which always enjoys the way the Canterbury based franchise goes about its rugby.

During the ‘home’ phase of the bacillus-ridden season each beat the other on their home turf, so there is reason to think that both sides probably have a realistic basis to believe they can win.

The Crusaders must feel that the Chiefs were sneaky, ‘Dirty Creatures’ when they pinched the game against the Crusaders earlier in the season.

History is massively against the Chiefs. 26 finals games have been played by the Crusaders in Christchurch and they have won … all of them.

Of course, ‘History Never Repeats’ might be a mantra the Chiefs want to chant, but these sorts of records can start to develop a power all of their own and it may be that by the end of the coming match the song that best applies is ‘I See Red’.

This isn’t a ground that is like the old ‘Arthritic Park’ in Wellington, or the ‘House of Pain’ in Dunedin, where specific local weather conditions could and often did give a distinct advantage to the home side (or the famous corner at Ballymore where it sloped considerably, making for an advantage for the side that understood this in kicking).

However, a partisan crowd and a really strong home side may well have some influence on the way the referee and his assistants perceive important moments in the game. The head says this is a big hill for the visitors to climb.

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Moving to the referees, I gather that Nic Berry has the whistle for this game. I liked on the weekend that instead of blowing some scrum penalties where the ball was available for use he called ‘use it, or re-set’. He is a referee that wants a game to move and flow.

I love scrums and defend their role in the game as being central to what makes rugby distinct. I even enjoy watching re-sets and associated shenanigans as part of the process, not an interruption. In boxing there is a lot of time taken up by the opponents in simply moving about the ring, feinting to punch and I think it helps to look at the process of setting the scrum in a similar way.

A fast game without too many scrum penalties would likely suit the Chiefs and take a way a little from a traditional way for a side like the Crusaders to establish domination and pressure and points.

However, Mr Berry can also be a puzzling referee to watch at scrum time. He is hardly alone in this, but in the same semi final where he encouraged some scrums to produce play without awarding a penalty, he short armed several scrums, not all of which I found comprehensible and he seemed to adopt a ‘go hard, go very early’ approach.

That could suit those wily scrummagers at the Crusaders. If only the mighty Moody were playing.

The scrum approach also raises two issues more generally that I sometimes feel Nic Berry could improve on. The first is consistency and it is hardly unique to him.

However, it can sometimes lead teams to adopt defensive approaches to how they will play, especially at the ruck. Sides with a strong kicking game may feel it is safer to play well away from their 40 by kicking deep for territory; an example of this was in the first Lions’ Test in 2021.

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In a game where long kicking becomes important, I would tend to say that favours the Crusaders with the likes of Mounga having an accurate and long kick. Gatland the Younger is a fine player in his own right but I would back Mounga to shade him in the kicking duel.

Likewise I see Canterbury having the slight edge at full back in long kicking.

The second issue area of his management of the game is my perception that he sometimes lets a bit go and then starts to jump in hard, when it might be better to be firm and consistent from the start.

With Nic Berry the ruck has a tendency to get messy and he sometimes seems to sit back for the first 10 minutes or so to see what the sides are doing at the ruck, before he starts to focus on one side, or one or two behaviours at the ruck.

In the quarter final, both the Waratahs and the Chiefs seemed to want to play and almost by unwritten agreement the rucks didn’t really become a free for all.

However, in the Brumbies versus Blues match in Canberra, my take was that the Orcs had reason to feel aggrieved early at penalties not awarded at the ruck but that from about the ten-minute mark Berry had made an assessment that the Brumbies were the ones primarily responsible for pretty willing and messy rucks and he appeared to me to begin to really focus on them.

I felt his calls were basically right but I also felt that he missed a bit on the other side. However, weight of possession and, often, success in the collision does merit reward.

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The Crusaders and the Brumbies are not dissimilar in their approaches to the ruck (one that I happen to like, because I like the ruck, almost as an end in itself), but my take is that the Crusaders are also a little more subtle and better at playing the referee and adapting slightly to deflect the worst of their just wrath. Messy rucks may well suit the Crusaders.

Make no mistake, I think Berry is a very good referee and the thing about refereeing is that he has an advantage of being right on the spot, where he may well see things we can’t, but he also has the nightmare of the complexity of our game’s laws to apply, in a hurry, to a dynamic and often confusing situation, where two reasonable and knowledgeable people looking at the same piece of play might come up with contrary calls on the laws.

The viewer also gets to watch multiple replays and look up the World Rugby website and so on. All referees will find their quirks dissected by the opposing teams and smart teams will be making adjustments to their play to fit the referee, just as much as they should to suit the pitch conditions and the opposition side.

In the forwards, my take is that things are potentially much closer than I would have expected, given that the Crusaders always put out first rate packs. I see the set piece as being a fascinating contest where there are some real All Black match ups occurring. I see something similar in the loose.

Jack Goodhue

Jack Goodhue. (Photo by Joe Allison/Getty Images)

The lineout contest between two pairs of All Black locks is really exciting. Retallick is playing compelling, almost evergreen rugby. He was the absolute standout player in the match last weekend.

He is a defensive lineout master, but he is up against his All Black locking partner, Stonkin’ Sam Whitelock, also a defensive lineout master.

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If Retallick can replicate last weekend’s energy and precision with power, I think the age gap with Whitelock may tell a fraction and it is by fractions that games like this may turn. Tupou Vaa’i is developing well and the Chiefs lineout jumpers are a taller unit, which helps (without being determinative) at the lineout.

However, around the ground, I see Bulky Barrett (scott variety) bringing a bit more power. I often take Spiro Zavos’ view on locks, that you want a ‘leaper and a lumper’ for perfect balance.

The Crusaders have two lumpers and the Chiefs two leapers. I can see the Chiefs potentially going very well at the lineout but the battle of the locks on the ground going to the Crusaders.

The scrum is intriguing because I see the two slightly ‘weaker’ players in each front row as being opposed to each other. The battle between the two hookers is an All Black trial in a sense. Cody Taylor brings more power than his frame suggests and he is a wily stager and knows the angles to work, both in the scrum and around the ground. However he is up against the smashing power of Samisoni Taukei’aho.

I would actually like to see the Chiefs start with their bench tighthead prop (a slightly stronger scrummager) and finish with Angus Ta’avao, but I doubt it will be so.

Might the Chiefs use the slight power advantage I perceive with their hooker and Retallick (shoving as tighthead lock) in particular and try to cause some separation between Taylor and his loose head prop?

The thing is, both Crusaders locks are strong in the scrum, so the pushing battle will be a hard one. In the end I suspect that the Chiefs will hope to minimise the number of scrums (say to about half a dozen) and maximise the number of lineouts.

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The scrum advantage may ultimately depend on who better applies some scrum wrestling moves and who the referee perceives to be winning the battle to go forward. Probable advantage to the wily Crusaders in the scrum, but it isn’t a certainty.

If the open play can be kept fairly quick, I can see Luke Jacobson really making problems for the Crusaders. He was in sensational form against the Waratahs and whilst I struggle for objectivity about that side, they are actually a pretty sound unit in the loose but Jacobson was a big part (along with some defective tactics) in really blowing them off the park in this part of the game.

The combination with the bulldozing Pita Gus Sowakula at 8 (he would be my selection in that position for the All Blacks but I am not sure that they will want to make the hard call around what that might mean for Ardie Savea and Sam Cane – maybe injury will help them out?) and the perhaps underestimated Samipeni Finau may just succeed in doing the near impossible and getting on top of a sadly Blackadderless Crusaders loose forward trio.

This will be a great test for the excellent Cullen Grace, who doesn’t quite seem to have had the impact this year that he did last year.

The midfield contest was a nightmare for the Waratahs last week and the power and accuracy of the Chiefs centre pairing was a sight to behold. They acted like an extra pair of loose forwards at times as well. There is something about guys like Alex Nankivell that I love.

Given the riches in New Zealand he is really at best an outside chance of even making an All Black match day squad. Yet match after match he delivers outstanding rugby smarts, great skills and crunching power in the collisions.

Quinn Tupaea is developing beautifully and he has real prospects of a distinguished All Blacks career. He offers the midfield grunt missing since Laumape was exiled (justly or not is your call) and Ma’a Nonu retired. Despite the excellence of the options available to the Crusaders, I see advantage on offer for the Chiefs in the midfield.

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Angus Taavao of the Chiefs runs against a tackle during the round 15 Super Rugby Pacific match between the Fijian Drua and the Chiefs at Churchill Park on May 28, 2022 in Lautoka, Fiji. (Photo by Pita Simpson/Getty Images)

Angus Taavao of the Chiefs (Photo by Pita Simpson/Getty Images)

The halves should be advantage to the Crusaders. If things work out as I suspect they might, Mounga will be operating under pressure in the loose, but he has a great temperament for this situation and I expect him to produce his usual masterclass in classical fly half play.

I find him a privilege to watch, especially so soon after the retirement of the Bradman of flyhalves, Dan Carter. It is the equivalent of getting to watch a second Richard Hadlee straight after the first one retired, or as if Stuart McGill had been born a few years later and had started his career as Shane Warne was ending his.

It is no slight on Gatland, who is having a fine season that he simply isn’t in the same class.

I don’t much care about the half-backs. They are just annoying swine whose main role is to find touch with the boot so we toilers of the soil can get a breather and then to be caught and bullied and buggered for being runts.

They seem about equally matched in this game, but I will playing the game of raising a huge cheer and a bigger beer, every time one of these agitated gnomes is smashed, up ended, dragged about or frustrated.

The outside backs look fine on both sides, but do they really matter? Full back is an interesting position to play and the suicide element is worthy, but these scapegrace types who profit off the graft of others can do what they do. Do they ruck and roll?

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What of them in the scrum or lineout? I confess to finding the delicacy of the footwork of Sevu Reece oddly beguiling, in the same way that sharks may find the grace of the seal pleasing to the eye. Will Jordon may be the form full back in the competition, but what of it?

When did he win a tighthead, or land a happy jab on an opposing lock’s head in a scrum? That head opposite, wedged and almost defenceless, just cries for some re-sculpting. Like the joy of rucking, it is so sad to see its demise.

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Actually, I do miss rucking, but it ain’t ever coming back. My heart says ‘I hope that by the 70 minute mark on Friday night I can say the same about the Crusaders’.

I have almost convinced my head that it is really possible. Allow me to sleep, so as to dream. I would then be willing to accept six months in a leaky boat as payment, were the dream to come true.

Besides, I do have a certain judgement about the Crusaders made earlier this season to live up (or down) to.

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