- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
The Brumbies will be out for another win when they play the Southern Kings at Canberra Stadium tonight. Join us for live scores and commentary from 7.40pm AEDT.
It’s unclear the logic behind the Kings’ promotion to the Super Rugby competition.
In replacing the Johannesburg-based Lions with the Southern Kings from Eastern Cape, the SARU have managed the insignificant achievement of replacing a plonker with another plonker.
A harsh assessment perhaps and it’s early days but if the SARU are going to make the pretty massive call of pulling the plug on rugby in their largest city, Johannesburg, well it’d want to be for a good reason.
Of course a relegation system works if the promoted team has a chance of actually achieving something.
Otherwise it’s just outright disruptive to have the players and their families in 12-month cycles of employment in Super Rugby.
Not that it’s anything new for a player to be treated like a tap: turned on and off.
On to the business of rugby and taking a look at the home team, the Brumbies.
These guys are on the top of the world, and top of the log.
Their last-ditch win against the Bulls last week was a number of things:
Lucky, ugly, incorrect. A travesty.
It was all these things, yet the Brumbies deserved their win.
They deserved it because they have developed the rare impetus that losing is not an option. It wasn’t a referee’s decision that night that cemented this win, it was the Brumbies’ desperation.
To put themselves in the position, right at the death of the game, for just the slightest opportunity.
About 12 or 13 other teams in this competition would not have managed the same thing.
Thus the Brumbies won playing some pretty average rugby.
They seemingly weren’t keen on backing themselves with the ball in hand, as though Jesse Mogg’s absence gave them the hoodoos.
With Clyde Rathbone not brought on at any time you have to wonder why they just weren’t willing to chance their arm.
Either way there wasn’t much backline play from either side.
The real business was done up front and George Smith showed again why he’s the best forward in Australia.
His call up for the British and Irish Lions tour is fait accompli.
Onto the Southern Kings who have a monopoly on bad stats when it comes to attack. Metres, runs, tries; all grisly reading.
But wait. Their tackle percentage rate is good. In fact it’s not good; it’s exceptional.
And they have the best tackle percentage rate in the comp, at 90 percent.
This is better than the world’s best provincial team, the Crusaders.
Also, their lineout is towards the upper part of the log and their scrum not bad at all. Curious.
If they can learn how to dance with the ball, they might score a try or two. Winning a game may also follow.
Perhaps tonight. To find out, join us at 7.40pm AEDT tonight on The Roar, the place to be for live scores and where you can have your say on the go.
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.