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The Brumbies have won 10 on the bounce against the Waratahs, but try telling Nic White his side has a stranglehold over their archrivals.
“Honestly, mate, we haven’t spoken about it one bit,” he said. “We’ve just been talking about our game.
“Everyone’s evolving, it’s round six, we’re going to have to consistently evolve our game in order to go to another level. What we did in round one’s not going to be good enough to do it down here.”
It was only last month that White and Michael Hooper were trading friendly barbs ahead of their round one showdown in Sydney.
Lots has changed since then.
The Brumbies’ opening win popped the balloon on the Waratahs’ lofty season ambitions and also spoiled their homecoming to the Sydney Football Stadium.
The Brumbies are expecting another tight tussle with the Waratahs. Photo: Mark Kolbe/Getty Images
Their seasons to date have followed that path since their first-up meeting on the opening night of Super Rugby, with the Waratahs hardly being embarrassed but certainly falling short of their own expectations.
At the same time, the Brumbies have put their heads down and are simply getting on with job, but know titles aren’t won in March.
“A lot of our chat, and led by Steve Larkham, has been just focus on ourselves,” White said.
“We’re not focusing on other teams, the Kiwi sides that everyone’s focusing on, we’re just focused on us.
“The way we want to play the game, if we can focus on that and deliver on it and evolve our game and do it really well, we know that that goes a long way to winning the game.”
While the Brumbies will welcome back a handful of their Test stars, the Brumbies are fully aware of what’s coming.
Ever since the Waratahs’ brave but clunky loss against the Chiefs on Friday night, Darren Coleman has had his mind fixated on going down and doing a job on their rivals.
“I think we’re 0-10 on the bounce against them,” he said. “I love that underdog stuff. We’ll go down there fighting. We’ll try and rain on their parade, there’s no doubt on that.”
Nic White says the Brumbies need to improve from their first-up victory over the Waratahs. Photo: Jason McCawley/Getty Images
White, too, has noticed that the Waratahs are in the fight at the moment. The issue is, the Waratahs’ attack is a mess.
“I think all the teams are doing that (going hard at the ball and physically trying to dominate) at the moment,” he said.
“That’s the beauty of rugby, right? Everything’s a contest. They’re throwing themselves into every contest. They’re desperate to win those and we’re going to have to be wary of that.
“You saw around the contact area and how physical they were in their defence and around the breakdown, so we’re going to have to be onto it.”
To be fair to the Waratahs, Coleman’s men aren’t sugar-coating anything.
Coleman said he needed to coach better after Friday’s loss 24-14 loss to the ladder-leading Chiefs, while attack coach and former captain Chris Whitaker also didn’t dance around their issues either.
“I think we had 33 per cent of the ball (against the Chiefs) and it was just really simple errors, handling errors, passing errors and penalties (that cost us),” Whitaker said.
“(In) the second half when we started hanging on the ball and got a bit more rhythm into the game, we started to make indents and make some line breaks.
“It’s (the attack) definitely been clunky that’s for sure. Whether teams have done a lot more homework on us this year. Obviously, last year was a bit unexpected how we went. This year, I think the teams have probably done more homework on it. So that’s on us coaches, we probably haven’t adapted well enough in terms of our strategies and what we’re doing.”
Chris Whitaker. Photo: Cameron Spencer/Getty Images
There is one thing that is giving the Waratahs some confidence, though: the side’s physicality is keeping them in the hunt.
“One of the real positives is that we’ve played the Kiwis back-to-back now against the Hurricanes and the Chiefs and both the coaches on the opposition teams have both commented on how good physically we were around the ruck and things like that,” Whitaker said.
“One of our big goals was to put onto the size and improve our physicality and I think that’s something we’ve definitely done this year. We’re not getting beaten off the field in terms of getting bashed physically off the field, but we’re holding in there and staying strong with the Kiwis. So that’s good for us, we’ve just got to start clicking in attack.”
As for the friendly banter between the two sides, it’s still there – or, at least, will be when it’s on for young and old on Saturday in Canberra.
“That cheekiness is still there. I’ll still send Hoops a text message this weekend to make sure he’s on his toes, but that comes with the nature of the beast,” White said.
“When you get six rounds in certain teams will be feeling that pressure a little bit, so we know that they’re going to come down swinging with everything they’ve got because they’re probably feeling it a little bit.”
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.