First up we have an excellent article from Greg Gowden continuing his doom and gloom appraisal of the game at the weekend, and pointing out many flaws the Wallabies had during the game, and in the lead up to kick off. There has been much comment about the haka, including the following from one reader of this blog who contacted me directly with his comments taking a different view from mine over the All Black performance of the traditional ‘ka mate’ haka. He had this to say of the haka:
“It wasn’t backing down at all, I reckon it was a win to the Abs, the Aussies were trying to goad them into doing that haka [the throat slitting version] even though they only do it very occasionally, and then when they did the standard haka it made their lame warm ups look even more childish!”
You’re right, it did have that effect in the end. However, the Wallabies played into the All Black’s hands by being silly about it all. Greg Gowden’s article, which can be read by clicking here, points out that there were a number of silly games being played by the Wallabies during and prior to that test match. Painting the touch lines yellow for instance to match the team colours of the home side, and for all the warming up with the tackle bags to delay kick off, the defensive effort by the Wallabies in the first half was below par. None of the shenanigans seems to have had any positive effect on their game, unless you count being beaten by less than 20 points.
My point of view is that the correct approach to deal with any criticism of the haka would have been to perform it again to avoid any suggestion that the performance of the haka will be dictated to the All Blacks by the opposition. The failure to respect the All Blacks by delaying kick off played right into New Zealand’s hands, no doubt about it. But that isn’t the point. The All Blacks should perform whatever haka they feel is right for the situation, and indeed it seems this is what happened. By changing the haka to a different version for this test, it hints of conceding that the haka is offensive when performed with that gesture. I am heartened by reports that suggest that this was not the case. For more on the haka, click here.
The game was, in my view, defined by the performance of captain Richie McCaw. It was a superb performance, and there can be no doubt that this is the man to lead the All Blacks into the next World Cup in 2007. His game was superb at the breakdown, and the tackle he pulled off to stop Mark Gerard, and also turn over the ball for a pressure releasing clearing kick from one of the largest full backs in the World, was just outstanding. He lead the tackle count by a huge margin in both teams, and was everywhere on the field, a truly inspiring performance. Click here for a full report on the captain’s knock. He was rightly named as man of the match.
While the lineout disintegrated in the second half, at least this All Black team is winning while it is sorting out the problems that it has – and make no mistake the lineout is still a worry. This will have to be rectified before New Zealand is unable to produce anyone that knows how to win good clean lineout ball. New Zealand will take the win, but hopefully the lessons of six stolen lineouts, and three throws that weren’t straight will be taken on board and sorted out before next year. For a full report on the win. Perhaps there is room for a mullet sporting bogan in the All Blacks yet! Keep at it Mr Eaton!
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I had forgotten the All Blacks have yet to notch up a win in the Republic under Graham Henry. They will be sorely tested over there by a side that will be pulling out all the stops to regain some pride at home (not to mention a few people that must be a bit uneasy in their present positions!). However, the All Black coaching staff must be confident that they can cast away this hoodoo against a pretty ordinary African team, and this will be the next goal for the All Blacks. Of note also, in the report can be read by clicking here, is that the controversy about Jerry Collins attempt to convince George Smith that a haircut is in order has been joined by Steve Hansen. Hansen defended the hair pulling basically suggesting that players with long hair were asking for it! Good call! Tana Umaga certainly got his fair share of hair pulls back when he was on the field. For the Aussie take on it, which unusually seems to be restrained, click here.
It was great to see Rokocoko back, scoring the only try of the match. The Fijian flyer richly deserved the try that required him to fend off Rocky Elsom (no easy feat) and also had to step Latham (again a difficult assignment). For more on Joe, click here. Let’s hope that now he has broken the seal we will see more try scoring action from the rocket man in the remainder of the Tri-Nations competition.
Lastly Mills Muliaina seems to be warming to his task at centre for the All Blacks. A positional change like this cannot be easy for a player, and it remains to be seen if he will be the first choice to take the All Blacks to World Cup 2007. However, without any serious contenders for the position in the frame due to injury, there aren’t many on the horizon that could challenge for the role, and it will be interesting to see if the rotational policy generates some more tinkering with this position. He’s played well so far, and has certainly had the acid put on him in the test matches he’s played this year. A sound candidate, possibly supported by Conrad Smith (recovery presumed) and Nonu (again, recovery presumed) to be the back up men. For more on Mils, click here.
Bring on the game this weekend in Sydney between the Boks and the Aussies. It’ll be good to watch these two teams bang away at each other. Steve Larkham still fancies that the Wallabies can win the Tri-Nations (for more on that click here), however the reporter does not seem to share his optimistic appraisal of the situation. You can’t really expect anything else from the players I suppose, but such claims hardly seem credible. I hope that the Boks can muster a good game this weekend and being some competition back into the Tri-Nations, however such hopes seem far fetched – although there has been little news of the Africans while the focus was on the All Black Aussie Bledisloe match. Let’s hope we hear more about African preparations this week as all I have been able to find is this report that Coach White will scrutinise the All Black Wallaby game for clues on how to turn around the South Africans form…hold the front page. If this counts as cutting edge coaching in South Africa, and newsworthy material, they really do need a complete overhaul of their system. If anyone feels like reading this they can click here…
Bring on the pre-test match hype!
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