Another impressive performance by the Wallabies, and I enjoyed watching the game a second time. Here are a few things I noticed:
1. Best performance since 2011?
We scored four tries and kept a good Irish team tryless on their own soil. Is this the best Wallaby performance since the Brisbane Bledisloe of 2011? Possibly, although I think that says a lot more about our form since that game than it does about the weekend’s effort. It was certainly the most clinical display we have seen for a long time, and the first real sign that Link is having a positive effect on the national side. A shame we had to do rankings and ratings, because in reality nobody had a bad game.
2. An old dog for a hard road
One of my favourite expressions, and there is no better embodiment of this than Stephen Moore. The bloke is just a marvel, and against all logic has gotten better and better as the season has gone on. Against the Irish he produced his best form yet, a sublime display of hard forward play interspersed with a few lovely touches – his offload to Nick Cummins was an absolute pearler. God knows what he will be doing by the final game, but nothing would surprise me any more with this bloke. If we need a droppy after the siren to win the game I would definitely be ushering him into position…
3. Doing the basics
What I love about our last couple of performances is they have been built on good basic skills rather than tactical smoke and mirrors. Our backs are making ground by running straight and passing in front of the man, while our forwards are hitting the ball at pace around the ruck. There are no flick-passes or chip kicks. When a player makes a break he now has options either side. Our first-up tackling was accurate and physical. It sounds easy but for so long we were seriously lacking in these departments. It’s funny but I think under Link we finally have a team that is… wait for it… playing what is in front of them!
4. Red zone efficiency
Option taking in the final third of the ground was what ultimately separated the two sides. We had roughly the same amount of possession and territory as the Paddies, but, much like Sal Kerrigan’s cooking in The Castle, it was what we did with it that made all the difference. We showed great endeavour in all of our tries: we spun the ball wide for the first two, ran a slick backline move for the third and finished it with a ten-man driving maul. It was this willingness to chance our arm in the red zone that put us ahead of the Irish, who stuck to predictable pick-and-drive like it was going out of style.
5. The Australian Style returns?
One of the big items on Bill Pulver’s wishlist on coming to office was to see a return to the Australian Style™ of running rugby. At the start of the year this seemed like a bit of a pipe dream, and still looked a mile off at the end of September. Saturday’s effort is the third or fourth good ‘running’ performance of the season, so I’d imagine the Pulveriser might have had an extra spring in his step at the office this morning.
6. No injuries… please
Isn’t it nice to see a couple of months of Wallaby rugby free of major injuries? Obviously now I have put the mockers on them, and 13 blokes will go down with ACL tears next week. But it’s not just about player preservation: our recent run of good fortune has allowed us to field a stable line-up week after week, with only a handful of changes made since the Rugby Championship. So well done to the physio and medical staff, as whatever they are doing is working well.
7. How good is Israel Folau?
It’s funny how quickly we have gotten used to Israel’s heroics at the back. I remember the (all too recent) days where you would grimace every time a high ball went up, and Kurtley/JOC/whoever would stagger towards it, arms outstretched, eyes closed in the vain hope the ball might stick. Inevitably it would cannon off a shoulder/chest/head, or hit the ground. But not any more. I relish box kicks and bombs, for it is yet another chance for Israel to show how he has single-handedly turned one of our biggest weaknesses into a strength. Have a look at this:
At the moment you can’t fault his game, and it is amazing to think he is doing all this in his first season. Freak.
8. Scrum dominance
Our scrum in the last five years has had more ups and downs than a teabag attached to a fiddler’s elbow in the elevator of the stock exchange. Every year it seems to go through the same cycle – we start off OK, get pulverised for a game or two by the Saffers/Argies/Poms, everyone decries our props and coaches, before we produce a stirring reply late in the season against NH opponents. Consistency has long deserted us here, so much like every other facet of our game at the moment I will be much happier when we can produce similar scrum efforts week after week.
9. Irish no-shows
I was looking forward to watching Jamie Heaslip go round, but I think he must have ducked off after the anthems because he was nowhere to be seen. Same with Sean O’Brien, Paul O’Connell and Cian Healy. The Irish big names didn’t have any impact on the game, and their handling was woeful at times. They clearly have the makings of a good side but their basic skills deserted them at critical moments.
10. Old Irish friends
Some may remember the last time we squared off with the Irish, I produced this rant and instantly became a friend of the Emerald Isle… although my memory is hazy (for obvious reasons). I received a few friendly reminders this week, so was understandably happy we banished the demons of 2011. Those Paddies are chippy bastards and we should never give them a chance to put the boot in, even if their World Cup record IS one of continuous failure…
What do you think?
