Monday’s rugby news has the ARU to make an official complaint, Cheika to stick with Cooper and Foley, Steve Hansen saying the Wallabies will not win the Bledisloe Cup before 2020 and Argentina earn their first win over South Africa at home.
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ARU to Make Complaint
The Australian Rugby Union will make an official complaint to World Rugby’s integrity unit over a meeting between referee Romaine Poite and All Blacks coach Steve Hansen before the Test, without the Wallabies knowledge or invitation.
Wallabies coach Michael Cheika was also left frustrated with the lack of communication Wallabies captain Stephen Moore was able to have with Poite.
Meanwhile, All Blacks prop Owen Franks has not been sighted for an alleged eye-gouge on Wallabies second rower Kane Douglas.
New video footage of the incident emerged late on Sunday that shows Franks clearly making contact with Douglas’ eyes but SANZAAR deemed there were no incidents from the match that reached a red card threshold.
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Cooper, Foley Combo
Wallabies coach Michael Cheika will not abandon the idea of playing Quade Cooper at flyhalf and Bernard Foley at inside centre.
“The two playmakers didn’t get much of a chance, really,” Cheika said.
“They were trying to work off bits and pieces when they had it and it’s something they’ll have to look at in the review but we’ll be persevering with that.
“We want to build that combination up and work with that.”
The Wallabies next opportunity to try out the combination will be in two weeks against the Springboks in Brisbane.
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No Bled before 2020
All Blacks coach Steve Hansen says he intends to keep the Bledisloe Cup until the end of his reign at the end of 2019.
“I thought about it at the start of the process, what it would feel like, and didn’t like the idea of it, and I mentioned it to a few people and they didn’t like the idea of it either, that’s why they played as hard as they played,” Hansen said.
“It means a lot to us, but one day it’s inevitable someone’s going to lose it for sure, I’m just hoping it’s not on my watch.
“Along the line somewhere we’ll get beaten and we’ve just got to cop that and take our lessons, understand where we went wrong and go and improve them.
“It’s sport, people get beaten. There’s a winner and a loser all the time.
“At the moment we’re on a bit of a role and things are going good for us. We’ve got to keep striving to be better, otherwise someone will come along and take it off us.”
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Pumas Win
Argentina have won their first ever game against the Springboks at home in Salta.
Replacement fly-half Santiago Gonzalez kicked the winning penalty to put the Pumas ahead 26-24 with two minutes to go.
“Argentina were very good while we made a lot of errors,” said Springboks skipper and hooker Adriaan Strauss.
“We need to take a long, hard look at ourselves and fix what has gone wrong before playing in Australia and New Zealand next month.
“We made a lot of errors, couldn’t build the phases, especially through the first half, played against ourselves, and that cost us on the day.”
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