Author: Scott Allen

Here’s part 4 of the videos looking at the Wallaby back line from 1979 to 2010 with this video covering the years 2002 to 2005. This segment includes the introduction of the league converts – Sailor, Rogers and Tuquiri and the 2003 World Cup campaign. Watching the footage reminded me how much the current Wallaby back line is missing strong, hard runners like Mortlock. Part 5 will cover the 2006 to 2007 period and part 6 will bring us up to date with a look at 2008 to 2009. In case you missed Parts 1, 2 and 3 they are displayed again further down…

The Wallabies attack hasn’t exactly set the world on fire in 2010 – so what can be improved? In this video I’ve looked at a short sequence of phases in the 3rd minute of Bledisloe 2 to show what I think needs to be improved.  Whilst there are other issues, the themes shown in this video are the most recurrent for me and have been repeated game after game this season. In summary the issues are: One out runners with little support; Playing with too much depth with the ball runner receiving the ball too far away from the contact line; Players not committing…

Here’s part 3 of the videos looking at the Wallaby back line from 1979 to 2010 with this video covering the years 1999 to 2001. This segment covers the 1999 World Cup win through to the win against the British & Irish Lions in 2001.  Bob Dwyer is always talking about the importance of quick ball at the breakdown and the footage of the games against the Lions really show what you can do with quick ball. It looks like the series is going to run into 5 or 6 parts given the extra footage available.  Thanks to RugbyReg and Mr Timms for…

Here’s part 2 of the videos looking at the Wallaby back line from 1979 to 2010 with this video covering the years 1991 to 1998. This segment covers the 1991 World Cup with some limited footage of the 1995 World Cup, some of the various flyhalf options utilised after the retirement of Michael Lynagh, the emergence of George Gregan and then the first year of Stephen Larkham’s reign.  Through it all Tim Horan continued to show his brilliance. In case you missed Part 1, here it is again.

I’ve been working on some analysis of the current Wallaby attack structure and in particular, the back line. I started by looking back at how the Wallaby back line has performed when players like Ella, Lynagh and Larkham were directing traffic. I kept the footage as I went through because I though there would be a few others that might like to see it as well.  As it turns out I found so much footage that I’ve had to break the videos up.  Today I’ve covered the period from 1979 to 1990.  From the early days of Mark Ella, through the…

A much better performance from the Wallabies last week but the All Blacks still look another step up in class. The statistics confirm what most of us already know – the Wallabies are retaining possession but have little to offer in attack.  It’s obvious to the vast majority of G&GR readers that Giteau shouldn’t play #10 ever again and there’s no doubt Cooper will slot straight back into that position for the next game.  The question is where will Giteau go?  It’s interesting that Giteau is allowed to play for his club this weekend but the rumours are that neither Quade…

The Wallabies needed to pressure the All Blacks on Saturday by taking advantage of their opportunities but instead they kept making basic mistakes which gave the momentum back to the All Blacks.  Dropped balls when hard on attack, soft attempts at tackling, failing to find touch, silly penalties, lineout & scrum losses and a lack of urgency to get into the breakdown are just some of the basics the Wallabies need to address. Here are some examples of those basic errors.

Last night to prepare these statistics I watched the game for the first time since seeing it live and I have to agree with those that have posted on the site after re-watching the game – the Wallabies weren’t terrible. They were outplayed on the night by a better team but  having watched it play by play, the gap between the teams isn’t as large as it appeared to me watching the game the first time. Robbie Deans has said there were a lot of little things that spoiled any chance the Wallabies may have had.  I wouldn’t classify them…

Before I start, let’s acknowledge that the All Blacks were simply too good for the Wallabies on Saturday night in Bledisloe 1. Having got that out of the way, let’s move onto the topic I want to discuss, which is all about the Wallabies, not their opposition. I presume that the Wallabies (and by that I mean the entire playing group and the coaches) have defined goals that are understood by everyone involved inside the team.  Rod Macqueen took over as Wallabies coach in late 1997 and at the beginning of the 1998 season introduced his players to the concept…

A lot of journalists in the press box tonight stopped concentrating on the game early in the second half and started writing their match reports – those guys just don’t believe!  Not me, I stuck it out making notes of what was happening.  I even kept some basic live stats as I watched the game to support my assertions of what the Wallabies needed to do better.  The notes and the stats were all pretty negative and the draft I wrote this afternoon was actually quite positive, so I knew I’d have to start again. As most people had finished…

Where are the opportunities for the Wallabies v All Blacks in Melbourne this weekend?  Let’s take a look back at some of the things the Wallabies did well against the Springboks in Brisbane last weekend and what opportunities arose in the first two Tri Nations games between the Springboks and All Blacks.

Whilst the Wallabies played by far their best game of 2010 against the Springboks on Saturday, there are a couple of areas that need urgent attention if they are to be competitive against the All Blacks this Saturday. Some of the positives were the performance at the breakdown where the Wallabies retained 98% of their own ball but inflicted damage on the Springboks whose retention was only 92%, the pressure exerted in defence, the ball in hand strategy and a return to top form by Will Genia. Apart from the return of his running game, Genia’s performance at the base…

The votes are in and Drew Mitchell’s try didn’t win! The winning try for June with 42% of the vote was scored by Juan Van Vuuren from the University of Queensland Club against Sunnybank in the Brisbane 1st Grade competition. Drew Mitchell’s try for Randwick came a close second with 31% of the vote. Congratulations to Juan who wins $750 worth of prizes from our great sponsors Skins and Kooga. This is the last weekend for tries in July – there have been plenty of good tries entered so far this month, so get your entries in by next Thursday.…

I’ve been looking at the first two Tri Nations games between

Here’s the video of that try and an analysis of how the move works. Adam Ashley-Cooper might have been playing #13 that night but you’ll see that you can interchange players in the different roles for this move. Let’s hope we see some more attractive rugby like this on Saturday night – there’s no reason they can’t run exactly the same move again and maybe it’ll be O’Connor or Mitchell scoring, then again why not an Ashley-Cooper repeat …..

Did you get a feeling of deja vu watching game 2 of the Tri Nations between the All Blacks and Springboks?  The All Blacks picked up where they left off in game 1 and the Springboks again looked to have no answer. The only area of the game won by the Springboks was at the lineout where the second half performance by the All Blacks was very poor resulting in a very low 56% win rate for the match. Possession was again fairly even with 53 possessions to the All Blacks against 50 for the Springboks.  Whilst it wasn’t apparent…

Over the last few weeks in the build up to the Wallabies first Tri Nations game we’ve looked at various aspects of the Wallabies performances so far in 2010.  Today it’s time to look at defence. Over the first four games of the season the Wallabies have attempted 534 tackles and missed 66 of those.  That’s an average of 134 tackles per game with 17 missed tackles each game.  Whilst the number of missed tackles against the Irish was the lowest for the season so far , the success rate at 85% was the worst.  In fact the success rate…

Here they are – the top 5 tries the G&GR panel have selected for June.  Have your say on which club rugby player is going to pick up $750 in prizes this month from our great sponsors, Skins and Kooga. QuestionsView Results

WARNING!!! If the pain from yesterday’s video on lost possession hasn’t subsided, don’t watch the video because although it’s not quite as painful, it’s shows plenty of “basic” mistakes the Wallabies need to eliminate. In the first four tests of the season the Wallabies have kicked the ball 82 times – that’s around 40% of the times they’ve started a possession sequence. In the first game of the Tri Nations last weekend New Zealand kicked 44% of the times they started a possession sequence and South Africa 53%. Click on “Read More” to see the video and further anlysis of the teams kicking…

So far in the 2010 season the Wallabies have given up possession 60 times (an average of 15 times per game) though forward passes, dropped ball, getting bundled into touch or chip & grubber kicks that have gone wrong.  That’s 30% of the times they’ve started a possession sequence. When you watch the video you’ll see that a large number of these errors are really basic and shouldn’t be made by international players.  Having done so much of the hard work to get possession the Wallabies have been wasting far too much ball. UPDATE: I’ve added some more numbers  below in answer to…