Hi all,
Many of you will have watched the series "The Call of The Wallaby" on Fox Sports and YouTube recently. There was an inconspicuous moment in the first episode, when Tiana Penitani said something along the lines of "My generation has never known the Wallabies to be that successful".
I was born the same year as Super Rugby, in 1996. My earliest memories are of my Dad taking me to rugby games at places like Coogee, Woollahra, Manly, Concord and North Sydney, or running around in the stands and on the hills, watching and learning about the sport that we all love.
My two clear earliest rugby memories are of Jonny Wilkinson hitting that drop goal in 2003, and of the Waratahs going down in the 2005 Final in Christchurch. I only have three clear memories of the Wallabies beating the All Blacks - in 2008 in Sydney, in 2010 in Hong Kong and in 2011 in Brisbane. I don't know what it's like to win a Bledisloe cup, and I don't know what it's like to win a World Cup. The last time the Wallabies won at Eden park was five years before my parents had met.
"Boo hoo, you are whining about the Wallabies losing" I hear you say. And you're right. But this isn't just me. This is the entire generation coming through high school. The kids playing Schoolboy rugby all have the same experience as I do - the next generation coming through to play for the Wallabies don't believe that it's possible for the Wallabies to match and compete with the All Blacks consistently, because we have never seen it done. These kids are going to play for the Wallabies and start the game already beaten because they don't believe they can do it.