Away from home, against the best that the South African conference can offer, and you’re without your two very best players – arguably the world’s two best players – and your starting scrum-half and both your starting locks and your regular bench prop – all of them All Blacks. This was the situation that confronted the Crusaders on Saturday at Newlands, Cape Town, as they prepared to take on the Stormers. “What more could go wrong?”, they must have been thinking.
Well, quite a lot more actually! As if the absence of Richie McCaw, Dan Carter, Andy Ellis, Brad Thorn, Sam Whitelock and Ben Franks was not a big enough handicap for this vital and confronting match, by the 30 minute mark they had all three backline reserves on the pitch. Five minutes later they had lost another back and played the remaining 45 minutes with a flanker, the outstanding Mike Todd, on the wing! Nobody but the Crusaders could have won this match. But win it they did, not with their normal style, but with a massive amount of commitment and self-belief – and a liberal sprinkling of gamesmanship, but let’s not quibble here.
The conditions were excellent and this fantastic rugby stadium was full to capacity — and full, also, of expectations for an absorbing contest. The locals were without top players as well, with form fly-half Peter Grant and world-class winger Bryan Habana unavailable, but there were clearly plenty more resources available for this top-level contest.
I speak often of the technicalities of the game and of the detailed technique required for quality play. A few weeks back, I mentioned that passion and commitment were also a part of the game, and these must not be forgotten. Well, none of the Crusaders players on show here forgot, that’s for sure.
They, above all other teams, exhibit quality technique across the board, week in and week out. Catch and pass, accuracy of ball-in-front, line and depth of support, body position at the ruck, etc. etc. The hard-nosed stuff up front and the fighter pilot stuff out wide are all top quality, pretty much all of the time. But yesterday, something else was needed. I know that ‘dig deep’ is a hackneyed term, but the Crusaders were certainly forced to dig very deep yesterday and they found an amazing reserve of strength and energy.
In my Wallaby team of the early 1990s, a much-used exhortation among the players was “Do it right – every time!”. It was a reminder to stay focused, to not panic, that proper execution under extreme pressure will be the key to success. It has been clear for a number of seasons now that this holds true also for the Crusaders, but never was this more clearly illustrated than in this thrilling match. And while the Crusaders stayed accurate and determined, the execution by the home side fell away with critical errors in the set pieces and in their finishing. In the 83rd minute, still with a chance for a win, the Stormers missed touch with a penalty kick and the game was over. It requires a heap of committed work from the coaching staff to develop this mind set – and a heap of committed players – and I take my hat off to them.
There were some great match-ups in store for the game, but, because of injury, some never really eventuated. One that did was the midfield contest, where de Villiers and Fourie opposed Williams and Fruean. The commentators had informed us, pre-match, that Sonny-Bill was the most talked about figure in Cape Town in the lead-up. He didn’t let anyone down. He was a constant threat and was the major contributor to Crockett’s first try in the tenth minute.
Jaque Fourie reminded us yet again of his outstanding pace and acceleration in his try in the 19th minute, which gave the Stormers their narrow 11–10 half-time lead. Robbie Fruean was not at his best. He dropped a couple of difficult chances from Sonny Bill offloads. One of the commentators remarked on one such occasion “I don’t think that he was expecting the ball”. Really! When you’re chasing Sonny Bill, I think you always expect the ball. Fruean did make one trademark break, midway through the second half, which set up the field position for Crockett’s second try.
During the first half I made a note for myself that the weekend’s matches had featured loads of ‘overs’ runs, much of it simply crossfield running and not of any great quality. As soon as I’d written it, the Stormers’ rookie winger Johann Sadie came on an ‘unders’ run, inside the drifting Jaque Fourie. It’s an old, old play – we used to call it “Drifter”. Straight running still works. This time it brought Fourie his try.
The Crusaders won the forward battle. This was clearly a must-do with only six backline players still standing, but they understood what was required of them and they set about doing the job. It seems wrong to single out any player, but Wyatt Crockett was immense. They won the scrum battle, but perhaps referee Chris Pollock was kind to Crockett there. He did eventually penalise him, towards the end of the game, but could have happened a lot earlier! They won the lineout battle, even with the outstanding Andries Bekker present in the Stormers line. They won the mental battle. Other teams should take note!
In the loose forward play, it was an immense battle – no surprise really, given the quality of the players involved. All of the usual suspects threw themselves into the collisions. If either team was short of numbers at the tackle contest, they were found out. Funny, isn’t it? Old fashioned rucking still works a treat – they call it ‘counter-rucking’ now! Vermeulen, Louw and Burger went toe-to-toe with George Whitelock, Read and Todd (and later Poff). This contest was pretty much a draw, with both sides out on their feet.
I dips me lid to you Crusaders!
