Monday’s Rugby News has Dave Dennis and the Tahs still hopeful they can make it to the promised land, Ed Jenkins staying put, assurances from Kiwis that being really really really good at Super rugby means little in the Test arena, and a new exciting pre-season rugby tournament that will put the Vegas in Brisvegas.
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Waratahs Still Hopeful
The Waratahs reckon they still can get into the Super finals, despite digging themselves into a hole with the loss against the Hurricanes on Saturday.
This weekend, the Brumbies play the Force in Canberra while the Waratahs travel to Auckland on Friday, having to better the result of the Brumbies to get into the playoffs.
“History aside, we need five points over there. If we start thinking of those stats, it’s not going to help our cause. We need to win, and win well,” Waratahs talisman Dave Dennis told the Daily Telegraph.
“If we win with five points, and we’re sitting at home on Saturday and it’s still not enough, we’ve finished how we wanted to finish. It would be extremely disappointing, we’ve always tried to make the finals and that’s going to be our goal still.”
The Waratahs’ task will no doubt be made harder by the thumping form the Blues showed against the Brumbies last week, and the poor history of the Tahs in Auckland (one win there in 21 years), as well as the fact that Taqele Naiyaravoro has been suspended for one week – ruling him out of the rest of the Super season, as he’s not eligible to play in the finals even in the Tahs get there – for his brain-fart mid-air grappling of Beauden Barrett on the weekend.
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Jenkins = Sevens
Part-time model Ed Jenkins has put pen to paper on a two-year contract extension with the Aussie rugby sevens team, which Jenkins himself sees as “potentially my last contract”.
Jenkins, the captain of the team, is excited for the future of the sevens team, and isn’t thinking that the Olympics are the be-all and end-all.
“With Andy Friend how he’s come on on board, I didn’t really want to jump ship after the Olympics,” Jenkins said to rugby.com.au, “the team’s building really nicely and I think there’s a lot more success to come.”
“I never thought I’d get to Rio, so you never know what’s around the corner and definitely getting older this is potentially my last 7s contract, so I want to give it everything to put the team in good stead,” he continued, “over the next few years, I want to help some younger guys help with their leadership and pass on any knowledge I’ve gained over the past 8 years.”
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Super Ain’t Bledisloe
It’s ok everyone, despite the fact that Australian sides got their arses handed to them this weekend by Kiwi teams, and have done all season – actually you could probably extend that to the past few years – two former All Blacks, as well as Reds co-coach Matt O’Connor, have assured Australians that Super form won’t necessarily translate into Bledisloe success.
“In the last few years Australia and New Zealand have been very close, so it’ll swing,” Gibson said, according to the SMH, “At the moment New Zealand teams are playing with a game style that’s troubling Australian defences for whatever reason”. Presumably he means they don’t seem to drop the ball as often.
“Right now the scoreboard’s not lying. I think we’ve got to look at our own strengths. We can’t afford to be going and copying different game styles. Different styles have their time and if you get good at them you can win rugby. That style’s pretty dominant.”
Meanwhile, Cory Jane of the Hurricanes added “Whether it’s a South African team, Aussie team or New Zealand team dominating or playing poor, once they put that Test jersey on it’s completely different. When you move on from Super Rugby to Test matches it’s completely different. The Wallabies will be the usual Wallabies.”
O’Connor also had his bit, telling Fox Sports that the Wallabies, under the strategic rugby genius of Michel Cheika, “showed at the World Cup mere months ago they can beat or compete with everybody in the world so I wouldn’t isolate what’s happening in Super Rugby.”
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Brisvegas Global 10s
Both Fairfax and News Limited are reporting that Brisbane will host an international club rugby 10s tournament next year, in direct competition with the NRL’s Auckland Nines.
Called the Brisbane Global 10s, the pre-season tournament is set to be launched next month. All ten Australian and Kiwi Super sides are set to take part, as well as Samoa (who have their Prime Minister’s backing – Malcolm, where’s your support, huh?), and the Robbie Deans-coached Panasonic Wild Knights, the Bulls and Toulon.
The 14-team event is also expected to be broadcast in France and the UK, and according to the SMH will have around $1.5 million in prizemoney and appearance fees. On top of that, individual contracts have been sorted out with the attending clubs’ top stars, such as Israel Folau and Sonny Bill Williams, ensuring that they will rock up for the event.
If this event still isn’t sold to you, SMH also happily reports that Eddie Jones, John Eales and Ali Williams have been in consultation with the events organisers over the format.
The first Brisbane Global 10s is set to be held over the weekend of 11 and 12 February, 2017.
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