It was far from perfect and resulted in a solitary competition point, but with their performance against the champion Bulls in Pretoria, the Tahs showed that the new demands 2010 Super 14 are starting to sink in.
The big difference this week; pace and aggression.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ftvDiphIJWY[/youtube]
As you can see from the highlights above, gone was the ponderously slow ball with futile hit ups, replaced by far quicker recycling and penetrative running. In fact, I don’t recall a single Burgess ‘meerkat’; instead he posed a genuine threat around the ruck and had a pick of runners. This sense urgency started from the kick off – the Tahs had scored 17 points by the 10th minute – and continued to the final whistle.
This commitment wasn’t constrained to attack. As a mini-compilation in the highlights shows, the Tahs have also adopted the hottest technique at the breakdown; the counter-ruck. Now being the safest way to slow attacking ball and even enforce a turnover, both forwards and backs worked hard to disrupt the powerful Bulls pack and forced them to commit more to the breakdown in the second half.
As enterprising and confident as the Tahs play was, far too much of it came from their own territory, which is where around 70% of the play took part in the second half. In this respect the 10/12 axis is still not working, and Anesi adds little from the back with Mitchell having the best of the boots. With Beale sparkling when he came on late in the game, Hickey has a dilemma as to which of his recent signings in Barnes or the Samoan fullback needs to take a step back.
Another factor that kept the Tahs pinned in their own half was the penalty count. By the end it was 13-4 in favour of the Bulls. Some of these came from the Bulls’ rolling maul, which the Tahs struggled to contain legally, but the New Ruck Interpretations gave Marius Jonker any excuse he needed to halt the Waratahs momentum. Interestingly, Morne Steyne passed up more than 8 kickable penalties, the Bulls preferring to go for territory deep in the Tah’s half.
Jonker also gave the NSW pack no pay-off for besting the Bulls in the scrum – to the contrary he even penalised the Australians instead. Robinson had Steenkamp on toast, he and his replacement repeatedly folded in under pressure. Far from being penalised over it, they even scored one of their tries in just such a situation (see highlights).
You do have to take your hat off to this Bulls side. The power with which they play the game is hard to live with. If that weren’t bad enough, Morne Steyne is evolving from being a Wilko-bot to being a real playmaker. He laid on 3 of the 6 Bulls tries; two with deft passes and one with a chip so perfect that even a backrower couldn’t help but score as it landed between 4 Tah defenders.
The Tahs come back to Sydney with 5 points from 3 games on the road – better than a hole in the head. Another performance of this intensity at home vs the hapless Sharks, and the bandwagon could just start rolling.
WALLABY WATCH
Put his hand up: A number of Wallabies had a great game, Burgo, Big Al, Shmoo and TPN to name a few. But Big Cliffy Palu’s rampaging workrate for the full 80 was phenomenal.
Did himself no favours: Berrick Buns – still out of sorts in this backline, at the minimum the Tahs needed his tactical kicking to be on song, and it wasn’t.
Bolter watch: A number of young guns showed promise – Fitzpatrick, Dennis and Douglas in the pack – but yet again Ben Mowen stood out, and for mine as the Aussie blind side of the round.
BULLS 48 (Francois Hougaard 2, Stephan Dippenaar, Wynand Olivier, Jacques-Louis Potgieter, Gerhard van den Heever tries Morne Steyn 6 cons 2 pens) bt NSW WARATAHS 38 (Drew Mitchell, Ben Mowen, Tatafu Polota-Nau, Lachlan Turner tries Berrick Barnes 2, Kurtley Beale cons Barnes 3 pens drop goal) at Loftus Versfeld. Referee: Marius Jonker (RSA).
