Wednesday’s Rugby News sees more Giteau Law flexibility, the imminent end of rugby union in New Zealand, today’s dose of Springbok schadenfreude and the Western Force turning Japanese.
Rugby Australia boss ‘clarifies’ Giteau Law.
PlanetRugby reports that Rugby Australia chairman Daniel Herbert has used the Old Jedi Mind Trick to clarify the criteria for overseas players to be selected for the Wallabies.
In his first year as head coach, Joe Schmidt has selected just one overseas-based player in his squad (Marika Koroibete) who got called into the team ahead of the Rugby Championship campaign. Instead, Schmidt has opted to get to know the locally-based talent better and has issued no fewer than 16 players their first caps for the Wallabies. However, there have been calls (including from eejits) for the Wallabies boss to turn to overseas-based stars to bolster the squad, and Herbert has explained what criteria they have to meet in order to be selected.
Herbert has also revealed that Rugby Australia have an overarching agreement with New Zealand Rugby that they will not go “full apeshut” on selecting overseas-based players. This is in order to protect Super Rugby Pacific with better contracts on offer from overseas clubs than in New Zealand or Australia.
Back in 2015, Australia tweaked their selection policy under Michael Cheika to allow him to pick overseas-based players ahead of the 2015 Rugby World Cup. The policy has undergone several changes over the years with players needing to reach a certain number of caps – internationally and in Super Rugby – and at a point required the player to have signed a deal to join an Australian team ahead of the next season. However, that is no longer the case as Herbert has confirmed that the requirements are far looser for Schmidt as it changed under Eddie Jones in 2023 as well.
“There’s plenty of flexibility there right now, if they [the Wallabies coaching team] want to use it and if you go back to even around the COVID time where we deliberately put a lot of flexibility in and around the policy with the closedown of the borders. So there is the ability for Joe to pick a number of those players and if he felt that the team would be improved by picking some others then he need only ask. Where there is a discernible difference then we’re certainly not going to stand in his way.”
“But he’s of the mind right now that there’s actually a better benefit in backing the kids and the guys who are here giving them more experience and more game time and build the squad depth that way. If he wants to supplement the squad by bringing in one two or more [overseas-based players] then he can but at the moment he’s making a deliberate decision to build that squad depth and experience with the guys that are here.”
The All Blacks have a similar approach to Australia in regards to selecting overseas-based players, but are more stringent as Scott Robertson is able to select any players based abroad who are contracted to New Zealand Rugby. For example, Jordie Barrett will be eligible for selection when he heads to Leinster for his short-term playing sabbatical later this year.
“If we look back over the history of what’s happened, the only time I would say there’s been a really positive difference around not an individual’s performance but the team performance was when [Queenslanders] Samu [Kerevi] and Quade [Cooper] played together in that truncated version [of the Rugby Championship] where we had double headers down the Gold Coast and up in Townsville.”
All Blacks are doomed due to Wellington and 2024 hoodoos.
Rugby365 and Stuff report that the All Blacks haven’t won at the Cake Tin in five Tests and six years. That run includes one Bledisloe Test in Dave “who’s laughing now?” Rennie’s first outing as coach in 2020 when New Zealand struggled to a 16-all draw, with Reece Hodge sending a 50-metre kick into the post after 80 minutes.
New Zealand’s shocking run in the capital includes a loss earlier this season to Argentina and a 2022 defeat to Ireland which nearly cost coach Ian “looking better in hindsight” Foster his job before a redemptive win in South Africa. As well as the 16-all draw with Australia, the All Blacks shared the same scoreline with South Africa in 2019. Steve “doo-wop” Hansen’s side were also beaten by the Springboks in 2018 in another thriller, a 34-36 loss. Looking further back, Wellington was also the venue involved in Australia’s last Bledisloe Cup sweep, in 2000.
In Bledisloe No. 1 2024, Scott “Queen and David Bowie collaboration” Robertson’s side went scoreless in the final quarter for the fifth Rugby Championship test on the trot. In their three defeats – against Argentina in Wellington and twice away against the Springboks – their last points came with 27 minutes, 27 minutes and 21 minutes to play. On all three occasions they had the lead at that stage, only to be outscored 13-0, 14-0 and 5-0 in the remainder to finish on the losing end. Across the 200 second-half minutes the All Blacks have played so far in the Rugby Championship, they have been outscored 79-38, after winning the 200 first-half minutes 104-46.
The All Blacks have already lost three times in 2024, something that was only true in one year, 2009, during the 20-year span from 2000 to 2020. A brief memorial service for New Zealand rugby will be held immediately after the game on Saturday. Locals who haven’t already left the stadium before full-time are encouraged to attend.
World Rankings: Paddies move above Jaapies without playing.
PlanetRugby reports that Ireland have moved into the top spot without playing a minute of rugby at the weekend, which was all thanks to a memorable Los Pumas win over former world number one side the Springboks. Relevant ranking factors include:
Rankings before the match: If a higher-ranked team beats a lower-ranked team fewer points or in some cases, no points are traded because the result is expected. However, if a lower-ranked team beats the higher-ranked team it is seen as an upset and as a result more points are exchanged. The greater the difference in rankings the greater the influence of this aspect.
Home advantage: Playing at home has obvious benefits so the system ‘handicaps’ the hosts by adding three points to their rankings accounting for the relative advantage.
Margin of victory: If a game is won by more than 15 points then the points exchanged is multiplied by 1.5
As such, there is often more to lose than to win for higher-ranked sides – which was the case for the Springboks in round five of the Rugby Championship. South Africa went into the Test in Santiago on top of the rankings with a tally of 93.37 while Argentina were in seventh with 82.49 which is a fairly significant difference, meaning there was a decent portion of points being exchanged. Los Pumas would go on to claim a memorable 29-28 win in front of their home fans meaning the Springboks had to forfeit 1.6 points. This took the world champions tally to 91.77 which was only good enough for second place behind Ireland. Argentina on the other hand climbed into the sixth spot with 84.30.
Expect a ranty video from someone.
Western Australians dig rocks.
In this week’s instalment of G&GR’s Operation Sandy Appeasement, we’re pleased to report on the Western Force’s commercial arrangement with Japanese club Urayasu D-Rocks (the actual club name), courtesy of rugby.com.au. It’s definitely not all East Coast content here.
The Western Force and Japanese League One club Urayasu D-Rocks have renewed their ongoing mutually beneficial partnership. Representative of D-Rocks visited Force HQ in Perth a fortnight ago, exchanging information and strengthening ties, meeting with numerous parts of the business. As part of the partnership, in November 2022 the Force and D-Rocks played a two-game series in Japan. In the future, the partnership will see the two clubs hold further friendly matches and/or training camps between all teams of both clubs.
Force director of strategic projects Matt Hodgson (pictured – right) said “Our ongoing relationship with Urayasu D-Rocks has been beneficial for both clubs, sharing ideas, different perspectives and commercial interests.”
Urayasu D-Rocks general director Uchiyama Hirofumi said “We hope that the actions and achievements of both teams will contribute to the success of the 2027 Rugby World Cup. We would like to express our respect and gratitude to the team officials for their hospitality”. Exactly what is stopping them was not explained by the time of publication.
