SUNDAY SPECIAL: Missing ingredients come together in the Cake Tin
The ABs may have unearthed a superstar, PLUS: Black Caps forget to put pants on ($).
The All Blacks were a long way from perfect in breaking their weird six-year, five-test drought in the nation’s capital, but if you were the dean signing off their report card you’d at least give them a pithy pat on the back to take with them to Europe.
Something along the lines of: “Team has a lot of work to do and continues to have problems with discipline, but latest test demonstrates notable improvement.”
If there’s nothing else to take from this tricky first home season, they have at least unearthed a piece of clay that could be moulded into something spectacular.
There was a danger that Wallace Sititi’s tyres were being over-inflated after some nice moments on the attacking side of the ball in his first few tests were interspersed with some questionable decision making on defence. Last night provided the most striking evidence that the 22-year-old loose forward could be the complete package.
Thirteen robust charges were allied to skills and vision on attack, while his 11 tackles carried sting and accuracy. After missing three tackles in Cape Town and another last week in Sydney, he redeemed himself with a spotless night on defence.
Oh, and he’s a source of lineout ball and disruption.
There is something beyond the stats that engenders a sense of giddiness when assessing Sititi. It’s that possibility that seems limitless. It’s reminiscent, even, of watching a young Ardie Savea charge around in the No 7 jersey though perhaps even with a bit more polish.
Scott Robertson was effusive in his praise of him following the match, though wasted everyone’s time with a bit of pointless waffle.
“He’s a great kid, you’ve got to get to know him to really understand his values. He’s a man of faith, he believes in himself and he trusts his skillset. He’s really humble.”
Perhaps it’s a sign that I need a cold swim and an injection of youthful naivete, but I find this pap irritating. It’s irrelevant to me if he’s a man of faith or an agnostic searching for meaning in a world full of pain and misery. Wake me up instead when a coach describes a new player as a “kid with no morals, a nepo-baby grifter who is rude to service staff and refuses to donate to the SPCA, but wow he can play”. That would be worth reporting.
Anyway, I digress.
The faithful Sititi has made a hell of a start to his career and has the potential to wear a variety of jerseys before it’s over. This, from Robertson, was worth the ink.
“Just the way it’s been in the past four or five weeks with the leadership that Sam [Cane’s] created, we’ve put him to six because he can lineout jump, and other than the scrum where he picks at six he can just play in the middle.
“I think those days are gone where you play six or seven or eight, normally they can play all three and you can mix and match; England do it and a lot of other teams do it. He’s comfortable at six, but he’s naturally probably an eight.”
This is good info. The days of rigid positioning in rugby feels outmoded. Rinus Michaels popularised “totaalvoetbal” in the 1970s but it has taken rugby a lot longer to throw off the shackles of positional convention.
Why wouldn’t the loose forwards mix and match to suit individual skill sets in different parts of the field and at different set pieces.
We’re seeing it more and more with the playmakers. When Damian McKenzie came on to great effect last night, it was noticeable that Beauden Barrett dropped back to defend at fullback, but he still regularly slipped into first receiver when in possession. This allowed McKenzie to flit around out the back on attack, looking for mismatches to exploit.
On that subject, did we learn anything from Barrett switching to first-five and McKenzie entering the fray as a supersub?
Yes and no.
We learned that Will Jordan is a devastating threat from the back when afforded a little time and space. We learned that Barrett can create more consistent shapes to the attack and that McKenzie can really offer something as a late-game sub. But then again, we had seen Barrett do that too against England.
Mostly though, as dismissive as this might sound, we learned that the Wallabies are a thoroughly ordinary side capable of playing stirring rugby in small doses only.
Last night provided evidence that Joe Schmidt was no closer to cracking the Bledisloe code than Eddie Jones, Dave Rennie and Michael Cheika were before him. It wasn’t for a want of trying. Schmidt’s men threw a series of quirky looks and training-ground moves that had the All Blacks clutching at shadows early, but Australia lack the cattle to sustain pressure.
For Robertson, the true test of his methods and the relative strengths and weaknesses of his playmakers will come on a brutal European tour where in the space of 15 November days the All Blacks face England, Ireland and France.
The emergence of players like Sititi, Cortez Ratima and Tamaiti Williams, and the resurgence of Tupou Vai’i and Jordan mean the arrow is trending up, but to use a hoary old chestnut… tougher tests await.