Young team is united and building, says Rocky Elsom

Wayne Smith | August 31, 2009

Article from: The Australian

OUTWARDLY the landscape is the same, with the Wallabies having lost four consecutive Tests, just as they did in 2005, but Rocky Elsom insists there is a world of difference between the mood of the Australian team then and now.

Four years ago, the Eddie Jones empire was crumbling, with his otherwise reasonably successful era ending on the sour note of eight defeats in nine Tests. The team, with Elsom then a first-year rookie, was reeling. Not only was Jones the target of a bitter media campaign, so was his captain, George Gregan.
By the time the Wallabies' last Test under Jones ended in agonising defeat to Wales at Millennium Stadium, the atmosphere had turned poisonous.
Back then, the Wallabies were an ageing team clinging to the glory days, hoping to wring one last triumphant World Cup campaign out of their fast-declining veterans.
Now, however, the Wallabies are a team seemingly on the rise, still feeling the pain of generational change, but united behind a coach, Robbie Deans, who remains secure in his position, notwithstanding an ugly run of six successive Tri-Nations Test defeats.
Elsom grimaced as he went back in his mind to the harrowing days of November 2005, but he was quick to reassure his listeners that all similarities ended with the run of losses.
"It just doesn't feel like that," said the 26-year-old blindside flanker after turning in a rampaging, if error-marred, game against the Springboks at Subiaco Oval on Saturday night.
"I think we had some pretty big problems then that helped us get to that big hole, and we don't have those same problems now.
"In 2005, everyone tried really hard and it wasn't as though we gave up at any stage, but I think we had some problems within the unit that accelerated the downfall."
Certainly there is a world of difference between the personalities of Jones and Deans. Where Jones micro-managed not just his players but also his coaches, and was not averse to peeling the paint from the dressing-room walls with a blistering half-time harangue, Deans is a more phlegmatic, unflappable character.
"You don't need to be convincing the guys that they can win," Elsom said. "The blokes don't need to be pepped up. What you really need is direction, particularly at times like these, when your mind can wander because there's a lot going on. What you need is a straight line of direction, and I think we're getting that at the moment."
Loosehead prop Benn Robinson was equally adamant that the Wallabies under Deans have an unwavering sense that they are improving, even if the stark results suggest otherwise.
"Of course he (Deans) was disappointed after the game," Robinson said. "Losing so many games in a row is tough, emotionally as well as physically, but you see our performances over the past weeks and you see as a team that we're making a lot of steps forward."
Playmaker Matt Giteau agreed. Indeed, while the evidence is stacking up that John Smit's "whatever it takes to win, this team will find it" Springboks will be at the peak of their powers by the time of the next World Cup in 2011, Giteau believes the Wallabies could be the side to most threaten them. "Looking forward to the World Cup, while it might not look it, we are building some really solid foundations," Giteau said. "We certainly aren't playing the best football we can but when we do that and start stringing some wins together, everything will change. I know we're copping a bit of a hammering from outside but inside the squad, we actually do know we are not far off."
The Wallabies should take heart from the fact that the Springboks, too, have come under fire on the home front over the way they have played. But, as Elsom astutely observed yesterday, while the Springboks appeared to completely change their tactics at Subiaco Oval by dramatically scaling back their kicking game, in fact they stayed true to their regular game plan.
The difference between the kickathon Cape Town Test of August 8 and Saturday's vastly more entertaining contest in Perth was field position. "Even though they racked up a few points last time, a lot of them were from penalties," Elsom said.
"They were way out (territorially) when we gave them to them. This time we gave them time in our own half.
"They don't want to play out of our own zone and we gave them more ball in our zone. And so things are going to
be different."

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au...015651,00.html