'Backwater' teams three of the top four in the world, Gareth

February 9, 2008


ARU chief executive John O'Neill couldn't let Gareth Davies' attack on the standard of southern hemisphere rugby go unchallenged.

The International Rugby Board updated its official world rankings this week. Opening-round matches at the Six Nations Championship were taken into account and England, after losing to Wales last Saturday, slipped one place to No.5.

Rugby World Cup champions South Africa remained at No.1, followed by New Zealand, Argentina and Australia. Our Wallabies moved up one place to leapfrog England and, significantly, leave Europe without a country in the top four. I refer to these rankings for one reason. In the Herald last weekend, former Welsh five-eighth Gareth Davies suggested Super 14 and Tri Nations were "backwaters in the order of world rugby".

It was an ill-informed assertion that demands a response from the Australian Rugby Union. We were at a loss to understand his attacks on southern hemisphere rugby.
The SANZAR countries - South Africa, New Zealand and Australia - have won five of the six World Cups played. Only England managed to break the monopoly, in 2003.

While making unwarranted criticism of the competitions run by the SANZAR countries, Gareth also extolled the virtues of the Six Nations Championship.

The Six Nations is a wonderful event, laced with tradition and played to sell-out crowds.

It seems, however, that the ongoing commercial success and popularity of the tournament is not dependent on where the competing countries are placed on the IRB rankings.

England at five is followed by France, Ireland and Wales, with Scotland down at No.10 and Italy at No.11.

Early last week, I suggested the Wallabies improving on a 60 per cent success rate in Tests from 2003-2007 was imperative for us moving forward.

During the previous five years, our national team delivered a strike rate of 73 per cent. Where we are now is not satisfactory. The ARU has made that clear. So we can only sympathise with a number of Six Nations countries that have, in the past 20 years, returned winning ratios of only 35 per cent. Equally disturbing was Gareth's suggestion that disappointing results for the Wallabies were behind a southern hemisphere-led "clamour" to change the laws of the game. Australia was accused of bleating, and wanting to deny other countries the chance to kick the ball or pack a scrum.

The point he so unfortunately missed is that the experimental law variations (ELV) have been instigated and implemented by the IRB, not the ARU. It was the IRB that set up an advisory panel of esteemed experts two years ago to look at developing laws to improve the game. The board's ELV committee is chaired by Scotsman Bill Nolan.


It was the IRB which invited SANZAR to play ELVs in the Super 14 series, which begins next week.

Let me also defer to Syd Millar, the former IRB chairman who presided over the Rugby World Cup in France last September-October. The day after a final in which there were 91 kicks in general play, he was quoted as saying how ELVs - still to be trialled at the upper levels of the game - were designed to make rugby more exciting.

"The creation of space, keeping the ball in hands rather than in the air, are things we want to encourage," he said. "On experiments we've had with the new laws, the ball is played 10 per cent more of the time, more tries are being scored and the rugby gets more exciting. Defences are on top at the moment. We need to free up the game a bit, make it easier to play, easier to referee, easier to understand."

IRB statistics show the average number of kicks in a Test is 55. The World Cup semi-finals produced 86 and 85 respectively, and 91 in the final.

In this part of the world we do want a better rugby spectacle.

But Gareth is wrong in suggesting Australia, or the southern hemisphere in general, is on its own chasing improvements for the game. The IRB has led the calls for change.
Gareth is also misguided suggesting Super 14 and Tri Nations are backwaters of world rugby. To paraphrase the former British Lion, that is "bunkum".


http://rugbyheaven.com.au

Touche' ARU, Touche'....

couldnt have said it better. its a bit like a South African mate of mine, pointing out that South African teams will dominate S14 2008, New Zealand teams will be competitive and Australian teams are just going to trying to keep up.

Although i hate bringing up historical data it is the best indicator we have for trends going forward.
And the FACTS are That Australia won the world cup twice before South Africa did. Australia have a better track record in Super14 and Tri Nations than South Africa..
case closed.


the same goes for NH teams vs Southern Hemisphere teams. the track record is quite clear. the top 3 (& now 4) SH teams DOMINATE every year!

How exactly are the South African teams going to dominate? Last season proved that the Cats, Cheetahs and Stormers are pretty miserable teams and despite their finish worse than the Waratahs and at best on par with the Reds. The Bulls have lost a few stalwarts and their style of play just doesn't match the ELVs more game time means tiring a lot faster and losing in the last 20 minutes. As for the Sharks they have fantastic backs and talented-mobile forwards and will do very well in my opinion but they have been racked by loss of experience and talent to the extent of the Brumbies. Dick Muir knows it thats why Johann Ackermann is back in the mix. You have to ask though at about 37 odd years old will he be able to keep up with the pace?

I don't fancy their chances all that much. I think the Hurricanes and Crusaders from NZ and Sharks and Force will make up the finals this year. With all the NZ teams doing pretty well, the other three Aussies in the middle somewhere and at least 3 legs of South Africa propping up the table.