Wallabies on notice: no more slip-ups

[travelling_gerry]

Wallabies on notice: no more slip-ups

GREG GROWDEN

June 26, 2010
Tough week ... coaches Jim Williams and Robbie Deans keep a close eye on Wallabies training in Brisbane yesterday. Photo: Getty Images

ENOUGH is enough. It has taken just more than two years for Robbie Deans to let his true feelings show and indicate how infuriated he is coaching a team that consistently lets him down. The real Deans is starting to emerge, and several Wallabies had better watch out.
The Wallabies coach needs no reminding that he might so easily have been chasing his eighth international win in a row against Ireland tonight, and the Wallabies should have been using the match to charge into next month's Tri Nations full of bravado.
Instead, due to several inexplicable losses - including unforgivable ones against Scotland at Murrayfield last November and England in Sydney last weekend - the Wallabies are in an all-too-familiar state of hesitancy and uncertainty: promising much, delivering little and losing respect along the way.
That is fair enough, considering their inability to back up and kill off an opposition, and propensity for losing intensity when the pressure is eased. The commitment of some key Wallabies has to be seriously questioned, as has Deans's ability to get the best out of them.
The perfect example was last Saturday night. Australian rugby officials are adamant that if England had lost again their rugby structure would have been dismantled, and high-ranking team figures, including head coach Martin Johnson and coaching director Rob Andrew, would have been moved on. They had been told as much by their English counterparts, and if the Wallabies had applied the sword and won in Sydney, they could have enjoyed the grand spectacle of one of their key foes falling apart just a year out from the World Cup.
Instead the Wallabies capitulated and let England off. And with it, the Wallabies dropped to fourth on the International Rugby Board rankings, while Deans's success rate slumped to an unimpressive 54.8 per cent.
For too long, Deans has mollycoddled his players, letting them off when they have dropped standards. Not this week. Murrayfield taught him a lot. He was irritable then, but the past few days he has been seething, and dejected that so many players whom he has provided with opportunities don't deliver when required.
Deans was frustrated after the match on Saturday, and still so at Sydney Airport the following morning. Matt Giteau's botched penalty from in front of goal - following a similarly straightforward missed conversion at Murrayfield - still rankled, as did numerous other facets of the game.
Deans would also have been mindful of team behaviour before the Sydney Test. Word had filtered out that the Wallabies, after their exceptional performance in Perth, ''weren't in the right headspace'' in the hours leading up to the Test. There was no edge, and that showed a few hours later when they took the field at ANZ Stadium.
It was clearly time for Deans to do something. There have been enough clues this week that he has been forthright at several Brisbane team meetings, with his assistant Jim Williams explaining the players had been told ''last weekend wasn't good enough''.
And Deans's quotes about players are suddenly not so sugar-coated. He made it obvious on Thursday it was time for second-rower Mark Chisholm, who has come into the pack for the injured Nathan Sharpe, to aim up. ''He became a 50-Test-capped player last week, and the conversation we had was essentially along the lines of: 'Your apprenticeship is over - it's time to start getting a return','' Deans said.
A good point, as Chisholm is among the players who have coasted for far too long. With the Wallabies pack decimated by injury, those who have been forever hovering need to become more than cardboard cutouts and provide actual leadership - a factor sadly lacking last weekend.
And despite Ireland being rank outsiders to win tonight, they should not be treated that way. Ireland know how to upset the Wallabies. Their belligerent approach works, especially against a team so unsure of its way.
In the Wallabies' favour is that they are long-time masters of picking up their act when the pressure is on. That's fine. But it is now more a case of proving they can actually back up, back up, and back up again. Until that happens, they will remain also-rans, and Deans's problems will just intensify.


http://www.smh.com.au/rugby-union/un...0625-z9qk.html

[GIGS20]

I see the Pie Man has a ghost writer!

That was actually a really good article and hit the nail right on the head. I guess that's Deans's input more than Growden's, but I guess at least, Growden didn't defend Giteau, Mumm, Elsom, Horne, O'Connor et al.

I think we'll have real problems winning by a big margin this week, We've lost the only true leader on the park in training and Elsom is a complete paper tiger as captain. It appears that Rocky's one of those guys who are truly inspirational when concentrating on their role but when asked to captain as well doesn't do either well. Maybe we should look to Genia as captain, he seemed to handle the responsibility well for the Reds, or Sharpie, since he's been doing the job anyway. If I was Robbie, along with telling EVERYBODY they'll be hooked as soon as they start to suck this week, I would be telling Rocky to play well AND captain the team or give up the role (coz he can't hand over an armband)

[Timbo]

For me one indicator of the "poor attitude" was that, after muffing THAT penalty, Giteau broke into a smile. Now maybe it was a nervous reaction (a la embarassment) or maybe it was an indicator that "it happens" - well that is how it seemed to me.

You do not win close games if you do not get pissed off with yourself for stuffing up simple things.

Whilst I would like to blame Gits totally for the loss, it is clear that the "just another run on the park" approach is wider than just him.

The problem we have at the moment is not a lack of skill - it is a lack of mongrel and G&D.