Record loss unacceptable
OPINION: Embarrassing, humiliating, disgraceful.
Not even Finance Minister Steven Joyce would dare attempt to put a positive spin on Canterbury’s record 60-14 pummelling at the hands of Wellington last weekend.
Just how the red and blacks rebound when they play unbeaten North Harbour in Albany on Saturday will decide how quickly their wounded fans - in the rare position of being trolled by the rest of the country in recent days - will forgive them.
Losses happen. Even for Canterbury, who are gunning for their ninth national provincial competition title in 10 years this season.
They lost two games (Counties and Manawatu) on their way to the title last year, while Taranaki was the only team to tip them up on their way to the 2015 crown.
All three losses could be accepted as part and parcel of the game. The same goes for the majority of Canterbury’s defeats since the proud union was founded in 1879. But the way they folded in the capital on Sunday left their fans feeling as empty as Westpac Stadium with all those yellow seats.
It wasn’t acceptable. Not for the second most successful province in New Zealand. Not for the team with 13 titles (Auckland has 16) and 17 Super Rugby players in their squad.
It was their biggest-ever losing margin. It was also just the fourth time they’d conceded 50 or more points in 138 years.
A handful of days earlier, Canterbury hammered Counties 78-5. The armchair critics came out in force on social media and talkback radio, calling for the province to be crowned with the title immediately.
But judging by the way Canterbury fell off 30 tackles, made schoolboy errors and conceded one more point than they’d leaked in their first five games of the season, nobody could be blamed for suspecting the players sucked up the hype before the game at the Cake Tin.
Sure, it was Canterbury’s third game in 10 days, and they were missing a bunch of players, including injured captain Luke Whitelock and rested vice-captain Tim Bateman.
But coach Glenn Delaney still wheeled out a starting side with nine Super Rugby players. There were another three on the bench.
It was a chance for senior players such as hooker Ben Funnell and stand-in captain Dominic Bird to stand up in Whitelock’s and Bateman’s absence. Midfielder Rob Thompson was one of the few players whose nose wouldn’t grow if he told you he played a decent game of rugby.
An intercept try and a couple of charged down kicks contributed to Canterbury’s demise in the wet conditions, as the match snowballed out of control early in the second half.
But what went down in the last 14 minutes of the match is what will have disappointed most of the Canterbury faithful. The red and blacks’ ticker went down the gurgler. The fight for the jersey appeared to dissipate.
Wellington got a whiff of it and rammed the dagger deeper than ever before, pouring in half of their eight tries to complete the embarrassment.
Delaney, rightfully so, didn’t throw any of his players under the bus in the aftermath of the defeat, but you wouldn’t bet against some choice words and demands being directed at players behind closed doors the past week.
‘‘It doesn’t define who we are, it wasn’t a good enough performance from us, it’s something we’re definitely not happy about and it’s something we’re going to correct,’’ he said.
The attitude down the stretch would be a good place to start.