NEL TARGETS CLEAN SCRUMS
WORRY about the citing officer later. First of all, Scotland have to deal with a southern hemisphere referee, the vagaries of interpretation that always seem to favour the favourites — and an Australian team who blur the lines between sharp play and downright illegal practices. Their famed breakdown is so good that it has to be borderline bent, those ‘dummy runners’ who cause such chaos in opposition defences may well be pinged for obstruction if they wore the jersey of a less exalted rugby nation, while the scrum — well, that is a law unto itself. The Wallabies have used this set-piece as a penalty-winning machine so far, partly because they have added some solidity to a former weak point in their armoury — and partly because they’ve run such a persuasive PR campaign about the newfound strength in this crucial area of the game. WP Nel, the naturalised Scottish prop who insists he won’t be having a quiet Afrikaans word in ref Craig Joubert’s ear tomorrow afternoon, still understands the importance of perception when it comes to those collapses that leave both front rows pointing accusatory fingers at each other. Asked if reputations can sometimes lead to penalties simply being handed to the ‘dominant’ scrum, Nel said: ‘Honestly, yes. Sometimes it feels like the team with more experience gets the better of it — but it’s up to the ref, so we can just do our bit in the front. ‘I can’t judge whether there are too many penalties handed out at scrums. That’s up to the ref. It’s up to us to try to keep it clean. ‘Do I talk to refs? No, no. It doesn’t help.’ Without wishing to give Joubert more reason to lean towards an Aussie scrum so hyped that you’d think they could shove a tank into reverse gear, Nel admits that he has been impressed with the turnaround in this traditionally weak area of the Wallabies game. He added: ‘They have made a really good progression with their pack, so yes, they have really worked hard on the scrums.’
JOHN GREECHAN