Wayne has to nail key combos for World Cup
IWAS sat down watching Scrum V with a cup of tea last Sunday when Wayne Pivac made a surprise appearance on my TV. One of the comments he made in his interview got me thinking. Wayne said: “We’ve looked at about 50-odd players in the last two years so it’s time for us to nail down 40 to 45 players of which 33 will come from that group for the World Cup.”
That is a statement which shows Wayne means business this autumn.
He is absolutely right to have that approach. The pandemic has warped everyone’s sense of time to a degree and it doesn’t feel that long ago that South Africa were crowned winners at the 2019 World Cup.
Now, remarkably, we are less than two years away from the next global showpiece which means every second counts in terms of evaluating what the make-up of Wales’ best team is.
You’d have noticed Eddie Jones recently made the same admission about his England outfit.
Wayne got plenty of criticism in the Autumn Nations Cup of last year, but he was right to look at several new players even if it meant results weren’t great.
We then saw what Wales were really made of in the Six Nations when Wayne picked his best available side for every game. The result? A Six Nations title win and very nearly a Grand Slam.
I’m sure we will see Wayne adopt the same approach for this autumn series especially because of the calibre of the teams coming to Cardiff ’s Principality Stadium. The three big southern hemisphere teams and Fiji are serious opposition which will test Wales in every facet of their game.
Wayne might experiment a bit more against Fiji (even though that is always fraught with danger) but what I want to see from Wales this autumn is a nailing down of combinations.
Who is Alun Wyn Jones’ firstchoice partner at lock? Is it Adam Beard or Will Rowlands? Who is the best nine? What is the centre pairing which can go through to France in 2023?
These are all big questions Wayne will be grappling with.
It’s not the end of the world if no definitive answers to those questions are answered in the upcoming campaign, but it would be a big boost for Wales if they were.
Wayne’s tenure to date has been dominated by Covid-19 which has made things so, so difficult. My view is he has done a brilliant job on the whole given the circumstances.
Now his challenge is to build on the Six Nations in the autumn. We must be realistic that Wales could very well lose to New Zealand, South
“Losses won’t be the end of the world as long as Wales continue to grow their game”
Africa and Australia.
Of course, beating one or even two of those sides would be a huge confidence boost, but in my opinion, losses won’t be the end of the world as long as Wales continue to grow their game with the World Cup in mind. Let’s be honest, there is every chance Wales will be rusty against the All Blacks.
They will also be without their English-based players so those who get the chance to impress first must take it. I can’t stress how important it is to have clarity in your combinations in key positions.
I’d like to see Tomos Williams given a long run at scrum-half.
He is such a livewire of a player and one who is perfect for Wayne’s attacking, free-flowing style of rugby. If you held a gun to Wayne’s head and asked him for his first-choice halfback pairing, I have a hunch he’d pick Tomos and Gareth Anscombe.
Wayne has chopped and changed his nines in the last two years with Gareth Davies, Tomos, Rhys Webb, Kieran Hardy and Lloyd Williams all having a go.
These are all good players but I think Tomos is the man for the next few years. I think he was unlucky not to tour South Africa with the British & Irish Lions this summer.
He brings something different. I am not tipping him for Wales on the back of one game, but look at the way he played for Cardiff against Connacht in round one of the United Rugby Championship.
Tomos started that game on the bench, but when he came on, he did everything. He even kicked goals! He was a lively running threat, created tries, and kept Connacht on their toes.
That is exactly what you want in a nine. At the 2019 World Cup it was Gareth who started games with Tomos coming off the bench. I accept the argument from those who might say Tomos is the better of those two in terms of having an impact as a replacement.
But I also believe he is too good a player to be having 20 minutes here or there. He is capable of having a real impact on Test matches from the start. He is now 26 and has 25 caps so he is no longer a rookie either. I honestly think he is due a big campaign so long as he stays fit.
Going up against the likes of New Zealand’s Aaron Smith and South Africa’s Faf de Klerk will be his biggest challenge yet but it’s a test I’m sure he would relish.