Bledisloe will make or break Aussie rugby
After a dismal year, the Wallabies just can’t afford to get beaten by 35 or 40 points in Sydney.
AAUGUST 19 will be one of the most important days in recent history for Australian rugby.
It’s got nothing to do with the performances of our Super Rugby teams or the drama surrounding one franchise being culled. But August 19 is the date of the first Bledisloe Cup clash.
Why is it so important? Because the Wallabies need to regain the support of the Australian rugby public in a sport that, it saddens me to say, is lagging desperately in the popularity stakes.
I amobviously a staunch rugby man, 15-man code through and through, but the negativity surrounding the game at the moment is unfortunately contagious.
I attended a junior rugby club lunch last week and it was a great turnout. Myself, Jeremy Paul and Bill Young waxed lyrical about the glory days, but the overwhelming feeling of the afternoon was: Can the ARU turn around the fortunes of a game that seems to have lost its heartland?
That’s why an extraordinary effort against the All Blacks is required, to restore faith in the game and faith in the system.
I know there’s three Tests coming up in June that, hopefully, will generate a groundswell of support again. But the Wallabies are really between a rock and a hard place when it comes to these games.
I’m looking forward to these Test matches after what’s been a desperate Super Rugby season but, by the same account, this will be a difficult proposition for our boys.
I say this because the Wallabies should win all three of these games – against Fiji, Scotland and Italy, who are 10th, fifth and 15th respectively in the world rankings – and win them well.
At first glance, people might not be too excited by these teams; and the Wallabies should put a score on all three. But the reality is, Fiji are not the old ‘throw it round and hope for the best’ kind of team they once were; they are now much more structured in 15s. Scotland, in recent years, have been our bogey team; the past two games, we have scraped home with one-point wins. While the Italians will front up with their standard massive forward pack that will try to push us around the park.
I just don’t think winning all three games will be good enough for many punters, because if the Wallabies don’t put 35 points on Fiji, at least 15 to 20 points on Scotland and 25 on Italy, people will think our lads have somehow failed. Yet I know our boys would have gone as hard as they possibly can.
Which brings me back to August 19 at ANZ Stadium, and a date with the All Blacks. Obviously the Wallabies will be out to reclaim the Bledisloe Cup but, if they don’t – again – the performance has to be dogged, gritty and skilful for 80 minutes. What we expect from any Aussie team competing on the world stage.
I’m not saying these blokes haven’t done so in the past, but the 80 minutes on August 19 will have more riding on it than there has been for a long while – particularly in the ARU’s corporate suite, where fingers will be crossed hoping that 2017 isn’t a complete whitewash. Thing is, though – and I hate saying it – it could well be.
Now the players might think, ‘‘So you want us to rip in, but not lose by too many?’’ Well, kinda. Obviously, I and all rugby fans would love a win, but the reality is few will bet against the Kiwis to retain the cup.
In a two-horse race stranger things have happened, but the Wallabies just can’t afford to get beaten by 35 or 40 points. At the end of a dismal domestic season, the fans need hope.
We will get an early read on just how the All Blacks are travelling when they take on the British and Irish Lions in a few weeks. With a bit of luck these two will belt each other around for a month or so and the Lions will soften up the Kiwis for us. We can only hope.
Which brings us back to August 19. Australian rugby fans need something to believe in. It’s unlikely to come from this Super Rugby season, and it’s probably not going to come from ARU headquarters, but it just might come from the Wallabies.