Cooper getting to know his players
THE scorelines in these preseason clashes are effectively meaningless, but nonetheless being on the end of a 45-19 result against the Blues will certainly have new Chiefs coach Colin Cooper on alert.
The man taking over at the franchise from Dave Rennie finally got the chance to see his troops in action on Friday in Te Kuiti, in an outing which showed up some clear areas of improvement required for the Chiefs three weeks out from their seasonopener.
It’s always tough to get a gauge on these games when All Blacks and several senior players are sitting out, as 30-plus others – unfamiliar names included – get the first run of the new year.
While there were glimpses of sizzling attack from the Chiefs early in the piece when their stronger side matched the Blues to 14-14 at halftime in the fourquarter fixture, the visitors then powered away with a 17-0 effort in the third spell thanks to some powerful work up front.
That’s an area Cooper will take pride in getting right – labelling the biggest difference between himself and Rennie being that ‘‘I’m a forwards coach, he’s a backs coach’’ – and will also be a big mandate of forwards coach Neil Barnes.
Cooper said there were still ‘‘a lot of things’’ he liked, and it would be ‘‘pretty simple’’ to review the first outing and get things heading in the right direction, as he gets to grips with his new role.
‘‘You’ve got to connect with players I’ve never coached with, I’m connecting with coaches I’ve never worked with either,’’ he said. ‘‘We’re going to go through that teething, and the quicker we can accelerate through that, the better for the team.’’
After three months on the training paddock, he was just happy to have seen his players under pressure, which means he can offer more accurate feedback.
‘‘We were just looking at individuals, so there’s some individuals that put their hand up, and as a group of coaches we can have a look at stuff that worked and that didn’t work,’’ Cooper said.
‘‘At times our scrum went well, at times our D[efence], our gain line went well, at times our maps went well, our little skills were good at times, then we let ourselves down – we were giving too many penalties away and we couldn’t stop the lineout drive, four tries from lineout drives. That’s an area where we’re going to have work on.
‘‘But more importantly, the lineout came from penalties. So down in their defensive zone we were letting them out of there. So GETTY IMAGES
‘ We’re going to go through that teething, and the quicker we can accelerate through that, the better for the team.’ COLIN COOPER
that was disappointing.’’
The big positive was that there were no injury concerns out of the game – barring the question mark around flanker Lachlan Boshier, who came off with concussion symptoms – as the team now turns its attention to the Brisbane 10s next Friday and Saturday. The defending champions have named a squad of 24 for that, which will also see Sefo Kautai, Mitchell Brown, Liam Messam, Marty McKenzie and Toni Pulu return to the mix.
The Chiefs will then stay on in Australia and play the Brumbies on the Sunshine Coast in a final warm-up game on February 14 – in a match where Cooper will reintegrate his All Blacks for stints of less than 80 minutes – before they eye up a tough seasonopener against the defending champion Crusaders in Christchurch on February 24.
And indeed with a team featuring several high-profile departures, it’s sure going to be a challenge for the new coach on his return to a Super Rugby competition he was last involved in in 2010.
‘‘I’m pleased I had the break, because it’s got bigger, the staff’s got bigger, more players, more responsibility, juggling a lot of balls. So I’m probably more ready for those challenges than I was with the Hurricanes,’’ Cooper said. part because of injury. But, there were a few pointers as to how Thorn might choose his side for their opening Super Rugby clash on February 23 with the Melbourne Rebels.
Hamish Stewart played the full 60 minutes at five-eighth for the Red team, which appeared to be close to Thorn’s best available side, and showed fancy footwork to beat two defenders on a neat 15m run to touch down late in the second half.
Stewart, 19, has played only a handful of minutes for Queensland but has been anointed their next chief playmaker after Thorn’s decision to show Quade Cooper the door.
Lachlan Maranta played at fullback, although how long be might be first choice in that position remains to be seen. News broke during the match that Karmichael Hunt’s cocaine charge would be dropped by police – a potentially careersaving development.
‘‘It’s like a soap opera, isn’t it?’’ Thorn said. - AAP