Battling Blues edge Force as Mac stews
‘‘It’s a marathon, not a sprint,’’ says Blues coach Leon MacDonald. Translation: his Super Rugby Pacific-leading side still have time to fix this weird funk they’ve fallen into.
For the second week in a row, the Blues have had all sorts of trouble dealing with an Australiabased foe they should have brushed aside with ease, having to defend 26-plus phases after the final hooter in Perth on Friday night to eke out a 22-18 victory over the Western Force that improved their win streak to nine, and counting.
They may be sitting pretty at a competition-best 9-1, with 40 points, but their rugby has been ragged the last fortnight, which began with that 35-18 slog down struggle street against the Fijian Drua.
Those wobbles continued on Friday night as the Blues went scoreless in the second half, lost five lineout throws, stacked too many errors and penalties, and spent most of the spell in battendown-the-hatches mode.
‘‘We were really disappointed with that second half,’’ said MacDonald before a 12-hour journey back to Auckland. ‘‘We’d worked our way into the game after an indifferent start, and had wrestled some momentum back with patient, controlled attack, rewarded with three well-taken tries.
‘‘At halftime (leading 22-8) we thought we were positioned really well. Then we missed a kick for the corner, and didn’t really get it right after that which was disappointing. We started stacking errors, and giving momentum away and this competition is too tight to do that.’’
Skipper Dalton Papalii led a fine defensive performance with 29 tackles made and just the one miss, while young No 8 Anton Segner wasn’t far behind with 24 stops. These were not stats that best pleased MacDonald.
‘‘We’re going to end up getting our key players injured if we’re not smarter with the way we’re playing.’’