You can put your money on Banks
Lions Tales It’s not often a player can say he got the better of Owen Farrell, and Highlanders folk hero Marty Banks never would, but on a chilly Dunedin night it happened.
Wearing 22, Banks landed a penalty six minutes from time to put the Highlanders ahead 23-22 on Tuesday night. As well, he slotted a tricky conversion to Liam Coltman’s try.
He succeeded where Farrell veered away. One of the best of the Lions and a goalkicker extraordinaire, Farrell had the chance to put his seal on an engrossing game in the 69th minute.
Having only just taken the field in 3degC might have contributed to his miss, but miss the best of goalkicker did. It was a shock, and greeted as such with blue, yellow and maroon joy.
Against the Crusaders Farrell had landed four from five to win the game, and there was a school of thought that the fifth went over as well.
Five minutes later the poodlehaired Banks landed his matchwinner, after the Highlanders’ tight five demolished a Lions scrum.
Highlanders captain Luke Whitelock put it like this: ‘‘The cool, calm and collected Marty Banks comes over and slots it’’. It never looked like missing.
Lions coach Warren Gatland mentioned Banks by name, in his summary of what went astray.
‘‘There are very, very fine margins - we miss a penalty that Owen would normally kick every day, and at the other end Marty Banks kicks a penalty, and it’s the difference between losing by a point, or winning by a couple,’’ he said.
Banks proved better than the best, better than Farrell at putting away a game that could have gone here or there.
Oddly, it was the first tour game in which the Lions had scored more tries than the opposition. Decried in earlier games for winning on kicks, this time goalkicking cost them.
And so the Banks legend grew. Now there will be even more chants of ‘‘there’s only one Marty Banks’’, and more offbeat claims he should be in the All Blacks.
Assistant coach Scott McLeod didn’t stop at praising the penalty. When Banks came on soon after halftime for the very rusty LIma Sopoaga, he had ‘‘really brought it home’’ with his game management, McLeod said.
Banks, who last year drank a beer thrown on to the field to distract him as he took a shot at goal, was modesty encapsulated talking to reporters afterwards. He was beaming though.
‘‘I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little bit nervous [about the kick], but I didn’t feel too bad,’’ he said.
‘‘Just to go out there and beat the Lions means a lot to this whole team. I’m just lucky the forwards did why they did and provided opportunity for the kick at goal.
‘‘It could have been anyone really.’’
The bedtime stories aren’t exclusively for the kids this week it’s the New Zealand Maori squad who are revelling in the nightly ritual, as they hunker down for their big match against the British and Irish Lions in Rotorua on Saturday.
After assembling last Sunday the Maori have been steadily building on-field combinations on the training paddock, but, perhaps just as importantly, have been striking up their off-field mateship, in the unique way the Maori squad tends to do.
There’s a special bond the group are able to come together with, and the traditions and
"I'd be lying if I said I wasn't a little bit nervous." Marty Banks on his matchwinning penalty.