Tank Lanning - Rugby Championship Round Five Review

Golden opportunity for Pumas

The Argentinians are the story of this year’s Rugby Champs, says Tank Lanning, who believes they have a golden opportunity to get that first win and set up their RWC campaign.

Tank Lanning

This time next year Argentina will also have just played New Zealand. But at Wembley Stadium in London as part of the Rugby World Cup, rather than at home in the Rugby Champs. They will also have played Georgia at Kingsholm, and have Tonga and Namibia to go in their chase for a quarterfinal spot.

To my mind, they are the story of this year’s Rugby Champs. Sure, they remain winless, but my word, they have pushed every one of the other three sides. And being ranked second in their pool behind the No.1 ranked All Blacks, this new look Pumas side should get through to the final 8 of next year’s showpiece relatively easily. It’s whether they can take that next step that begs the question.

Other fringe semi-final contenders Fiji, Japan, Samoa, Scotland, Wales, Ireland and France all lie above the Pumas on the rankings, but their rather lowly ranking of 12 does not tell the true story given that they play all games outside of the Rugby Champs without their European based players.

And with 4 of those sides above the Argentinians set to be knocked out through pool game attrition, and a potential quarter-final game against one of France or Ireland (the winners of Pool D), the men from South America have a real chance of upsetting the Northern Hemisphere applecart even further.

They remain a 65 to 70 minute team, but with better conditioning, that will improve. They also looked a fairly rattled and plan less when really pushed by the pace of the All Blacks on Saturday, but no more do we see the impetuousness so often linked with the Latino culture. Their defence is now well structured, and they have a plan on attack that includes keeping ball in hand and remaining patient, and they have that awesome weapon in the form of the Bajada scrum technique.

Hold on for the full 80 minutes, use that Bajada to great effect on a weak Australian scrum, and keep both Israel Folau and Tevita Kuridrani in check, and that first Rugby Champs win could well come this weekend. How wonderful would that be for the tournament, and world rugby in general? And given that the Wallabies do not have a lot to play for (at best, they could sneak second with a 5 point win), and will have travelled after a demoralising loss in Cape Town, this is a golden opportunity for the Pumas.

Given the All Black dominance - for the third year in a row - the penultimate game of the tournament at Ellis Park is also a dead rubber, but use those 2 words to describe and All Black vs Springbok Test at your peril! Even though it happens more frequently these days, when the top 2 sides in the world go head to head, the world takes notice.

The All Blacks were written off far too easily prior to the tournament, and remain the team to beat, but the Springboks are the other story of the tournament for me.

Having ditched Morne Steyn at flyhalf, the South Africans have now certainly adopted a more heads up, ball in hand approach, with Handre Pollard afforded the opportunity to be the general in a new look army. It has come with errors, and it has not always looked pretty. But when it has come off, like it did in the final 10 minutes of the game at Newlands, it has looked breath-taking. It is definitely the way forward.

It is a game that is difficult implement without dominance up front though. Hence the struggles against the Pumas. And hence being down against the Aussies for 75% of the game. Schalk Burger brought intent (above execution), as did the likes of Bismarck du Plessis and Bakkies Botha, and in the face of such brutal physicality, the Aussies wilted. It was a classic reminder of important a role the bench plays in modern day rugby, and how important it is to win the battle up front before the show ponies out wide can strut their stuff.

Dead rubber? Pah … Boks vs All Blacks will be an absolute cracker!