The Rugby Championship - Round 1
The southern hemisphere’s annual tournament got off to an exciting start last weekend with an almost surprising result in New Zealand and a confirmation of South Africa’s dominance in Australia.
New Zealand’s All Blacks hosted Argentina’s Los Pumas at the Sky Stadium in Wellington. This locale is not a favorite of the All Blacks given they’d only won 1 of their last 6 matches there, and “the hoodoo continued”. New Zealand with a mix of veterans and relative newcomers started well in H1 scoring 2 converted tries and 2 penalties to go in at the break up 20-15. However, Argentina’s try in the 37th minute gave spectators an inkling of what would happen in H2. Despite an additional try and 2 penalties for New Zealand, Los Pumas outfought the hosts and 2 converted tries and 3 penalties saw them run out the winner 38-30, the highest score against their opponents ever. NZ were leading with 12 minutes left but a try under the posts by 109-cap Creevy and a penalty after 2 botched passes in the NZ 22 gave the visitors 10 late points and the win. A curiosity of the game was the first scrum took place in the 60th minute! So Argentina get the win and 4 points; NZ zero points. (Winners can get a bonus point if they score 3 or more tries than their opponent; Losers can get a BP for a loss by 7 points or less.)
At Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane, the Wallabies took on RWC Champions South Africa and any hope that the Springboks might be off the boil were soon dashed. In a dominant and efficient H1, the Boks scored 3 converted tries with no answer, helped by a lot of penalties from Australia, not that they seemed to need it. The power of the scrum and the enterprise of their backs made the lack of an established 9-10 partnership an irrelevance. MVP of the World Cup Final, Pieter-Steph du Toit, now playing #5 was everywhere and scored a great try as did 2 other pack members in their 5-try victory. A curiosity of this game was South Africa receiving 3 yellow cards in the last 15 minutes meaning that Australia had a 2-man advantage for that period, only scoring 1 try and losing 33-7 at the whistle. South Africa took 5 points from the win with a bonus point and Australia none.
Next round, Australia play South Africa in Perth, Western Australia (sold out) and New Zealand play Argentina at their stronghold, Eden Park (a few tickets remaining). Streamed on Florugby.