Cup will decide Knuckles legacy
Comment by Wayne Smith
June 11, 2007
FROM any other coach at any other time, it would have sounded like hubris or at the very least as recklessly tempting fate.
But when Australia coach John Connolly said yesterday that he wasn't going to be sacked before the Rugby World Cup, it was no more than a statement of the bleeding obvious.
John O'Neill's legendary red slacks have not even eased into the chief executive seat at Australian Rugby Union headquarters, but already the press speculation has begun that, if things turn belly-up for Connolly during the Tri-Nations - not a visual image to dwell on, granted - he will suffer the same fate that former Australia football Frank Farina did in the countdown to the 2006 World Cup finals.
But where O'Neill, then at Football Federation Australia, had time up his sleeve to ditch Farina and install Guus Hiddink before the Socceroos even qualified for Germany, time's as good as up on the Wallabies before they embark for France and the Rugby World Cup, with a mere 89 days remaining until they confront Japan in Lyon.
By the time the Tri-Nations wraps up, the countdown will have reached 49 days. Seven short weeks. Only a lunatic would change head coaches at that late stage, and even O'Neill's fiercest critics in their most vitriolic moments, have never accused him of being touched by the moon.
So, it's Connolly through to the end, be it bitter or sweet.
On the face of it, his recent coaching record is impressive enough not to warrant any of this nonsense, only one loss in the past seven Tests, and that to Ireland on a bleak, gale-swept Dublin night not fit for man or beast.
But every one of those wins was against sides ranked well below the Wallabies and, it's fair to say, the last truly meaningful match Australia played was at Ellis Park last September, when South Africa beat them 24-16, two tries to one.
Australia might be three Tests into its 2007 international campaign but its season effectively only starts on Saturday with the Newlands match against the Springboks. And the same applies to South Africa. But there the similarities end.
The Springboks have the Big Mo, momentum. The Wallabies, by contrast, appear to be playing in Slow Mo.
Just once, it would be reassuring to see them put an opposition to the sword, particularly when the opposition is a second-tier rugby nation such as Fiji fielding a team that included only four players likely to see any action in the Rugby World Cup come September.
Always the Wallabies seem to be scraping by with a pass mark.
That was probably a 50-point win against Fiji,, but 49-0 probably will do given that Julian Huxley kicked only four goals from nine attempts.
And that's the way it has been with this Australian team in recent years. It's competent but not compelling, diligent but not dazzling.
Connolly and his assistants have come under fire for not conducting enough selection experiments, but that's not quite fair.
They have run experiments but most of them have yielded results akin to the those Thomas Edison recorded on his way to inventing the light bulb. With each thing they try, they have discovered a new way that doesn't quite work.
Sam Norton-Knight headed back to Sydney yesterday rather than taking the red-eye to Johannesburg, not quite a failure at five-eighth but not a shining light.
Adam Freier played heroically and well at hooker against Fiji, clearly outpointing the man who came on to replace him, Stephen Moore, but Connolly is almost certain to be swayed by a single stat when it comes to the crunch this week: Moore weighs in at 112kg, Freier at 98kg.
As cruel as this question sounds, if Connolly does not believe Freier is big enough to cope with a monster pack, isn't it time he faced up to the fact and brought in the 113kg Tatafu Polota-Nau?
And is it really possible to determine if Scott Staniforth is a legitimate option at inside centre when the only two Tests he has played there have been against Scotland and Fiji, neither an especially scary opponent?
Even Staniforth doesn't know.
Besides, Steve Larkham was virtually under instructions not to run the ball to the line against the Fijians for fear he might get coathangered so the Stanifroth experiment was inherently flawed. It's one thing for him to receive the ball with space to spare - and he certainly proved he is more than capable under those circumstances.
But the real test of a Wallabies inside centre is whether he can work at Larkham's shoulder in the thick of traffic, and that we're not entirely sure of, even if he did unload a pearl of a pass to Lote Tuqiri under real pressure at Subiaco Oval.
The trouble is that Connolly has now locked up the lab, hung up the white coat and called an end to the experiments.
Time has beaten him and that means going back to what's been tried and tested, however boring it might be.
There's nothing sexy about a George Gregan-Steve Larkham partnership. Nor a Matt Giteau-Stirling Mortlock centre pairing. Nor a second-row pairing of Dan Vickerman and Nathan Sharpe. They have all been around since the days of Eddie Jones, longer in some cases, much, much longer where the halves are concerned.
The question now is whether Connolly can take them to a new level and get something out of them that others couldn't. And in the process, whether he can put the Wow! back into the Wallabies.
In the last weeks of his career, we're about to discover whether Connolly really can coach.
http://www.foxsports.com.au/story/0,...-23217,00.html
and Rugby Heavens slant on same subject
Monday, June 11, 2007 Print this article
Australia coach John Connolly laughed off suggestions he could be sacked before the World Cup if the Wallabies struggle during the Tri Nations series.
Australia, fresh from a 49-0 rout of Fiji in Perth on Saturday and a 2-0 series win over Wales, open the Tri Nations when they face South Africa in Cape Town on Saturday.
However, the successful start to 2007 has failed to shake off the critics, who say the experienced halfback axis of George Gregan and Stephen Larkham is too predictable to take the Wallabies to a record third World Cup in France later this year.
That tallied with John O'Neill's return as head of the Australian Rugby Union has the critics sharpening their knives for Connolly.
"People will throw those things up but it's not going to happen before the World Cup as much as they might like it to at times," Connolly was quoted as saying in Sydney's Daily Telegraph newspaper on Monday.
"That would just be crazy."
But O'Neill has previous form.
He sacked Australian soccer coach Frank Farina when he was head of Football Federation Australia and replaced him with Guus Hiddink just four months before the Socceroos' World Cup playoff qualifier against Uruguay in 2005.
The Socceroos went on to qualify for the finals in Germany, where they reached the second round and boosted the popularity of the sport in a rugby-mad nation.
"It's not even something I've thought of," Connolly added.
"But that is the life of the coach, I guess. I spoke to John O'Neill yesterday. We had a chat and we're going to catch up on Friday week in Sydney for coffee.
"He's totally committed to Australia. I wouldn't think that commitment is to anyone in particular, but he's totally committed to getting the team in the best possible shape for the World Cup."
Connolly on Sunday named his 25-man squad to face the Springboks at Newlands. They next play the All Blacks at the Melbourne Cricket Ground on June 30, two days after O'Neill officially starts his new role.
Reuters
