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Bret Harris | March 01, 2008
AUSTRALIAN rugby is producing a bunch of brilliant young attacking players, but boy oh boy, they sure can't tackle.
The NSW Waratahs have been forced to hide five-eighth Kurtley Beale in defence because his front-on tackling is not up to scratch.
But Beale is not the only rising young star in Australia who has difficulty tackling head-on.
Usually, when a five-eighth is weak in defence, the coach will swap him with the team's fullback, as new Wallabies coach Robbie Deans used to do with Andrew Mehrtens and Leon MacDonald at the Crusaders.
But Waratahs fullback Lachlan Turner's front-on defence is not much better than Beale's, although he is a very good cover defender, which is a different skill entirely.
Waratahs coach Ewen McKenzie will play wingers Lote Tuqiri and Timana Tahu at five-eighth in defence against the Highlanders in Dunedin today and hide Beale on the blind-side wing.
The Brumbies' inexperienced inside backs combination of halfback Josh Holmes, five-eighth Christian Lealiifano and inside centre Anthony Faingaa were waving matador capes at the Highlanders in Canberra last Saturday.
Lealiifano and Faingaa missed 50 per cent of their attempted tackles, turning the Brumbies' 10-12 defensive channel into a super highway.
Yet, all of these young players are very talented in attack. So why are they such liabilities in defence?
By the time players reach Super 14 level they are expected to know how to tackle. Super 14 coaches spend more time on implementing defensive patterns than teaching tackling technique to individual players.
But a gifted back, playing behind a strong forward pack, can go through his schoolboy career without making a fair dinkum, front-on tackle.
How many front-on tackles did Beale have to make in six years at St Joseph's College in Sydney? Not many.
And when these young players graduate to the Australian Schoolboys they might have to play one or two hard Tests against New Zealand.
The point is, many of our best young players are not fully tested in defence until they play Super 14, and it is clear they are not ready, mentally or physically.
In American football, players spend four years preparing for the rigours of the NFL by playing college ball.
There is no such intermediary competition in Australian rugby.
Australia's best young players might be better served spending a couple of years in a strengthened club rugby competition or a third-tier development league such as the defunct Australian Rugby Championship.
Instead, they are pitch-forked into the Super 14 because of the lack of depth in Australian rugby.
McKenzie admitted Beale was pushed too far too soon when he made his Super 14 debut last year as an 18-year-old straight out of school.
The plan was for Beale to learn the game sitting on the reserves bench, but this was thrown out when Mat Rogers decided to return to rugby league.
Beale, who is bigger and stronger following a rigorous off-season, is a better playmaker this year than he was last year, but his game still needs a lot of work, particularly his defence.
Lealiifano is experiencing a similar fate in Canberra this year.
Brumbies coach Laurie Fisher originally intended to replace Wallabies great Stephen Larkham, who was a tremendous front-on tackler, with the experienced Julian Huxley at five-eighth this year.
But a spate of injuries in the backs has forced Fisher to play Huxley at fullback and promote rookie Lealiifano to replace Larkham.
Fisher has made adjustments to his inside backs for the Reds game today with the experienced Patrick Phibbs replacing Holmes and the hard-tackling Tyrone Smith moving to inside centre in place of the injured Faingaa.
This has left the Brumbies with another rookie, Leo Afeaki, at outside centre and the Reds have already signalled their intention to target him in defence.
While Afeaki is regarded as a good front-on tackler, his biggest defensive challenge will be his decision making in the complicated number 13 channel.
It is worth noting that the world's best five-eighth, Dan Carter, did not make his Super rugby debut for the Crusaders until he was 21.
To be sure, Carter had some handy five-eighths in front of him in Christchurch in All Blacks Mehrtens and Aaron Mauger.
But Carter learnt an enormous amount while he waited, soaking up knowledge while watching from the reserves bench as Mehrtens and Mauger played for the Crusaders.
Australia has not been able to prevent veteran players finishing their careers with rich European or Japanese clubs, which means young players here are lacking mentors.
Carter's back-up at the 2007 World Cup in France, Nick Evans, was even older when he made his Super rugby debut at 22 years of age in 2004.
Of course, New Zealand rugby has had the luxury of depth, although this is starting to change on the other side of the Tasman too with an exodus of players to the northern hemisphere.
The next time Beale talks about switching to rugby league, the ARU should encourage him to go. At least, he will learn how to tackle front-on.
Queensland five-eighth Berrick Barnes is an outstanding front-on tackler and that is due largely to his experience with the Brisbane Broncos.
Somewhere along the line, Australia's precocious young backs need to be taught how to tackle. And tackling, like any other skill, has to be practised.
You can have the best defensive system in the world, but in the end, defence comes down to personnel.
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, Rod Kafer did it on Inside Rugby and Bret Harris has done it again, there wasn't even a mention of the :Force: young guns who are, to a man, great defenders, Bamm Bamm...no question, Nicky Cummins...has done the job, Hockings, Holmes, Horua, Chickie, Wykesey....There's not a hole with one of them!
