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Wayne Smith | July 21, 2009
Article from: The Australian
THE good news is the Wallabies have just under three weeks, during which the All Blacks and Springboks will twice beat the living daylights out of each other, before they resume their Tri-Nations campaign.
Satisfying as it always is watching New Zealanders and South Africans inflicting pain on each other on the rugby field, Robbie Deans and the Wallabies can ill-afford to idly waste this lull in the battle. A strategy must be formulated to beat the Boks in Cape Town on August 8, then a team picked to implement it.
It may be that the All Blacks will expose some weaknesses in the South African team that the British and Irish Lions weren't able to illuminate, but it was clear by the end of the recent series that the Lions wanted to avoid kicking for touch at all costs.
It was not just that the Boks have the best lineout in the world -- which they do. It's what they do with it that worried the Lions and now, presumably, is causing a furrow or two in Deans' brow.
Any lineout ball won within 20m of the opposition line inevitably finds its way to the back of the Springbok rolling maul and the Green Machine begins to rumble.
The Springboks will surely employ it, especially if Deans again opts for three "small" openside flankers in his 22.
It's not just the maul that springboards off the lineout in the South African game plan. Most of their backline play flows off it as well. So the fewer lineouts the Wallabies present to their hosts, the less opportunity they have for structured attack.
If the Wallabies do as the Lions did and kick to keep the ball deep in play, that exposes them to the ball-running threat of Bryan Habana, Akona Ndungane/JP Pietersen and probably Francois Steyn.
Not kicking to find touch, curiously, places a higher premium on kicking skills than merely hoofing for the line. While an argument could be made for a Stirling Mortlock-Ryan Cross centre pairing, the Wallabies must retain Berrick Barnes at inside centre if they are to have a genuine point of difference.
Barnes performs a much-undervalued task in taking some of the heat off Giteau.
As well as figuring out what they will launch at the Springboks, the Wallabies need to be well aware of what the South Africans will fire back. Fourie du Preez, assuredly the world's best halfback, doesn't need any encouragement to put up the box kick at the best of times. Seeing the benefits the All Blacks reaped from Jimmy Cowan's pinpoint bombs in Auckland will have made him doubly determined to test the Wallabies back three.
The All Blacks made an art form of appearing to leap for the ball when in fact they were merely shouldering the Australian wingers away from the catching zone in the hope a 50-50 bounce would go their way. And at 88kg and 95kg respectively, Lachlan Turner and Drew Mitchell weren't that difficult to move.
It is time for Peter Hynes to be recalled. He was one of the safest players under the high ball last season and the Wallabies could do with his calming influence in Cape Town.
As for that other key area of concern for Australia at Eden Park, the breakdown, the Wallabies are in a quandary. They can try to run the Boks off their feet by using three opensiders, but South Africa will only allow the game to turn expansive on its terms and that one of George Smith, Phil Waugh or David Pocock will have to go.
Given that Deans didn't use Waugh in Auckland, as ferocious as the breakdown contest was, chances are he will be the one sacrificed, although this is the sort of contest for which the Waratahs skipper was made.
As for the under-performing Wycliff Palu, the Wallabies can't afford not to have him. But while the rest of the Australian team will be worrying about bombs from above, Palu should be more concerned about the one under him, planted by Robbie Deans.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au...015651,00.html
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