In New Zealand rugby, their idea of a crisis is a losing sequence of one-game in a row

In New Zealand rugby, their idea of a crisis is a losing sequence of one-game in a row. Heck even a draw against Australia a fortnight ago got them into a tizz, prompting coach Steve Hansen to call for a week of serious introspection “from myself down to the waterboy.”

The country was seriously miffed and the fact that the 12-12 draw with the Wallabies in Sydney denied this All Blacks team the chance to break the world record of 17 consecutive wins had a lot to do with it.

The result was 50 points put past the Aussies in the return game in Auckland at the weekend in a performance that was quite possibly the best of the professional era. It really was that good. The Wallabies should have known better – don’t make the All Blacks angry!

Later on that day, we watched the Springboks labour to a narrow win over the Pumas in Argentina, in the process suffering the ignominy of being repeatedly shoved off their ball in the set scrums. Some big Springbok reputations took a knock and it will be interesting to see how the tight forwards respond against the Wallabies in Perth next week.

But back to the All Blacks and their ruthlessly efficient performance. They played the game at a tempo rarely seen and with an intensity that no other team in world rugby can match. The Wallabies did not play that badly, but they simply could not live with the raw power and aggression of the super-charged Kiwis.

The Boks’ underwhelming performances against Argentina – in the wet of Pretoria and the stifling heat of Salsa – left South Africans depressed about our chances of beating the All Blacks this year, in Wellington and then at Ellis Park in the final match of the Championship.

The funny thing is that it is not impossible to beat the All Blacks if you play the right game. It IS impossible to beat the All Blacks if you try and match their game. They are too strong and too fit. We saw that last year when the Boks took on the All Blacks at their own game in that memorable match at Ellis Park. The Boks were trying to score four tries to earn a bonus-point win and secure the Championship, and they looked the part for three-quarters of the game before running out of steam and the Kiwis ran in three tries without reply in the final quarter.

Heyneke Meyer was the first one to acknowledge that the Boks were not fit enough that day. At the end of last year’s tour to the northern hemisphere he said the same thing again – South African rugby lags behind New Zealand rugby when it comes to conditioning. Meyer called for a national conditioning programme to be run by his fitness team. He knew it would never happen because our Super Rugby franchises own the players and follow their own programmes as well as play leading players into the ground out of self interest. The Bok coach plays second fiddle.

The New Zealand Rugby Union owns their players, not the franchises and Hansen and his management team call the shots, ensuring players are fit through a national programme and that senior players are rested.

In 2009, the Springboks beat the All Blacks three times, including a win in Hamilton, the last time the All Blacks lost a Test on home soil. The Boks did it with a highly effective kick-and-chase game. They sucked the All Blacks into trench warfare and avoided high-paced, attacking rugby.

The Boks have to cut their suit according to their cloth. It might not be as entertaining as the way the All Blacks play, but it is the only way the Boks can beat them.

By Mike Greenaway