Robbie Butcher stars as Australian Origin prove too strong for New Zealand Origin in annual Anzac Day rugby union clash

AUSTRALIA locked up the annual Anzac Day rugby union origin series at 1-1 after a comprehensive 45-17 win over New Zealand on Sunday night.

Australia Origin v New Zealand Origin rugby union: New Zealand team performas the Hakka before the game

AUSTRALIA locked up the annual Anzac Day rugby union origin series at 1-1 after a comprehensive 45-17 win over New Zealand on Sunday night.

It was the Robbie Butcher show at Rugby Park as the gold shirted No.10 collected 20 points to play a big part in avenging last year’s 22-16 loss to the Kiwis.

The Australians drew first blood when Drew Tobin crashed over after nine minutes from a kick forward and apart from a brief surge by the Kiwis late in the first half, they were always in control.

Superboot Robbie Butcher had no problems with the conversion 10 metres from the left upright to give the yellow and green shirts a deserved 7-0 lead.

But the Kiwis were quick to respond when the magical Bobby Nurse took advantage of a big push by his forward pack to score next to the right upright three minutes later.

Junior Ravetali converted to level the scores, bringing the big crowd to life who had come to watch a genuine clash of the Anzacs.

Butcher’s workload had to be seen to be believed in the first half, running on to passes, looking for scoring solutions and kicking long when in possession to keep the Kiwi defence on the back foot.

Stephen Bunn’s try from another rolling maul got Australia to a 12-0 after 20 minutes, an advantage increased by another two when Butcher calmly converted from five metres inside the touch line.

Australia’s work in the backs was worrying the bigger Kiwi side, the slick passing and hard running of Butcher and Anthony Smith out wide forcing them to exert a lot of energy.

One headache for the Australians was New Zealand’s Smaika Sala’a, who borrowed Smith’s book on hard running and clever sidestepping.

It was the evasive Brock Price who scored next for the Kiwis, taking advantage of a lack of concentration out wide by the Australians to move one way and then the other to run over the try line unopposed.

Price’s try after the half-time hooter got the black shirts to within two points before a missed conversion from Ravetali left the scoreboard reading 14-12 to Australia at lemon time.

The slick handling Australians, with Butcher leading from the front, put their feet on accelerator after the main break.

Two tries to the hard running Butcher, one when he split the Kiwi defence to score next to the uprights and another out wide when he ran away from the defence were trademark tries from the University No.10.

AUSTRALIA 45 (R Butcher 2 E Erikson S Bunn D Tobin S Richards B Hogan tries; R Butcher 5 con) d NEW ZEALAND 17 (B Nurse S Sala’a B Price tries; J Ravetalia con).