Love’s labour lost for the Waratahs

For a moment the Waratahs were in love with the idea of beating the most prestigious of all New Zealand Super Rugby sides.

Is it better to have loved and lost than never to have loved at all?

Alfred Lord Tennyson probably never realised his words would be applied to the game spawned by his contemporary, William Webb Ellis, and certainly not to those colonial ruffians known as the Waratahs. But for a brief moment — actually for the first 28th minutes of the match against the Crusaders in Christchurch on Saturday night — the Waratahs were madly in love with the idea of beating the most prestigious of all New Zealand Super Rugby sides.

Bit by bit, the dream soured and by the 80th minute order had been restored. The Waratahs’ love affair lay in ruins and the critics were swarming, taking shots at them for daring to have dreamt the dream. What side cannot defend a 29-0 lead? Better to have rolled over meekly, as they were expected to do, than to have dared greatly and then failed.

It’s difficult to say anything in defence of the Tahs without also feeding the beast that is the New Zealand myth of absolute superiority. Anyone who knows and understands the extraordinary Crusaders culture knows they will respond mightily to any side that puts 29 points on them in as many minutes at the start of a match. But there was also pure arrogance in Sam Whitelock’s post-match summation. “I don’t know where we were in that first 20 to 25 minutes,” he lamented.

I can tell you precisely where they were, Sam. Your players’ heads were spinning. They didn’t know what had hit them. Why is it so difficult for Kiwis to acknowledge that Australian rugby players might have done something that took them completely by surprise?

Still, it’s a pity some of that smug arrogance didn’t rub off on the Waratahs. Their problem was that they fully anticipated the Crusaders’ comeback and, in anticipating it, actually made it happen. It’s the ultimate self-fulfilling prophesy. It’s why that figure of 39 consecutive Kiwi victories has been achieved.

It was so easy to relate to Stephen Hoiles’ controversial line that Australians need to “start cheating better” if they’re going to match it with their cousins across the ditch. Oh, everyone tut-tutted and told him how dreadful it was to say such a thing, but the fact is that he is 100 per cent correct — Australians are rank novices compared to New Zealanders when it comes to pushing the envelope on the rugby field.

Let us give thanks to whoever it was that found Joe Moody’s atrocity in the lead-up to his own try, the one that started the Crusaders’ comeback. He was doing what Kiwis always do, going up into the Australian defensive line in advance of his runners, loitering with intent, getting in everyone’s way. Every New Zealand Super Rugby side does it, every single one. They all run plays behind the screen of protection the bullyboys provide and they all look mortified on the rare occasions when the referee blows them up for obstruction.

Only Moody took it one step further. He took out Beale with an elbow to the head and created the hole through which his five-eighth Richie Mo’unga charged before turning the ball back to Moody himself to go over between the posts. Moody was later cited for striking, pleased guilty and suspended for two weeks, during which he can ponder his actions, though that’s of scant consolation to the Tahs.

Save for the foul play and the fact that Beale ended up on his backside, such tries happen in almost every trans-Tasman match. And Hoiles is right. Most of the time when the Australians do the same thing, they get pinged for obstruction. If that’s the way the game is to be played — and it clearly is — then Australians do need to get craftier at pushing the envelope.

So the Crusaders comeback was under way, by fair means or foul, and it would have to be said that the Tahs panicked. Possibly they panicked a little because they were down to 14 men for the first of two occasions in the match but mainly they knew, deep down, that they had prodded the beast and they momentarily doubted their ability to fight it off.

To be fair, that panic lasted only for about 500 seconds. By the time they returned from the halftime break, they had their heads back in the game and they were willing to fight. But in those 500 seconds, they let in three Crusaders tries and had brought the baying Crusaders crowd right back into the contest. It would be a torrid second half, most of which the Waratahs spent on desperate defence. In the end, the scoreboard said all that needed to be said: Crusaders 31. NSW 29.

So, was it worth it? Was it better the Waratahs gave it a shot and ultimately lost, or would it have been better had they just not put us all through this anguish?

I can’t answer for you, but I actually felt proud of Michael Hooper’s side. Or at least as proud as any Queenslander can ever feel about any NSW team.

I hated the fact that in the end they allowed their own mental frailty to get the better of them, that they doubted themselves precisely at the moment when the Kiwis most believed in themselves. But they willingly put themselves in that position and the more times they do that in future, the less they’ll be screwed up by their own heads.

And certainly Waratahs supporters had more reason to feel proud of their team than did Queensland Reds’ supporters. It wasn’t that the Reds lost to the Sunwolves on Saturday. Everyone always knew what a dangerous opponent the Japanese were. No, it was the lack of skills from the Reds that blighted the game, the lack of ballrunners and, frankly, the poor selections.

There was a “seize the day’ element to the Tahs’ performance. The Reds? Nothing said stilted conservatism quite like a halfback who dithers at the ruckbase and telegraphs his plays.

Lord Tennyson, your question has been answered.