Grand final that was never supposed to happen
It is a grand final which the doomsayers predicted would never actually take place.
It is a grand final that the doomsayers predicted would never actually take place.
Australian rugby might have turned up its toes any number of times this year. There were even times when it seemed it might be for the best if it did. A return to its amateur ethos and Shute Shield suburban battles. The quiet, comforting nostalgia of it all. Let Rugby Australia tear itself apart, its internecine wars unending, unstoppable. And this was even before the global pandemic struck and Super Rugby was suspended in March. And subsequently abandoned.
Staff were slashed, wages too. As much as the players’ suffered, the game’s workers suffered far worse. Yet, on 30 per cent of already humble salaries, they somehow pitched in and kept the game alive. They drew up plans. Then scrapped them. They drew up other plans and scrapped them too. Rugby Australia swallowed its pride and invited the Western Force back in. The Force swallowed its rightful anger and agreed. The Rebels evacuated Melbourne, just in time. Be back in a little while, they called over their shoulder. It turned out to be 79 days.
But at 7.05pm on Friday, July 3, something wonderful happened. Queensland played NSW at Suncorp Stadium. The outcome was not unexpected — Queensland won, though it was close. But the match itself was unexpected. Almost right up to the kick-off, everyone expected it to be called off. The first match of Super Rugby AU had been played and won, 32-26 to the Reds. Another 21 matches stretched out improbably into the mist-covered future.
Against the COVID odds, 20 have now been played. And while the Rebels and Waratahs and Western Force all had their moments, somehow it comes as no surprise that the Brumbies are hosting the Reds in the final.
From the moment they first met this season in the opening match of Super Rugby, on January 31, they looked the two Australian teams to beat. The Brumbies won that match by three points. They won again in Canberra by two points after the bell in Super Rugby AU, but then the Reds took their revenge on September 5. A nothing match with seemingly everything to play for.
Subtly, it seems, the Reds’ 26-7 victory that day has changed the dynamic for Saturday night’s final at GIO Stadium, Canberra. No doubt each of The Australian’s six rugby tipsters thought they were being daringly cunning when they nominated Queensland to win, only to discover that they represented a 5-1 majority. There is now a genuine sense that the match could signal a changing of the guard in Australian rugby.
There is also an expectation that, in recognition of what a wretched year 2020 has been, the match will be a lusty celebration of rugby. Get real — it’s a grand final.
There was even a suggestion the Brumbies had embraced their inner entertainers by choosing Noah Lolesio as five-eighth, aiming to fight fire with fire and match the Reds’ running game. Really? Lolesio is as enterprising a playmaker as is going around these days, a fine foil to Reds veteran James O’Connor, but he also stood idly by while the Brumbies scored all three of their tries from driving mauls against the Highlanders this year.
The Brumbies will do whatever it takes to beat the Reds, as they again did that cold August night when Mack Hansen kicked them to victory after the bell. That night, too, they scored all three of their tries from driving mauls.
Reds coach Brad Thorn took careful note of how the Brumbies reacted to that surprise win. They hooted and hollered, much as Wallabies captain James Horwill did when his side narrowly beat the British and Irish Lions in the second Test in Melbourne in 2013, sending the series into a decider. Lions coach Warren Gatland observed not just the celebrations but the intensity that went into them and declared the Wallabies had shot their bolt. He was right. They lost the third Test 41-16.
All four of the Brumbies players who are leaving the club, outside centre Tevita Kuridrani, lock Murray Douglas, flanker Lachie McCaffrey and almost certainly halfback Joe Powell, have been rewarded with places in the starting side. All are experienced veterans but they will have to guard against trying too hard, as Kuridrani did in Brisbane a fortnight ago.
The Reds have only one departing player in their match day 23 — loosehead prop JP Smith. Queensland have high hopes for their scrum, even if it is opposed by the Wallabies front-row, and Smith, hooker Brandon Paenga-Amosa and tighthead Taniela Tupou will be operating under tight instructions: keep your head, but help yourself to as many of the locals’ tightheads as you can grab.
There is still many an obstacle the game must clear if it is ever to reach those fabled broad, sunlit uplands. But they can wait. The game has earned this brief, engrossing respite.
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