[2014 TRC] New Zealand v South Africa in Wellington (13/09/2014)

[Jaguares]

1 Wyat Crockett
2 Dane Coles
3 Owen Franks
4 Brodie Retallick
5 Jeremy Trush
6 Steven Luatua
7 Richie McCaw (c)
8 Kieran Read
9 Aaron Smith
10 Aaron Cruden
11 Julian Savea
12 Ma'a Nonu
13 Conrad Smith
14 Ben Smith
15 Israel Dagg

Reserves:

16-Keven Mealamu, 17-Joe Moody, 19-Patrick Tuipulotu, 20-Sam Cane, 21-TJ Perenara, 22-Beauden Barrett, 23-Cory Jane

1 Tendai Mtawarira
2 Adriaan Strauss
3 Jannie du Plessis
4 Eben Etzebeth
5 Victor Matfield
6 Francois Louw
7 Marcell Coetzee
8 Duane Vermeulen
9 Ruan Pienaar
10 Handré Pollard
11 Bryan Habana
12 Jean de Villiers (c)
13 Jan Serfontein
14 Cornal Hendricks
15 Willie le Roux


Reserves:


16 Bismarck du Plessis, 17 Trevor Nyakane, 18 Marcel van der Merwe, 19 Lood de Jager, 20 Warren Whiteley, 21 Francois Hougaard, 22 Pat Lambie, 23 Damian de Allende


Stadium: Westpac Stadium
Capacity: 34,500
City: Wellington
Country: New Zealand
Referee: Jerome Garces

 

[ianw16]

AB'S win this and it's Championship won, I would suggest. Not a very daring prediction, I'll grant.

 

[Jaguares]

AB'S win this and it's Championship won, I would suggest. Not a very daring prediction, I'll grant.

Hey bud, I love the new Auckland jersey. Send me an Auckland's jersey to Latin America

 

[squirrel]

Think the boks are gonna get smoked and Meyer's solution will be to get Os DuRant and Jon Smit out of retirement for next years world cup, maybe Percy aswell

 

[nzlizard]

Gonna be an interesting game, SA will be angry from the weekend and looking to prove a point.

I expect a fireworks first half and the game to be sorted in the last 20.

 

[austingtir]

Gonna be an interesting game, SA will be angry from the weekend and looking to prove a point.

I expect a fireworks first half and the game to be sorted in the last 20.

Id add last years result into that equation aswell. Im going to go against the grain. I still keep predicting the AB's to slip up and they havent so it must be this one surely.

 

[The Jones Boy]

Gonna be an interesting game, SA will be angry from the weekend and looking to prove a point.

Bingo.
Aussie have done us no favours by beating the Boks in Perth.
This saffer team will be gunning for glory at the cake tin.
AB pack will have a lot of pressure questions asked of them.

 

[ianw16]

Bingo.
Aussie have done us no favours by beating the Boks in Perth.
This saffer team will be gunning for glory at the cake tin.
AB pack will have a lot of pressure questions asked of them.

Sort of irrelevant in my opinion, given that most of their backline is NPC standard at best.

 

[Zapphod]

Sort of irrelevant in my opinion, given that most of their backline is NPC standard at best.

When it comes to New Zealand/Australia/South Africa matches all teams seem to rise to the occasion so I think it is a dangerous thing to under rate them.

At this stage I am not even confident enough to say New Zealand will win the return match against Argentina because I think playing the way they did last weekend New Zealand are far from invincible after all a little bit of luck and some decent refereeing would have seen a far closer match last week.

 

[nzlizard]

At this stage I am not even confident enough to say New Zealand will win the return match against Argentina because I think playing the way they did last weekend New Zealand are far from invincible after all a little bit of luck and some decent refereeing would have seen a far closer match last week.

I am never confident until we win, I have belief, but to save myself disappointment I now think most RC games are 50/50.

 

[ianw16]

When it comes to New Zealand/Australia/South Africa matches all teams seem to rise to the occasion so I think it is a dangerous thing to under rate them.

At this stage I am not even confident enough to say New Zealand will win the return match against Argentina because I think playing the way they did last weekend New Zealand are far from invincible after all a little bit of luck and some decent refereeing would have seen a far closer match last week.

Dry track, guy gets sin binned for taking out Savea early off the ball, possible penalty try, and the All Blacks were winning that by 30+. Trust me, when they need to do it they will. Let the Argies and SA have a dick measuring contest about their scrums, at the end of the day it's about what you do with the ball you get, and nobody is better at doing that than the AB's. SA are stuck in a different decade (or at least their coach is), and Argentina are doing bloody well with what they have to hand. The team that most worries me for the WC is Australia. They have the backs to give NZ a game. Nobody else does. If (and it's a huge "if") they ever sort their pack out, then they will be the ones to watch.

 

[ianw16]

I am never confident until we win, I have belief, but to save myself disappointment I now think most RC games are 50/50.

Fair point. It is a very difficult championship to win. I do worry about who is going to start at blindside flanker, with Messam and Kaino seemingly out, I also worry about Whitelock not being available. However, I do believe there is no other team in the world capable of filling those gaps with decent players better than NZ can.
Whatever some may accuse Super Rugby and NPC of, it does seem to produce test standard players in bigger quantities than any other competitions in the world.

 

[Larksea]

I think its pretty clear that Cane will start at 7 and Richie will move to 6

Thrush will start and Luatua will cover lock from the bench.

It will be interesting to see who gets that loose forward spot on the bench? Todd? Vito? Shields? Luke Whitelock? Else? Not sure what the injury situation is on these guys. From memory I think Luke Braid is recovering from surgery? I think Vito is on injury comeback as well? From memory Shane Christie has attended All Black Camps recently.

I think Todd would be a safe option he's performed well in tests, actually better than well I think the few chances he got to pull a black jumper on he was fantastic. You would think he would get more tests when Richie retires next year but he will also be ~27 by then. Sam Cane is still only 22, hard to believe.

 

[nzlizard]

Yeah McCaw to 6, Cane to 7 like on the weekend.

Todd and Luatua to cover on the bench.

 

[TRF Mr Fish]

What about Liam Squire for a surprise call up?

I think we'll see the above loose forward trio, with Luatua and Tuipulotu on the bench.

 

[smartcooky]

AB pack will have a lot of pressure questions asked of them.

The Argie pack absolutely munted the Saffas, owned them completely, but we mostly held out own against them, and actually scores two set piece tries, one of them off their feed.

I do not expect the Bok pack to own us.

 

[Jer1cho]

If we continue kicking the ball away for no reason, we are going to get smashed. Hopefully Habana will be marking Savea, because he will have a field day running at little Cornal Hendricks all night. I can see us being competitive, but with the gameplan we have, along with Pienaar, we will lose. AB's by 15-20.

 

[Darwin]

Surely 6. Luatua, 7. McCaw, 8. Read would make the most sense? Cane played well against Argentina, but given the ABs have a genuine blindside in their squad it would make sense to use him. Luatua's lineout expertise could be very valuable against the Boks too. This of course is assuming Tuipulotu is fit enough to be included on the bench.....

 

[The Jones Boy]

Trust me, when they need to do it they will. Let the Argies and SA have a dick measuring contest about their scrums, at the end of the day it's about what you do with the ball you get, and nobody is better at doing that than the AB's. SA are stuck in a different decade (or at least their coach is), and Argentina are doing bloody well with what they have to hand. The team that most worries me for the WC is Australia. They have the backs to give NZ a game. Nobody else does. If (and it's a huge "if") they ever sort their pack out, then they will be the ones to watch.

On your proviso we should have won every RWC that has been but history will show us that we have struggled to get parity with the Boks and Wallabies and just keep our noses in front of England.
I have no presumptuous inklings about any game because on any given day it can all go belly up and turn to custard.
Underestimate the Boks at your peril.
There is a reason they have a 2nd in the world ranking and last year it took the greatest game of rugby the world has ever witnessed to get passed them on the high veldt and carry the day 5 tries to four to secure the Championship.

 

[TRF_stormer2010]

Went through the stats a bit against Aus. Looks like Morne Steyn nearly made as many missed tackles as passes; 7 missed tackles and 9 passes.. that blows my mind. Pienaar's error rate is also through the roof. I can't believe it's 2014 and we are stuck with Pienaar. Looking at the stats it would suggest Jan Serfontein at 13 was our best player with 18/0 tackles at 13 under all sorts of pressure and a try assist though we didn't give our backline any opportunity other than that one that ended in Hendrick's score. The buck really has to stop at 9/10 who shouldn't play next week as a repercusion IMO. Etzebeth had a goodish game taking into account this was essentially his 2nd game back from a year of missing rugby through injury. The rest of the tight 5 need to make a 180 degree turn if we don't want NZ to put 25+ on us.