@bovidae said in Taranaki v Wellington:

As someone who didn't see the game, how did Coles go?

15 minutes, didn't have much to do and the game was over by that point. He seemed like he wanted to get stuck in.

Aussies were good value for the win. When they played sensibly, they carved the Argies up. The second half showed they are still very good with ball in hand. In the first half, they handed the Argies a few tries. Then they did short kicks which went too far and Argentina just kicked behind them. Those were the wrong tactics for altitude. When they got the tactics sorted out, Australia were too strong.

I look at the stats and don't see evidence that Argentina collapsed. Their set piece was good, they didn't make a tonne of errors and Australia conceded far more penalties. Argentina did miss tackles in the second half but that was because the Aussies ran it more. This was more of a great comeback than a serious implosion, although being 24 points up should be enough to overcome a great comeback regardless of the circumstances.

3 votes as usual

hydro11 said:

Should be a try.

Actually not.

Should be a try.

hydro11 said:

Mounga was so casual about getting back there. He saw Barrett missed the ball on the ground and immediately needed to run back and cover fullback

That overhead shot showed what I meant. Barret lost it and no one covered the space he left.

Mounga was so casual about getting back there. He saw Barrett missed the ball on the ground and immediately needed to run back and cover fullback

JC said:

Should have kicked it out

Probably but now we only have another five minutes without SBW.

This crowd is feral.

Aussies should have won. They would have but they didn't seem to have the patience to break the South Africans down. The disappointing thing for the Aussies would be how difficult they found it to break down the defence. This team doesn't have a plan B. Some shocking passes and poor ball security let them down as well. They aren't a bad team but they don't help themselves.