Don't blame Super Rugby for All Blacks' woes

After the All Blacks‘ losses to South Africa, in addition to the one conceded to Argentina, the fingers are now being pointed at Super Rugby for the results.

Argentina, who used to field the Jaguares made up of their national team, and South Africa, left the flagship southern hemisphere competition in 2020.

Yet for all the noise about the demise of Super Rugby as an adequate pathway, the All Blacks ended up within a converted try of the Springboks twice.

Overlooked is the team that Scott Robertson and his coaching staff used in South Africa.

Ardie Savea, Sam Cane and Beauden Barrett all completed sabbaticals in Japan this season, with Cane playing not much rugby at all for Suntory Sungoliath.

Those three started in Johannesburg, while Barrett came off the bench in Cape Town.

Codie Taylor had a non-playing sabbatical this season and returned to play four times for the Crusaders.

Starting loosehead prop Tamaiti Williams was injured in round one and returned to play three games at the back end of the season.

Will Jordan did not play a single minute of Super Rugby after rehabbing his shoulder following elective surgery at the start of the year.

Ethan Blackadder, who started the first test, managed just five games of Super Rugby. Half of this All Black team played no, or very little minutes, in Super Rugby Pacific.

The results of this Rugby Championship so far are better explained by the selections, picking undercooked and out-of-form players, not to mention snubbing the championship-winning side.

The Blues won the competition with a unique game plan unlike any other team.

Vern Cotter in his first year as head coach leaned on the likes of Hoskins Sotutu, Akira Ioane, Patrick Tuipulotu and his big pack to bully teams up front. A young Crusaders’ pack were given a towelling at Eden Park and taught a lesson in big boy rugby.

The Blues played forward-dominant 9-man rugby and ended up demolishing the Chiefs in the final. How many Blues’ forwards started for the All Blacks in South Africa? Zero.

If the All Blacks aren’t using the backbone of the championship-winning Super Rugby side, why is the competition being blamed?

The other standout pack from this year’s competition was the Hurricanes. They finished the regular season on top of the ladder with a 12-2 record.

They had the most dominant scrum anchored by the world’s best tighthead prop in Tyrel Lomax, along with Asafo Aumua and Xavier Numia.  They had a dynamic back row including openside Peter Lakai and No 8 Braydon Iose, two of the most damaging ball carriers in the competition. The Hurricanes were surprisingly better this year without their talisman Ardie Savea.

They had the best fullback in competition in Ruben Love who is better than Will Jordan in a number of areas, namely distribution and putting away his wingers under pressure. Love has the best hands in the country out wide.

Billy Proctor is one of the best defensive midfielders in the country and showed what he can do against Fiji on debut.

Yes, these are a number of inexperienced names.

But they are in form, like 21-year-old Wallace Sititi who was the best forward in Cape Town. If Sititi can play like that, could Lakai, Love, Proctor and Numia? What about Sotutu?

Based on his track record incoming head coach Scott Robertson earnt the benefit of the doubt and the blind trust of the public. Seven championships in seven years. There is no better candidate.

But now questions can be asked. Why have we got a third of the Crusaders team starting after they failed to make the Mickey Mouse playoffs? Why do we have a bunch of guys playing Test rugby with no minutes under their belts?

You could blame Super Rugby if the team was made up of the form Super Rugby players.

It isn’t, so Robertson and company must cop that.