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How Los Pumas Could Perhaps, Maybe, Beat The All Blacks This Weekend
The Pumas are looking to chalk up their first victory over the All Blacks at Waikato Stadium this weekend. Scotty Stevenson says the Argentinians need to disrupt the Kiwi side’s lineout dominance to have any hope of success.
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The Pumas roll into Hamilton this week to face an All Blacks side that has mastered the percentages. If the Argentineans have any chance of victory, they must improve their set piece – and do more with what they have.
While the rest of the rugby world still rages like a rat in a cage over the non-citing of Owen Franks and the perceived special treatment of the All Blacks in rugby’s judicial process, the All Blacks themselves will line up at Waikato Stadium confident that all the wailing and gnashing of teeth has done little more than obscure the obvious: they simply have the jump over other teams at lineout time – if you’ll excuse the pun.
The lineout has become the biggest weapon in the All Blacks arsenal. The team won 79 of its 84 throws during the 2015 Rugby World Cup, and stole a tournament high 15 throws to boot. They have rolled into the new international season with the rest of the field grasping at air.
The lineout is fundamentally a better attacking option than the scrum. For starters, all players are on their feet, as opposed to having their heads buried between the legs of their team mates. Attacking and defensive lines are farther apart, variation in lineout plays allow for more options in terms of drive, pass, kick or run, and there is unarguably a greater chance of contested possession, as the All Blacks have demonstrated over recent seasons.
The statistics back this up. Of the 20 tries scored so far in the Rugby Championship, eight have come directly from lineout (compared to just two from scrum). The All Blacks have scored four tries from lineouts and a further try from a lineout steal – far and away the most of any of the four sides. Australia and South Africa have scored just one apiece from lineouts, with the latter also scoring one from a steal.
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Argentina, to get to the original point, have yet to score one from either their own throw or the opposition’s. And that is a problem for the big Pumas pack. For all their industry, they can’t convert. Argentina have won an average of 11 lineouts per match (the same number as the All Blacks, and a tournament high), with just one lineout concession per match and yet, nada.
The creation of opportunities is seemingly not the problem for the Argentinians: the taking of them is. If the lineout statistics are cause for concern in the Pumas camp, their use of turnover ball certainly should be.
Again this is where the All Blacks manage to do more than the Argentinians, despite the fact they win fewer turnovers per game. In fact, the All Blacks have won fewer turnovers (6.5 per game) than any other team in the first two rounds of the Rugby Championship, while conceding the most (18.5 per game). That would be an alarming for the All Blacks but for the fact they are the ONLY team so far in the tournament to score a try from a turnover. They have scored three.
Compounding the concern for the Argentinians will be the increased defensive workload they will be forced to endure this weekend. They head into the match having been forced to make just 101 t tackles per game against the South Africans, and they missed 20 of those. The All Blacks forced the Australians to make 156 per game, and the Wallabies missed an excruciatingly bad 33 of those. Extrapolating the percentage of tackles made to missed, and on the evidence of the first two games, the Argentinians would not fare much better.
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If there are silver linings in the numbers for Argentina they come in jerseys 8 and 9 where the battles between Facundo Isa and Kieran Read and Martin Landajo and Aaron Smith may go some way to deciding which side can control the tempo of the match. Isa leads all carriers this Rugby Championship and trails only Beauden Barrett in terms of metres run. Landajo for his part must control the exit of the Argentinians, and was in full control against the South Africans in the last test. Harassing Smith at the breakdown must be his defensive focus. Watch the All Blacks force him onto the left foot behind the defensive ruck. A tip: weak foot box kicks are an Argentinean frailty.
Never before have the Pumas defeated the All Blacks, and all expectations are that fruitless search for a win will continue at Waikato Stadium (where the All Blacks have lost just once). The only hope is that the Argentinians have spent the week working on their lineouts, and learning how to make their tackles. If they’ve done that, we may just see a contest.
Comments on RugbyPass
Dagg is still trying to get enough headlines to make himself relevant enough to get a job. The Crusaders went back to square one at all levels. Shelve this season and nail the next one.
4 Go to commentsHe was in such great form. Sad for him but only a short term injury and it will be great to see him back for the finals.
1 Go to commentsAfter their 5/0 start, I had the Crusaders to finish Top 4 only…they lost the plot in Perth but will reload and back themselves vs 4th placed Rebels…
3 Go to commentsBoth nations missed a great opportunity to book a game that would have had a lot of interest from around the world. I understand these games can’t be organised in 5 minutes but they should have found a way to make it happen. I don’t think Wales are ducking anyone but it’s a bad look haha.
3 Go to commentsIt will be fascinating to see the effect that Jo Yapp has. If they can compete with Canada and give BFs a run for their money that will be progress
1 Go to commentsFollowing his dream and putting in the work. Go well young fella!
3 Go to commentsPerhaps filling Twickenham is one of Mitchell’s KPIs. I doubt whether both September matches will be at Twickenham on consecutive weekends. I would take the BF one to a large provincial stadium so as not to give them the advantage and experience of playing at Twickenham before a large crowd prior to the RWC.
3 Go to commentsvery unfortunate for Kitshoff, but big opportunity potentially for Nché to prove he is genuinely the best loosehead in the world, rather than just a specialist finisher. Presuming that if Kitshoff is out, it will also give Steenekamp a chance to come into the 23? Or are others likely to be ahead of him?
1 Go to commentsA long held question in popular culture asks if art imitates life or does the latter influence the former? Over this 6 nations I can ask the same question of the media influencing the thoughts of its audience or vice versa. Nobody wants to see cricket scores in rugby, as a spectacle it is not sustainable. With so many articles about England’s procession and lack of competition it feeds the epicaricacy of many looking for an opportunity to pounce. England are not the first team to dominate nor does it happen only in rugby, think Federer, Nadal, Red Bull or Mercedes, Manchester Utd, Australia in tests and World Cups. Instead of celebrating the achievements why find reasons to falsify it pointing towards larger playing pool, professional for a longer period or mitigate with the lack of growth in other nations. Can we not enjoy it while it is here and know that it won’t last for ever, others coveting what England have will soon take the crown, ask the aforementioned?
6 Go to commentsShame he won’t turn out for the Netherlands now they’re improving. U20s are Euro champs and in the U20 Trophy this year. The senior sides gets better every year too.
3 Go to commentsWill rugbypass tv be showing these games?
1 Go to commentsWell where do you start, the fact that England have a professional domestic league and Ireland’s is fully amatuer, that they have fully seperated professional squads at Fifteens and Sevens (7’s thinly disguised as GB), and Ireland have fully pro Sevens squad who loan some players back to the Semi-Professional Fifteens squad (moved from amateur for only a year or so) for a few games at 6N & RWC’s. The Women’s games is a shambles, and is at risk of killing itself by pushing for professionalism when the market isn’t really there to support it outside one or two countnries..
6 Go to commentsWayne Smith's input didn't have as much impact on the last final as Davison's red card for Thompson. England were 14 points up and flying when that happened.
6 Go to commentsBilly's been playing consistently well for 2 - 3 seasons now and deserves a look in at the top level. Ioane and ALB are still first choice but there needs to be injury cover and succession. His partnership with Jordie gives him first dibs you'd think. Go the Hurricanes.
3 Go to commentsIt’s not up to Wales to support Georgian Rugby. That’s up to International Rugby and Georgia. I sympathise with Georgia’s decent attempt to create this fixture. But for Wales the proposed match up is just a potential stick to beat them with and a potential big psychological blow that young Welsh team doesn’t need. (I’m Irish BTW.)
3 Go to commentsCale certainly looks great in space, but as you say, he has struggled in contact. At 23 years old, turning 24 this year, he should be close to full physical maturity and yet there exists a considerable gap in the power and physicality required for international rugby. Weight doesn’t automatically equate to power and physicality either. Can he go from a player who’s being physically dominated in Super rugby to physically dominating in international rugby in 1 or 2 years? That’s a big ask but he may end up being a late bloomer.
37 Go to commentsIf rugby wants to remain interesting in the AI era then it will need to work on changing the rules. AI will reduce the tactical advantage of smart game plans, will neutralize primary attacking weapons, and will move rugby from a being a game of inches to a game of millimetres. It will be about sheer athleticism and technique,about avoiding mistakes, and about referees. Many fans will find that boring. The answer is to add creative degrees of freedom to the game. The 50-22 is an example. But we can have fun inventing others, like the right to add more players for X minutes per game, or the equivalent of the 2-point conversion in American football, the ability to call a 12-player scrum, etc. Not saying these are great ideas, but making the point that the more of these alternatives you allow, the less AI will be able to lock down high-probability strategies. This is not because AI does not have the compute power, but because it has more choices and has less data, or less-specific data. That will take time and debate, but big, positive and immediate impact could be in the area of ref/TMO assistance. The technology is easily good enough today to detect forward passes, not-straight lineouts, offside at breakdown/scrum/lineout, obstruction, early/late tackles, and a lot of other things. WR should be ultra aggressive in doing this, as it will really help in an area in which the game is really struggling. In the long run there needs to be substantial creativity applied to the rules. Without that AI (along with all of the pro innovations) will turn rugby into a bash fest.
24 Go to commentsSouth Africa rarely play Ireland and France on these tours. Mostly, England, Scotland and Wales. I wonder why
2 Go to commentsIt was a let’s-see-what-you're-made-of type of a game. The Bulls do look good when the opposition allows them to, but Munster shut them down, and they could not find a way through. Jake should be very worried about their chances in the competition.
2 Go to commentsHats off to Fabian for a very impressive journey to date. Is it as ‘uniquely unlikely’ as Rugby Pass suggests, given Anton Segner’s journey at the Blues?
3 Go to comments