LONG READ Aussie fans need to ‘cool their jets’ despite opening clean sweep

Don’t get too excited, don’t get too excited. Don’t. Get. Too. Excited.

Everyone just cool the jets. The temptation to dial up the elation after a clean sweep of Australian wins on the opening weekend of Super Rugby Pacific is very real, but for goodness’ sake everyone, can we just keep the lid on it?

That’s bloody hard to do after two after-the-bell wins for the Waratahs and Western Force, and the Brumbies registering the first Australian win over the Drua on Fijian soil! Three wins like that would be celebrated in any other round, so why do we need to tone it down a bit in Round One?

Well, because all the sporting clichés are mostly true. Swallows not making summers, tournaments not being won but often lost in February, and all that.

Australian rugby fans more than most know all this. Over the last few years, derbies have been scheduled in the first few rounds of the season, meaning early-season wins have been viewed carefully in Australia, and almost with contempt – or at least with an asterisk applied – by New Zealanders.

But here we are one week in, and it’s a clean sweep of Australian victories on the opening weekend for the first time in many a year.

Two of those three wins were very much in doubt when the final sirens rang in Sydney and Perth, and the other one looked doubtful when the Brumbies named six debutants after electing to leave most of their Wallabies contingent at home, rather than have them attempt a first game in the heat, humidity and rain of Suva.

All three coaches will have let the teams have their moment after the wins, but the reviews would still have revealed plenty of things about their respective games that caused undue stress upstairs in the box

Instead, three Australian teams occupy the Super Rugby top five, and it’s as good a start to the year as the average fan can remember.

Make no mistake, all three coaches will have let the teams have their moment after the wins, but the reviews would still have revealed plenty of things about their respective games that caused undue stress upstairs in the box. In one positive, at least Western Force coach Simon Cron has no hair to pull out.

The three teams conceding 15 tries between them won’t please their defensive coaches, for starters, though they would certainly agree conceding that many is much better in Round 1 than on the eve of the Finals series.

New South Wales will have got plenty out of the ‘Suaalii effect’ off the field, but will be still trying to make the most of it on the field.

There was a definite over-egging of the high-kick-for-Suaalii-contest in the first half, and I suspect a little bit more experimentation is in order to determine whether the prize recruit is best placed in the midfield frontline – as he was for the Wallabies on their UK tour last November – or coming in from the back as he did on Friday against the Highlanders in Sydney.

The Brumbies conceded 21 turnovers against the Drua in Suva, almost all of them handling errors, though again it’s worth a reminder it was 32C and 86 per cent humidity at kick-off, and rained throughout the second half. As warm as it has been in Canberra this summer, it’s nigh on impossible to replicate those conditions.

There was a certain clunkiness through the first half, and a bit of ill-discipline allowed the Drua back into the contest and onto the scoreboard last in the first half.

The injection of Dylan Pietsch proved crucial for the Force, with the Wallabies winger offering immediate impact and surely making an undeniable case to start games hereafter

The Force’s inability to hold onto the ball for any length of time throughout their match with Moana Pasifika also undid a lot of the good work and effective attack evidenced in the few instances they did maintain possession.

The second half was a perfect storm of everything going wrong that possibly could have. Their front row replacements proved no match for the visitors at scrum time, which led to a yellow card and a minute of uncertainty entering the last 10 minutes as to whether contested scrums were possible, followed by long periods of no ball and leaking points, and a 44-31 deficit with five minutes to play.

That the Force were able to build any pressure from there, never mind actually go on and win the game, was quite remarkable. Almost in spite of everything they had done since half-time, in fact.

But the injection of Dylan Pietsch proved crucial, with the Wallabies winger offering immediate impact and surely making an undeniable case to start games hereafter.

From there, after really not being able to string phases together much at all through the previous 80 minutes, the Force took 26 phases out of their own half to send Ben Donaldson off into space down the right edge, the Wallaby showing a surprise turn of pace for someone whose ankle looked done half an hour earlier, before scoring an unlikely match-winner under the posts.

In Suva, the Brumbies will be trying to remember what they said to Luke Reimer while he was off for an HIA, because once back on the field, he invoked memories of George Smith and David Pocock combined, wreaking havoc on the breakdown and barging over twice in seven minutes to get the ACT side home by four.

In public, the Brumbies will maintain they had confidence in their young side, but I’m quite sure there will be times through the season where they admit to themselves they are definitely four competition points ahead of budget.

The Dan McKellar fingerprints were evident in the Waratahs’ forwards play, and any scoffing and looking-down-the-nose Tahs fans used to throw in the direction of the Brumbies’ mauling prowess was quickly forgotten when the Waratahs used their lineout set-piece for the origin of three of their five tries.

The common denominator in all three wins was the uncoachable elements like character and belief and determination that the Waratahs, Brumbies and Force players found on the way to victory.

Do it once and it’s a handy start. Do it a couple more times thereafter, and then the excitement will be real.

All three coaches were rightly proud and full of praise for their charges, and you can be assured all three games will be used as reference points for the rest of the season.

So how are Australian fans supposed to keep a lid on a Super Rugby Pacific start like that? As ever when it comes to Australian rugby, all teams are only as good as their next win.

The challenge from here is certainly going to be to replicate that same character and belief and determination in Round Two, and to not show quite as many frailties as they did last weekend.

Do it once and it’s a handy start. Do it a couple more times thereafter, and then the excitement will be real.