Hand over the Rugby Championship trophy to the Boks now
The 2024 Rugby Championship has already been won. It is South Africa’s, writes Mark Keohane.
Give Siya Kolisi the Rugby Championship trophy now. The Wallabies, 33-0 down on 75 minutes, will now focus their energy on winning the Bledisloe Cup because even the Puma Trophy, which they have won 13 times to Argentina’s one, looks a stretch.
The All Blacks will do well to hang onto the Bledisloe Cup for the 22nd successive year because they looked every bit as awful as the Wallabies in conceding 38 points against a fired-up Los Pumas.
The Boks were expected to whip the Wobblies by 20-plus points, despite the Test being played at SunCorp Stadium, where the Boks, pre Saturday’s win, had previously won just once in the professional era.
Kolisi’s Rainbow Warriors did not disappoint. The scrum buckled Australia at the first set piece in the second minute and there was only ever going to be one winner in Brisbane. Green crushed gold on this particular super Saturday.
The Boks, in the opening 40, were sublime.
The second half was ugly because the game had been decided on two minutes, in terms of knowing who was going to win, and the only time the Wallabies looked competitive was when they had 15 on the pitch and the Boks had 13. Even then, competitive is as good as it got the Wallabies, who made it into the Boks 22 metre area for the first time in the 35th minute.
It was a crushing victory for the Springboks, but it was not surprising, given the difference in class between the world champions and a squad on the build under Joe Schmidt.
The Boks scored five tries and banked the bonus point. It was very easy, but the Boks also made it easy because they arrived in Brisbane with both eyes on the Wallabies and not with one across the pond that is the Tasman.
It was a proper result for the Boks and one you expect when the best team in the world plays a team that has dropped out of the Tier 1 discussion.
The Wallabies, right now, don’t have the stallions to be at the races. They haven’t for some time. You can dress up a donkey to look like a stallion but you can’t expect it to run like one.
The All Blacks are not quite as bereft of talent as the Wallabies but they have some serious issues for a team that has dominated world rugby for more than a century. The once mighty All Blacks, with 20 Tri Nations/Rugby Championship titles in 28 years, were a shambles in Wellington in coughing up a 20-8 lead to lose the last 50 minutes 30-10.
If the game had gone on for five more minutes, the Pumas would have gone past 40 points.
The Pumas have beaten the All Blacks three times in their history and all three wins have come in the last four years, one in Australia and two in New Zealand.
The All Blacks, under sustained pressure, were a mess and the two missed passes backwards that travelled nearly 50 metres, led to Argentina’s match-clinching try.
The Pumas, beaten at home by a French team that did not include one of the 2023 World Cup players, never looked like losing the Test against the All Blacks, despite being down 20-8. Every time the All Blacks scored, the Pumas struck back immediately.
And once the visitors went ahead 35-30, with 10 minutes to play, New Zealand never looked like getting the necessary six points to reclaim the lead.
The All Blacks disintegrated in the final 10 as the Pumas pounced on everything.
It was a famous win and what would be the most famous is a second successive win at Eden Park next Saturday.
The Boks will win in Perth next weekend, if not necessarily with such dominance. Perth has always been a difficult place to play.
Then the All Blacks head to South Africa for two Tests in Johannesburg and Cape Town before the Boks tackle the Pumas in two Tests that should determine the winner of this year’s Rugby Championship.
The Boks have won the title just four times in 28 attempts and finished last on 11 occasions. It is a statistic that betrays the considerable talent of South African players in pedigree and numbers.
The Boks, back to back World Cup winners, have spoken of their desire to win consistently in between World Cups, and in Brisbane they made a statement that they right now are rugby royalty, while in Wellington the All Blacks looked more court jester than royalty.
Photo: Matt Roberts/Getty Images
