SYDNEY — You’d think the Wallabies might have learned a thing or two by now, they haven’t held the Bledisloe Cup since 2002 after all.
Yet on a glorious Saturday afternoon in Sydney, in front of 68,061 fans, they may as well have gift-wrapped the enormous trans-Tasman trophy and adorned it with a matte black bow, for such were some of the inconceivable errors they produced in the first half at Accor Stadium.
The Test, which doubled as a Rugby Championship clash, a tournament neither the Wallabies nor All Blacks can claim this year, finished 31-27 after an incredible second-half turnaround, but only after Australia had made some simply inexplicable decisions which helped New Zealand out to a 28-7 lead inside 30 minutes.
Before the mother of all comebacks, and some bone-headed plays of New Zealand’s own, set the stage for an incredible finish — that ended anticlimactically.
In a weird way, you get the feeling it will be Schmidt who is sleeping easier in Sydney tonight rather than All Blacks coach Scott Robertson, who saw his side concede two second-half yellow cards and put itself under further pressure with ill-discipline that very nearly cost them the Test.
As it stands, though, the All Blacks’ Bledisloe run will extend into a 23rd year no matter what happens at Wellington’s Sky Stadium next week. And Robertson, skipper Scott Barrett and co. will have enjoyed a few frothy refreshments from the trophy in the meantime.
“Well better than the last few weeks,” Robertson said when asked how he felt about his side sinking into such a hole in the second half.
“Every Test match is different, there is so much importance on the Cup; we talked about it all week about how important to us [it is] and the people of the past who have won it before us and how we honour it – we found a way.”
While Schmidt was buoyant about his side’s second-half effort, which they won 14-3, some of the errors the Wallabies made inside the first 40 were inexcusable against mediocre teams, let alone the All Blacks.
“There’s not a lot of water in the glass – you lose a Test match,” Schmidt said when asked whether this performance was glass half-full or half-empty.
“There’s things that we have got to learn from, we can’t finish a close second. There’s some things to be proud about and I totally agree with Harry [Wilson] around building our way back into the game, but giving a New Zealand a start like that it’s too tough to overcome that, albeit, it almost did happen at the finish.
“By no means is it back to the drawing board, there’s some things there that they’ll be looking at and saying ‘we were a bit a vulnerable here or there’, and I just thought that there were some things that we put together that they’ll look at and be a little bit challenged by.
“But what we can’t do is turn ball over to them or kick loosely to them because I thought Will Jordan was awesome tonight. Damian McKenzie, he maybe didn’t finish a couple of opportunities but geez he makes them; there were a couple of guys who obviously stood out in amongst a number of guys… Caleb Clarke as well was really dangerous with ball in hand.”
The All Blacks’ first-half romp started after Australia botched the opening kick-off – restarts continue to be a problem for Schmidt’s team – and Jordan, who was a late inclusion for an unwell Beauden Barrett, cut through in midfield and sprinted away to score beneath the crossbar after just 91 seconds.
Already it had the feel of an all-too-familiar Sydney Bledisloe nightmare for the Australians, and while it was the first Test at the Olympic precinct since 2020, the sight of a wave of black jerseys steaming onto the ball quickly brought the memories of heavy defeats of the back half of the past decade.
While Jordan’s speed created the first try, the All Blacks’ came off a wonderfully worked piece of counter attack that first saw Caleb Clarke bend the line and offload to Wallace Sititi, who was just about New Zealand’s best, before Cortez Ratima quickly moved the ball onto an unmarked Rieko Ioane and the score was 14-0 inside 10 minutes.
Then came the tries presented on a silver platter, with a side of Steinlager and a dozen Sydney Rock Oysters to boot.
Wallabies skipper Wilson threw a horrible pass just after Australia had secured a turnover, the errant ball gleefully grabbed by Clarke who would score a few phases later out in his left-hand corner by powering through Tom Wright.
At 21-0 the Test looked over then and there after 15 minutes. However, the Wallabies responded off the back of a smart lineout move where they threw long to Rob Valetini, who again emptied the tank in another huge performance, the No. 8 then popping back inside to Nic White who drew Damian McKenzie to put Fraser McReight under the sticks.
Australia’s joy was shortlived however as they soon bottled a lineout, only to get the ball back but then give it away again. This time a horrible Hunter Paisami pass was scooped up by Sevu Reece and while the winger was scragged by Andrew Kellaway, he was able to regather his feet and find Ardie Savea for his side’s fourth try and a 28-7 All Blacks lead.
The Wallabies got one back when Matt Faessler peeled off the back of a rolling maul and beat Sam Cane to score, only for New Zealand to have the final say of an open first half, albeit until the TMO intervened to scrape off Jordie Barrett’s try just before the halftime hooter.
That was to be a theme of the second half too, as New Zealand had two more tries, correctly, scrubbed off, first when Ardie Savea was held up and then, somewhat sadly, for a spectacular 80-metre effort that started from a Wallabies turnover and ended up with Ratima diving into the corner at the other end of the paddock. This time, a forward pass from McKenzie saw the try pulled back, and the Wallabies had yet another reprieve.
Cue the drama.
Not long after the hour-mark, Lukhan Salakaia-Loto tore through the heart of the All Blacks after a sublime short pass from Valetini and Paisami had a five-pointer a few phases later, while referee Karl Dickson added to the All Blacks’ pain by showing replacement Anton Lienert-Brown a yellow card after three consecutive New Zealand infringements.
Suddenly it was the Wallabies who were full of running. Virtually off the kick-off, Tom Wright put Brandon Paenga-Amosa threw a yawning gap, the hooker finding McReight on his outside before the flanker then put replacement Tate McDermott into the All Blacks’ 22, where he was rocked by a huge hit from TJ Perenara.
Twice the All Blacks denied the Wallabies at the breakdown thereafter; first Luke Jacobson was too strong over the ball, before Sititi repeated the dose inside the final five minutes.
In between those two vital turnovers, Clarke, who had otherwise had a whale of a game and looked dangerous every time he touched the ball, was sin-binned for a deliberate knockdown while Pasilio Tosi was also pinged for a high tackle.
That indiscretion gave Australia the opportunity they needed to set up a gripping finale, to which Wright obliged when he burned McKenzie on the outside and stretched out his right palm to bring the home fans to their feet.
With 25 seconds to run, the Wallabies had the chance to keep the Bledisloe alive, but Paisami’s upright carry off the kick-off and the raw strength of Savea and Perenara brought a topsy-turvy Test to a flat conclusion.
McKenzie, while perfect from the kicking tee, will again be in the spotlight after he spurned a golden scoring opportunity earlier in the second half with a care-free flick pass with his side up 31-14. At that stage, New Zealand looked to be on their way to a comfortable win, but still the standards of the All Blacks demand excellence for the full 80 and this simply was not it.
The All Blacks No. 10 will be thankful his side held on for a three-point win, while Robertson said he would be having a quiet word to his playmaker about maintaining his skill diligence even when New Zealand are well clear.
“Slap him on the wrist? No, you do want them to trust their skill set, you want them to be instinctive because and that’s his greatest gift, isn’t it? To find space, glide, but put it [the pass] on someone’s chest; give that maybe a step earlier and just get the reps [in] and get a bit of pressure underneath him at training but keep trusting himself.”
But Robertson continues to have a major second-half problem on his hands. Yet again this Championship, his side failed to score a point inside the final quarter — they did not add to their total after the 44th minute on this occasion — and they very nearly once again blew a game that was not only there for the taking, but on this occasion was basically offered up to them from the opening whistle.
What about Australia, then? There is no hiding from the fact that the Wallabies produced the same-old errors that have bugged them throughout this dreadful Bledisloe run – some of them were probably even worse this time around – and also needed some errant All Blacks play and the help of the TMO to claw their way back into the match.
But they got far more off their bench than New Zealand did and with the wind in their sails they looked like a Test nation capable of mixing it with the world’s best – not the one that fell in a gigantic Sante Fe hole and conceded a record 67 points against the Pumas two weeks’ ago.
It wasn’t a step forward per say, but an afternoon that could have been another step back instead will have left Schmidt, his team, and the 10s of 1000s Wallabies fans who lapped up the Sydney sun in a glorious advertisement for afternoon rugby believing that brighter days might just lie ahead.
“I think they were gritty, but they also put together some pretty good footy,” Schmidt reflected on the four-point loss.
“I think we earned the [scoreline] that we got in the first half and then we really rolled our sleeves up in the second half, got a couple of nice line breaks, but so did they. The reality is they maybe could have got more of a margin on the scoreboard if they’d finished a couple of opportunities, so we’ve got to be realistic about that.
“But we probably missed a couple of opportunities toward the end there as well, which was really frustrating to get so close.”