Hurricanes wanted tries over security
Hurricanes head coach Chris Boyd says he owes his 35-10 bonus-point victory over the Crusaders to playing for territory instead of playing for poles.
The Wellington franchise recorded a valuable win over one of their fiercest competitors to top the overall Super Rugby table. Boyd’s charges’ strategy was to constantly play in the Crusaders half, which led to them scoring five tries to a Crusaders one.
“We decided that rather than trying to mount pressure by the scoreboard, we’d mount pressure with territory. We didn’t have a kick at goal all night and even when we got our bonus point and were in control of the game, the word came out from the ground ‘are we going to start playing normally?’ If there is such a thing,” Boyd told Stuff.
“And we were pretty keen to say the answer’s no, we’re going pretty well like we are so we’ll keep going that way. Not to say that we’ll be doing that next week.”
Boyd believes that their defence and planning have also been vital to their progression.
“It’s interesting; the analyst has just told me that the starting forward pack in the game missed one tackle between them. The pack, particularly, has a real desire to work for each other,” said Boyd.
“It’s possibly not even the best side in the playoffs on paper, but it’s a good team.”
“We’ve found with this side that our preparation is crucial to our performance.”
“There’s a direct correlation there so we need to make sure that’s nice and tidy this week and enjoy the fact that we can come out and play our quarter at home, where we probably didn’t think we would at some stages of this season.”