George Gregan identifies key area of improvement needed for Wallabies to beat Springboks
Australia and South Africa in action and former Wallabies captain George Gregan.
Former scrum-half George Gregan has identified what the Wallabies will have to improve on if they want to beat the Springboks in Saturday’s Rugby Championship Test in Perth.
These sides faced each other in the corresponding fixture in Brisbane last weekend and South Africa cruised to a 33-7 bonus-point victory which put them at the top of the standings.
Meanwhile, Argentina claimed a shock 38-30 triumph over New Zealand in Wellington which means Australia are currently rooted to the bottom of the Rugby Championship table.
Gregan, who holds the record for the most Test appearances (139) for the Wallabies, joined former Springboks Juan de Jongh and Rudy Paige on their podcast Behind the Ruck and when Paige told Gregan that he expects a backlash from the Wallabies in Perth, he replied: “I agree with you. And you’d expect to see that, wouldn’t you? I think any team, we’ve all played in teams where that’s happened.
“You get beaten badly. And often when you review it, it looks really bad on the scoreline and no one likes to see that sort of scoreline.
‘You’ve got to win those physical contests’
“But often it’s just the small areas. I think maybe the inaccuracy, just missing, and particularly in rugby and particularly against the Boks, you’ve got to win those physical contests.
“You’ve got to be up for it and you’ve got to be prepared to do that for 80 plus minutes.
“Because if you don’t and you start losing that, it has a big impact. It drains you, you’re on the back foot defensively, you start missing tackles, et cetera. So the flip side occurs when you’re on the front foot.
“So it’s a matter of them wrestling away a bit of that advantage that the Boks had in the first Test.”
Gregan faced the Springboks in many Tri-Nations clashes and believes there is one key area which the Wallabies will have to dominate if they want to exact revenge on the world champions this weekend.
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“You’d hope to see a really positive response from the Wallabies. You heard language from Joe (Schmidt) about losing the contact areas and the collision areas,” he said.
“You’ve got to win the breakdown. In all Test match rugby, particularly when you play the Boks, it’s going to be hard, you’ve got to win it, be that through speed, be it through precision and accuracy.
“You’ve got to do all those things so you can play and move the ball to space or make decisions quickly.
“Because if you don’t, then you’re under pressure and you’re on the front foot. So that’s an area which I’d imagine you’ll see some improvement (from the Wallabies), but it’s not going to be easy.
“Because the Boks defend with high line speed, Jesse Kriel gets a lot of accolades for that, but they really understand how to harass and reduce the time and space for their opposing teams, which puts you under pressure.
‘Test match rugby is aptly named’
“Then they (Australia) went to the aerial kicking game last week, didn’t bear a lot of fruit. So whether there’s an adjustment in that, we’ll have to wait and see. But I think Test match rugby is aptly named.
“You’ve got to try and test the opposition. You’re obviously going to get tested, but you want to test the opposition and make them a little bit uncomfortable and potentially see things or do things which they haven’t seen or prepared for, which makes them a bit uncomfortable.
“And then that’s what I’d like to see from the Wallabies.”
Gregan warned, however, that it would not be plain sailing against the world champions, who will be determined to continue where they left off in Brisbane.
“We’ll wait and see what Joe and his squad can do,” he added. “But I also see a response from the Boks. They’ll want to improve and finish that Australian trip with two from two.”
