Springboks star’s heroics helps to clinch emphatic win over champions while ex-All Blacks coach’s side keep play-off hopes alive
Toyota Verblitz head coach Steve Hansen (inset) and Yokohama Canon Eagles skipper Jesse Kriel.
Experienced Springboks centre Jesse Kriel led from the front as he captained Yokohama Canon Eagles to an emphatic 50-26 victory over Japan Rugby League One champions Toshiba Brave Lupus Tokyo on Saturday.
Leon MacDonald’s Eagles unheralded outfit made it four wins from their last six after a remarkable turnaround where they overcame the concession of a fourth-minute try by ex-Crusaders hooker Andrew Makalio, to storm to an eight-try-to-four win.
Todd Blackadder’s men had beaten the Eagles 41-19 when the teams met in December.
On a bad day for Brave Lupus, who would have taken a major step towards play-offs qualification with a bonus point win, Toshiba conceded three tries in 10 minutes either side of half-time while fly-half Richie Mo’unga was in the sin bin.
The triple strike, which included the second of two for the afternoon from the inspirational Eagles skipper and Boks outside centre Kriel, floored their higher-ranked opponents.
Mo’unga’s time in the sin bin proved costly
It was 14-5 when All Blacks playmaker Mo’unga exited; a scarcely believable 33-5 when he returned.
While the outcome has left Toshiba under pressure to hold onto their tickets for the play-offs, the Eagles are in the box seat to avoid the post-season relegation series, seven points ahead of 11th-placed Mitsubishi Sagamihara Dynaboars, whom they face next.
Avoid defeat, and what once seemed an unlikely salvage job will have been completed with 80 minutes of the season to spare.
Elsewhere, Shizuoka BlueRevs did move up one place to eighth in the table, confirming Urayasu D-Rocks’ participation in the end-of-season promotion/relegation series in the process, otherwise it is ‘as you were’ on the standings – the top six unchanged with two weeks of the regular season remaining.
Seventh-placed Toyota Verblitz can still have a say in the make-up of the play-offs, though, with Sunday’s 40-28 victory over BlackRams Tokyo putting them within striking distance of a position in the finals.
Former All Blacks boss Steve Hansen’s men took full advantage of a yellow card to BlackRams centre Yuta Kurihara early in the second half, breaking the game open with two tries while their opposition’s complement was reduced.
All Black winger Mark Telea had opened the scoring with the sixth try of his maiden season in League One to put Toyota ahead, but a try by his ex-Test teammate TJ Perenara was part of the BlackRams’ response, with the two sides level 14-14 at the break.
Although the former Queensland Reds and Australian U20 representative Isaac Lucas put the BlackRams ahead when play resumed with the fifth try of his last four appearances, the yellow card came two minutes later, allowing Toyota to edge ahead.
In an exciting conclusion, Wallaby back-rower Liam Gill had the Black Rams back on terms while his Toyota counterpart Ryusei Koike was in the sin bin, only for the Australians’ score to be cancelled out four minutes later by Verblitz winger Taichi Takahashi, before his side had been restored to a full muster.
Prop Hamdahn Tuipulotu, the younger brother of All Black second-rower Patrick, settled the issue by scoring the second try of his freshman League One season, four minutes before the end.
The finals door ‘re-opened’ for Verblitz, who are now two points behind sixth-placed Toshiba Brave Lupus Tokyo, after the two-time champions crashed to that defeat against Yokohama Canon Eagles.
Meanwhile, having averaged 57 points a game across the seven most recent engagements between the teams prior to the start of this season, history suggested Saitama Wild Knights would be far too strong for the Dynaboars.
So, it proved, as the home side ‘batted’ to their pre-season average in a 57-19 win.
While they had ‘held’ the Wild Knights to 33 points, in a 33-3 defeat earlier in the competition, the half century was already on the horizon by half-time on Saturday, looming large after the break when inside centre Damian de Allende matched his Springbok midfield mate Kriel by touching down for the second of his two tries.
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By the time the full-time whistle blew at Kumagaya, Saitama had bagged nine tries to secure their eighth try-scoring bonus point from 16 matches.
This is three try-scoring extras fewer than the Kobelco Kobe Steelers.
Dave Rennie’s charges are just a point behind the Wild Knights on the table despite suffering a defeat more, thanks to their 11 bonus points for tries; the latest picked up in a 49-28 demolition of Tokyo Sungoliath.
Kobe are averaging six-and-a-half tries a game; a tally they exceeded against Sungoliath, where they deposited seven in the ‘bank’ to take their account beyond 100 tries for the season, the first side in the league to do so.
Brodie Retallick’s fine form continues
Sixteen of Kobe’s 105 tries have been scored by their irrepressible skipper, All Black second-rower Brodie Retallick, who has failed to cross the opposing goal-line just five times in 16 appearances.
Free of injury after subjecting his body to years of battering on Test duty, the 34-year-old is running around with the energy of a first-season rookie, and he opened the scoring at Hyogo to set the home side on their way.
Leading in word and by deed, Retallick completed his double midway through the second half as Kobe held the visitors from the capital at bay, picking up the extra log point despite conceding four tries.
Although they suffered a fifth consecutive defeat, results below them on the table continue to work in Sungoliath’s favour, and they remain in charge of their finals destiny.
The same cannot be said for Mie Honda Heat, whose shoots of promise following a string of three wins have withered after they backed up last week’s 44-point stinker against the BlackRams with a 33-point hammering at Spears Edoriku Field.
Having scored just his second try of the season during last week’s win over Sungoliath, World Rugby Player of the Year Malcolm Marx added two more as Kubota Spears dispatched the visitors 54-21 to extend their winning sequence at the ground to 25.
A tight opening saw Kubota ahead by just one point when the Springboks hooker made his first intervention, five minutes before half-time.
When scrum-half Ippei Okada also scored before the break, Honda suddenly found themselves 20-7 down, with the deficit increasing shortly after the re-start when Marx scored again.
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Although full-back Lemeki Lomano Lava and the in-form Flying Fijians’ Test hooker Tevita Ikanivere gave Honda hope with tries, the latter’s ninth of the season, Honda still trailed by nine and Okada’s second five-pointer of the afternoon shut the door.
As well as putting the game out of reach, the try precipitated a collapse as Honda leaked four tries in the final 11 minutes, allowing Kubota to pocket maximum points.
Tries by Test stars Samu Kerevi and Jasper Wiese came too late to rescue Urayasu, who will play the promotion/relegation series for a fourth consecutive season after their 49-26 loss to Shizuoka on Friday night.
Needing a maximum point return to keep their slim play-off hopes alive, the Kwagga Smith-led BlueRevs bounded to a 28-0 half-time lead before resisting a D-Rocks fightback that at one stage threatened to deny Shizuoka the vital extra point.
Brave Blossoms winger Malo Tuitama’s fifth try from his last seven outings two minutes before the end made the try-scoring bonus safe; Shizuoka finishing with a seven-try-to-four count in their favour.
