2015 Rugby Championship Preview

The fourth annual Rugby Championship kicks off this weekend with New Zealand and Australia hosting matches on Friday and Saturday respectively. For three of the four it has been a quick turn-around from Super Rugby to get ready for the competition. Argentina, in contrast, has gone straight from camp in Australia to New Zealand.

All competitors are playing to win but the coaches of all four are looking ahead towards the bigger picture of the Rugby World Cup. Similar to in the final edition of the Tri Nations in 2011, opportunities will be available to the weaker of the two teams in individual match-ups depending on the approach taken to each match. In 2011 Australia won after being the only country to win away.

That year the teams played four matches while in 2015 there is to be three matches followed by an additional non-tournament round with New Zealand  hosting Australia in Auckland and Argentina taking-on South Africa in Buenos Aires.

For now, though it is all eyes on Christchurch and Brisbane as the Rugby Championship is set to get underway.

New Zealand

Friday’s opening fixture is to be New Zealand’s first home match of 2015 and second overall. The All Blacks historic test in Apia last week did not see the World Champions dominating nor winning comfortably. Rather Samoa held their own in a match in which both sides scored one try each. Seeing New Zealand home was Dan Carter who kicked 20 points in what was a 25-16 win.

The All Blacks team, though, was below full strength. Missing were players from the Hurricanes and Highlanders, the same franchises who contested the Super Rugby Final only four days earlier. Coach Steve Hansen now has no such limitations but has, nonetheless, opted against wholesale changes.

A total of eleven starting players have been retained from the Apia test. The four newcomers are Brodie Retallick, TJ Perenara, Ma’a Nonu and Waisake Naholo of whom three were involved in the Super Rugby Final but only Fijian-born Naholo did so for the competition winning Highlanders. The remaining player, Retallick, was on the bench in Apia.

For veterans Dan Carter and captain Richie McCaw the fixture marks the end of an era. For both it is to be the final match in Christchurch, the home city of their Super Rugby franchise the Crusaders. The pair are preparing for a fourth Rugby World Cup with Carter set to join Racing 92 and McCaw having indicated his intention to retire after the World Cup.

The pair are joined by a non-traditional Hansen selection as size over speed is apparent across the starting line-up. The All Blacks team would appear to be expecting a physical Pumas game plan but the opposition’s coach has opted for youth in looking to play with greater pace and push for a win.

Argentina

The South Americans have had different preparation than in previous years. The team gathered for a warm-up series against the French Barbarians but did so without most foreign based players. The series was used by coach Daniel Hourcade to filter out players in all positions to subsequently name a Rugby Championship training squad to prepare in Sydney, Australia.

The two-week preparation differed to that of previous years because of when and where it occurred. Camps in 2011-2014 had all been in Pensacola, Florida at the same venue in which the 2007 Pumas underwent high performance training.

Cooler conditions in Australia had the players requiring less adjustment as did the close proximity of Sydney to New Zealand. Hourcade took 36 players to Sydney of whom 28 traveled to Christchurch. Involved in Sydney but missing out was star tighthead prop Juan Figallo who will play no further part in international competition in 2015. His loss was followed by a recall for Manuel Carizza.

Carizza is back for his first test in over a year and will be joined by Rugby Championship debutant Guido Petti Pagadízabal in a new-look second-row. Neither player from the 2014 combination of Mariano Galarza and Tomás Lavanini is to be involved this weekend with Galarza likely to only return after the Rugby Championship.

Hourcade has also selected Jerónimo De la Fuente for a first Rugby Championship starting cap with him named at inside centre and Juan Martín Hernández having been rested. Like Lavanini he is expected to play against Australia in the round two match in Mendoza. Wingers Juan Imhoff and Gonzalo Camacho are two further players expected to feature in that match which sees Horacio Agulla and Santiago Cordero starting in Christchurch.

Cordero will earn his first Rugby Championship cap while Agulla will return from outside centre to the wing. Also debuting in the Southern Hemisphere tournament is Facundo Isa who has emerged in quick time to be regarded by many as a better option than either Leonardo Senatore or Benjamín Macome to start at the back of the scrum in the World Cup.

Hourcade’s team demonstrates a will to experiment while having a solid list of veteran players. It has been done so to ensure that Los Pumas can build towards the World Cup while also having an opportunity of defeating the All Blacks.

Teams
New Zealand
1 Tony Woodcock, 2 Keven Mealamu, 3 Owen Franks, 4 Luke Romano, 5 Brodie Retallick, 6 Jerome Kaino, 7 Richie McCaw (Captain), 8 Kieran Read, 9 TJ Perenara, 10 Dan Carter, 11 Charles Piutau, 12 Sonny Bill Williams, 13 Ma’a Nonu, 14 Waisake Naholo, 15 Israel Dagg

16 Codie Taylor, 17 Wyatt Crockett, 18 Nepo Laulala, 19 Jeremy Thrush, 20 Liam Messam, 21 Andy Ellis, 22 Colin Slade, 23 Ryan Crotty

Argentina
1 Marcos Ayerza, 2 Agustín Creevy (Captain), 3 Ramiro Herrera, 4 Manuel Carizza, 5 Guido Petti Pagadízabal, 6 Juan Manuel Leguizamón, 7 Juan Martín Fernández Lobbe, 8 Facundo Isa, 9 Tomás Cubelli, 10 Nicolás Sánchez, 11 Santiago Cordero, 12 Jerónimo de la Fuente, 13 Marcelo Bosch, 14 Horacio Agulla, 15 Joaquín Tuculet

16 Julián Montoya, 17 Lucas Noguera Paz, 18 Nahuel Tetaz Chaparro, 19 Benjamín Macome, 20 Javier Ortega Desio, 21 Martín Landajo, 22 Santiago González Iglesias, 23 Lucas González Amorosino

Australia

Three disappointing years from the Wallabies remains at the forefront of the minds of the players, coaches and administration. In simple terms the importance of winning for rugby in the country is the difference between making a profit or a loss.

The winter sporting market in the country is so competitive that rugby squares off head-to-head against Australian Football (AFL), Rugby League (NRL) and Soccer (A-League). With such a saturated market the productivity of the Wallabies is crucial as unlike in AFL and NRL rugby is truly international in competition and unlike in the A-League international competition is in, no small part, against culturally similar nations.

Australia’s 2014 was forgettable on the field and the consequence was a multi-million dollar financial loss. The Wallabies lost against all opposition in the 2014 Rugby Championship and despite opening with wins against the Barbarians and Wales in Europe the Australians lost against France, Ireland and England.

The Wallabies home Rugby Championship internationals were all far from being at capacity which combined which contributed significant to the deficit. In a bid to get the team back to winning ways the ARU has taken drastic action by putting an end to the selection policy which prohibits players based abroad from playing for the Wallabies.

Now any player with 60 or more caps is eligible for the Wallabies regardless of where he plays his rugby. The Toulon pair of 32 year old Matt Giteau and 31 year old Drew Mitchell are to be the first benefactors of the change when Australia host South Africa on Saturday. Giteau will play outside future Toulon teammate Quade Cooper while Mitchell has been named on the bench.

Also in the starting team are Adam Ashley-Cooper and Will Genia who are probable players to be selected from France for international duty after the World Cup. The team named by Michael Cheika is a very solid one and close to the likely lineup that England and Wales can expect to face at the World Cup.

The Australians enter without match practice. The loss of June tours in Rugby World Cup years and having both the Brumbies and Waratahs in the Super Rugby Semi Finals meant Cheika has had less opportunity with his team than others.

South Africa

Having failed to have a franchise in the Super Rugby Semi Finals Heyneke Meyer has had greater access to all of his squad members than have others. South African teams disappointed this year with the strongest performer, the Stormers being well beaten at home, 39-19 by the Brumbies in a qualifying Semi Final match.

The lack of June internationals this year saw South Africa prepare for the Rugby Championship with a non-capped international against a World XV in Cape Town. The fixture saw eye-brows raised as Jesse Kriel played outside centre and there was also room for injured captain Jean de Villiers on the bench.

The 46-10 win silenced the critics and Meyer has shown his hand in retaining fourteen of the fifteen players for this Saturday’s Rugby Championship fixture in Brisbane. The one change from the team sees Rugby World Cup 2007 winning openside flanker starting at number eight in place of Warren Whiteley.

His selection was welcomed by Springboks supporters but the same cannot be said of the inclusion of Jannie du Plessis who has been targeted on social media as having played substandard rugby. Another talking point has been the selection of Victor Matfield who is the team’s captain but at 38 years of age has many questioning his inclusion.

Heyneke has faith in Matfield who is one of seven starting players aged 30 or older, one more than the All Black team named to face Argentina. Meanwhile five starting Wallabies are in their 30s.

Teams
Australia
1 James Slipper, 2 Stephen Moore (Captain), 3 Sekope Kepu, 4 Rob Simmons, 5 Will Skelton, 6 Scott Fardy, 7 Michael Hooper, 8 Scott Higginbotham, 9 Will Genia, 10 Quade Cooper, 11 Rob Horne, 12 Matt Giteau, 13 Tevita Kuridrani, 14 Adam Ashley-Cooper, 15 Israel Folau

16 Tatafu Polota-Nau, 17 Scott Sio, 18 Greg Holmes, 19 James Horwill, 20 David Pocock, 21 Nick Phipps, 22 Matt Toomua, 23 Drew Mitchell.

South Africa
1 Tendai Mtawarira, 2 Bismarck du Plessis, 3 Jannie du Plessis, 4 Eben Etzebeth, 5 Victor Matfield (Captain), 6 Francois Louw, 7 Marcell Coetzee, 8 Schalk Burger, 9 Ruan Pienaar, 10 Handré Pollard, 11 Bryan Habana, 12 Damian de Allende, 13 Jesse Kriel, 14 JP Pietersen, 15 Willie le Roux

16 Adriaan Strauss, 17 Heinke van der Merwe, 18 Frans Malherbe, 19 Lood de Jager, 20 Oupa Mohoje, 21 Cobus Reinach, 22 Pat Lambie, 23 Lwazi Mvovo