The All Blacks 47-26 crushing defeat to the Wallabies on Saturday was mostly followed by talk surrounding Scott Barrett’s sending off, but it now seems as though he could have been joined on the side-lines by some of his teammates
Social media exploded on Saturday in the
aftermath of Barrett’s red card, for which he subsequently received a three-week
ban from rugby. However, Fox Sports have done some research and found that the
All Blacks actually committed 17 instances of foul play in the 80 minutes of
which only three were penalised.
The most noticeable of which happened only eight
minutes into the game when the All Blacks were fortunate not to have three men given
at least yellow cards at once.
Dane Coles, Owen Franks and Ardie Savea all could have faced further punishment than the penalty awarded with the trio performing no arms tackles that were high on Wallabies captain Michael Hooper.
Flanker Sam Cane complained after the game of the Wallabies methods of breaking up the ruck.
“To be honest, I wasn’t aware of it until I looked at my game yesterday but there were times when you’d get over the ball and you’d know you were in a good position and then for whatever reason you get taken off it. Sometimes it was because players were coming blatantly in from the side, sometimes it’s those neck rolls,” he said on Monday.
However, it has since been noticed that he flipped Wallabies hooker Tolu Latu on his head in the 35th minute to prevent a turnover at a ruck and a short time later Franks was spotted tackling Izack Rodda around the neck.
That was only in the first-half.
In the second-half there were two instances
were substitute prop Angus Ta’avao tackled players around the neck and also didn’t
use his arms in a tackle.
As well as this the Wallabies were
constantly being hit off the ball, but there was no punishment.
The Wallabies were at fault on multiple
occasions too with neck rolls being missed and late tackles slipping by.
However, the call from fans and players
alike that the All Blacks were treated unfairly during their side’s record loss
to the Wallabies would appear to be unjustified.
If anything, it seems as though things
could have been much worse for the All Blacks if the officiating was stricter.
What is certain though is that both side’s
will need to solve their defensive indiscipline for the second test this
weekend or we could be seeing more players join Barrett on the side-lines.
