The Lions Demonstrate Their Prowess Against AUNZ: Are They Ready for the Wallabies?
The AUNZ XV friendly match was the toughest test for the Lions before the series against the Wallabies. However, they offered their most complete performance to date. AUNZ co-captain David Havili called the team “the best in the world”, although former All Blacks coach Ian Foster believes they still have work to do. After the Lions struggled to beat the Waratahs and Brumbies last week, the AUNZ team was tasked with facing the tourists in their final test match. Instead, they played to their advantage, with players like Duane van der Merwe, Sione Tuipulotu, Huw Jones, and Owen Farrell competing for places in next week’s team, approaching a cricket score at the famous Adelaide Oval. Despite the resounding result, Foster warned that the Lions still have work to do. This after he was asked to compare the current lineup with the team he faced as assistant coach of the All Blacks in 2017.
The Lions showcased a very different team from the one that was frustrated and pushed to the limit by the Waratahs a week earlier, with their defensive efforts creating an impenetrable red wall that stifled any AUNZ attack, while their offensive prowess shone by punishing every mistake. First, it was a quick lineout in the first half that caught AUNZ off guard after Havili kicked the ball out of bounds. Hugo Keenan was quick to run to his mark and send the ball into the field for Van der Merwe to cross the line for the first time of three on the night. In the second half, it was a short pass at the front of the lineout for a clever try, before Henry Pollock capped a terrible night for AUNZ as he pounced on a loose ball in the in-goal for the final score of the night.“They’re good, I think they’ve got a lot of work to do for next week,” Foster told reporters. “I think they’ll be pleased with today’s performance and in some ways it was good to have an attacking game for them, probably having the opportunity to have a little bit more fluency in their game and if they can continue that when the battle is a little bit tougher at the breakdown, I think that will be their challenge.
Ian Foster
Foster also highlighted the tourists’ precision and their ability to shorten the defense to exploit the edges with AJ Lam, Marika Koroibete and Jock Campbell caught out on several occasions.“If there’s one big thing [we learned] tonight it’s that if you give them easy moments, you have to be on your toes all the time,” said AUNZ coach Les Kiss after the match. “They seem to have the ability to smell a moment and make you pay for it immediately, and those are the tries that, you know, it’s the quick lineout, the front of the lineout in the second half, any loose ball, they seem to be first on it.
Les Kiss
Tourists dominated in every metric. Meters carried, line breaks, possession and territory, as they sharpened their claws for next week’s opening match in Brisbane, but it was their defense that deserved the praise. Six players topped the completed tackle statistics list, including Jac Morgan (18), James Ryan (16) and Finn Russell (15), as any crack or curve in the defensive line was quickly restructured, stifling any AUNZ attack.“I think they still have the basic principles they’ve always believed in,” Foster said of the attack. “You know, it’s a lot of short passing game, a lot of hard lines, hard carries, that’s still there, but then we saw their execution in the middle of the park to get to the width, I thought it was really crisp today, like on a couple of occasions we went up to try and shut them down in that space and they were good enough to get the ball away.Ian Foster
Havili was equally impressed by the Lions’ defensive structure, with the loose trio wreaking havoc at the AUNZ breakdown.“You know, they are a very good team,” Kiss said. “Their defense is difficult to break down. Simon Easterby has done an incredible job with that defense, with a lot of people coming in over the last four or five weeks.
Les Kiss
The pressure will now fall on Joe Schmidt to discover a way to dismantle a team that has started to sound with five wins on the tour in Australia and growing confidence. According to Foster, discipline will be key for the Wallabies, while the aerial battle is an area that Joseph-Akuso Suaalii should seek to exploit. «I think in the Lions series, if there’s a lot of pressure, it comes down to your discipline and you saw that in our team tonight, that we were combative, but when they put a little pressure on us, we lost our discipline and suddenly we were penalized nine times in that third quarter and you can’t do that against a team and just keep letting them pressure you and get you into the 22 and the Lions will hurt you if that happens. «I think [the aerial battle] will also be big, and we actually saw that a little bit tonight too. Even though we were struggling to get a real forward ball, there were a couple of aerial times that, we still put some pressure on them in that space. They did the same to us. «I think that will be part of it and we didn’t get enough opportunity to implement what we wanted, but we were certainly keen to explore that a little bit, but I’m pretty sure they [the Wallabies] will be prepared in that space.»David Davies/PA Images via Getty Images“They are good at doing these simple things, well done,” Havili said about the Lions. “They put a lot of heat on the breakdown, and we had a couple of carries over the gain line and they stopped the ball pretty early and it’s difficult for us to find seams or find weak shoulders.
David Havili
Tourists dominated in every metric. Meters carried, line breaks, possession and territory, as they sharpened their claws for next week’s opening match in Brisbane, but it was their defense that deserved the praise. Six players topped the completed tackle statistics list, including Jac Morgan (18), James Ryan (16) and Finn Russell (15), as any crack or curve in the defensive line was quickly restructured, stifling any AUNZ attack.“I think they still have the basic principles they’ve always believed in,” Foster said of the attack. “You know, it’s a lot of short passing game, a lot of hard lines, hard carries, that’s still there, but then we saw their execution in the middle of the park to get to the width, I thought it was really crisp today, like on a couple of occasions we went up to try and shut them down in that space and they were good enough to get the ball away.Ian Foster
Havili was equally impressed by the Lions’ defensive structure, with the loose trio wreaking havoc at the AUNZ breakdown.“You know, they are a very good team,” Kiss said. “Their defense is difficult to break down. Simon Easterby has done an incredible job with that defense, with a lot of people coming in over the last four or five weeks.
Les Kiss
The pressure will now fall on Joe Schmidt to discover a way to dismantle a team that has started to sound with five wins on the tour in Australia and growing confidence. According to Foster, discipline will be key for the Wallabies, while the aerial battle is an area that Joseph-Akuso Suaalii should seek to exploit. «I think in the Lions series, if there’s a lot of pressure, it comes down to your discipline and you saw that in our team tonight, that we were combative, but when they put a little pressure on us, we lost our discipline and suddenly we were penalized nine times in that third quarter and you can’t do that against a team and just keep letting them pressure you and get you into the 22 and the Lions will hurt you if that happens. «I think [the aerial battle] will also be big, and we actually saw that a little bit tonight too. Even though we were struggling to get a real forward ball, there were a couple of aerial times that, we still put some pressure on them in that space. They did the same to us. «I think that will be part of it and we didn’t get enough opportunity to implement what we wanted, but we were certainly keen to explore that a little bit, but I’m pretty sure they [the Wallabies] will be prepared in that space.»“They are good at doing these simple things, well done,” Havili said about the Lions. “They put a lot of heat on the breakdown, and we had a couple of carries over the gain line and they stopped the ball pretty early and it’s difficult for us to find seams or find weak shoulders.
David Havili
