The Canterbury Crusaders revived their Super Rugby playoff hopes with a 58-17, eight-try win over the Queensland Reds yesterday.
The Crusaders took a slender 15-10 lead to halftime, but ran in six second-half tries, including winger Nemani Nadolo’s double, to take a bonus point and rise inside the top-six playoffs zone at the start of the 13th round.
The match was a farewell to All Blacks captain Richie McCaw and star flyhalf Daniel Carter, who likely played their last Super Rugby matches in Christchurch.
Carter is likely to end his 13-season association with the Crusaders after the Rugby World Cup, when he is to join French club Racing Metro. McCaw has played for the Crusaders for 15 seasons and, while he has yet to make his intentions clear, is likely to retire after the world tournament in October.
The impending departures of Carter and McCaw made Friday’s match emotionally significant for the Crusaders, who are unlikely to play again in Christchurch this season. Their only other home match will be at their secondary home ground at Nelson and, while they improved their playoffs chances with Friday’s win, their chances of hosting a home playoff are slim.
However, Canterbury started Colin Slade at flyhalf, with Carter at second-five.
Slade outshone Carter, creating a try for scrumhalf Andy Ellis and scoring himself to give the Crusaders their narrow first-half lead. He also kicked six conversions and two penalties for 23 points.
McCaw took the field from the bench as a second-half replacement. By the time he joined the game the Crusaders were overwhelmingly in control.
They tore apart the Reds’ defense in the second half, with tries to Nadolo in the first and 12th minutes of the half. All Blacks lock Sam Whitelock dashed 60m through paper-thin defense to put the Crusaders on course to a landslide win.
Meanwhile, the Melbourne Rebels kept up their unlikely push for a playoff spot by scoring a bonus-point 42-22 win over the struggling Auckland Blues.
Skipper Scott Higginbotham crossed for one of the Rebels’ five tries to become the top try-scoring forward in Super Rugby with his 30th effort as the hosts picked up their sixth win from 11 matches this season.
They sit third in the Australian Conference, three points behind the leading ACT Brumbies.
The Blues were quickly trailing as flanker Colby Fainga’a finished off for the first try in the 11th minute after a strong counter from an interception.
The teams traded tries to leave the Blues trailing by six with 13 minutes to go.
However, a slack Blues effort from a restart allowed center Dom Shipperley to scoot through after Higginbotham’s tap down was deemed not to have gone forward by the television match official.
Additional reporting by reuters
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