The Wallabies have a chance to lift some of the gloom hanging over Australian rugby tomorrow, but to do so they will have to achieve the considerable feat of upsetting the All Blacks in the Rugby Championship opener.
A miserable Super Rugby campaign, during which none of the nation’s five teams beat New Zealand-based opponents in 26 attempts, was accompanied by the bitter and protracted effort to shut down the Western Force.
While that public-relations disaster rumbled on, Australia coach Michael Cheika has had his players in a training camp for a month, plotting to take down the world champions in the first of three Bledisloe Cup Tests this year.
Photo: AFP
That lengthy preparation time and the talent at Cheika’s disposal makes the Wallabies a “dangerous beast,” All Blacks coach Steve Hansen said yesterday.
“The third thing that makes them really dangerous is their desire to try to help Australian rugby and at the moment it has a bit of a cloud over it,” Hansen told reporters. “They haven’t won the Bledisloe in a long time and they’re pretty hungry for it so, as a team, we have to be hungrier than them, otherwise we’re at a disadvantage.”
Australia have not held the trophy that symbolizes tran-Tasman rugby supremacy since 2002 and the bookmakers do not share Hansen’s caution, making the All Blacks 1-10 favorites to win at the Olympic Stadium.
Photo: AFP
Moreover, New Zealand begin the defense of their Rugby Championship title feeling they have a point to prove after losing a Test at home for the first time in eight years during the drawn British and Irish Lions series in June.
Hansen has summoned the latest explosive back off the New Zealand production line by awarding Damian McKenzie the start at fullback and slotted the rugged Liam Squire into his back row to give Jerome Kaino a rest.
Sonny Bill Williams is back in the centers after serving his four-match ban for the red card he was shown during the Lions series and he is to line up opposite Kurtley Beale, who plays his first Test since the 2015 World Cup final.
That run leading up to the world title decider at Twickenham is now a distant memory for Australian rugby fans, who have had to get used to regular losses in the intervening two years.
It was a Sydney victory over the All Blacks in the truncated Rugby Championship of 2015 that really sparked the run to the World cup final and Cheika knows exactly the kind of effort that will be required to replicate it tomorrow.
“I just want to see them enjoying the battle,” Cheika said yesterday. “It’s gonna be a big battle. Just that 100 percent commitment to each play, be decisive and the rest will flow from there.”
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
Taiwanese judoka Yang Yung-wei on Saturday won silver in the men’s under-60kg category at the Asian Judo Championships in Hong Kong. Nicknamed the “judo heartthrob” in Taiwan, the Olympic silver-medalist missed out on his first Asian Championships gold when he lost to Japanese judoka Taiki Nakamura in the finals. Yang defeated three opponents on Saturday to reach the final after receiving a bye through the round of 32. He first topped Laotian Soukphaxay Sithisane in the round of 16 with two seoi nage (over-the-shoulder throws), then ousted Indian Vijay Kumar Yadav in the quarter-finals with his signature ude hishigi sankaku gatame (triangular armlock). He
Rafael Nadal on Wednesday said the upcoming French Open would be the moment to “give everything and die” on the court after his comeback from injury in Barcelona was curtailed by Alex de Minaur. The 22-time Grand Slam title winner, back playing this week after three months on the sidelines, battled well, but eventually crumbled 7-5, 6-1 against the world No. 11 from Australia in the second round. Nadal, 37, who missed virtually all of last season, is hoping to compete at the French Open next month where he is the record 14-time champion. The Spaniard said the clash with De Minaur was
RALLY: It was only the second time the Taiwanese has partnered with Kudermetova, and the match seemed tight until they won seven points in a row to take the last set 10-2 Taiwan’s Chan Hao-ching and Russia’s Veronika Kudermetova on Sunday won the Porsche Tennis Grand Prix women’s doubles final in Stuttgart, Germany. The pair defeated Norway’s Ulrikke Eikeri and Estonia’s Ingrid Neel 4-6, 6-3, 10-2 in a tightly contested match at the WTA 500 tournament. Chan and Kudermetova fell 4-6 in the first set after having their serve broken three times, although they played increasingly well. They fought back in the second set and managed to break their opponents’ serve in the eighth game to triumph 6-3. In the tiebreaker, Chan and Kudermetova took a 3-0 lead before their opponents clawed back two points, but