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| # 28 Wee Johnny Wilkinson |
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My lovely wife has an attitude, and like all good attitudes it is made up from her very foundation beliefs. One of her beliefs is, if your not in you cant win and over the years that I have been lucky enough to share with her, she has won her fair share of things. Some big, some small, but none more important than the NZRU ballot tickets to the first test at Jade Stadium on Saturday.
Now I dont know about you, but I like my footy and almost as much as I like going to the first test of a Lions tour, I like baiting Pommy Lions supporters.
The only way you can beat the atmosphere when walking into the back end of Jade surrounded by great one liners, strange accents and funny repartee, is the walk out afterwards.
This is when visiting teams discover, that you come to Jade Stadium, you play 35000 spectators as well as the fifteen on the field.
The Rugby Bosses are a smart breed; they know that after the All Blacks deal to the Lions, the Canterbury crowd will nullify the Barmy Army for the rest of the tour.
My personal favourite is not to say a word but just hand out tissues, if only I could find some black ones.
For some reason, it reduces once Cocky visiting supporters to a state of hopelessness in seconds.
If we underestimate Sir Clive, the Lions will bite us, he is a Fox from the top draw.
Every one has bagged him about bringing such a big team, but I believe this was very astute of him, as he is blooding the next generation of Lions and their Coaches in the very heartland of New Zealand Rugby.
Commentators have been talking about not yet seeing a complete performance from them and not rating their chances against the All Blacks, but this is a series and not just a one off battle.
This is how I think Sir Clive will play it and why.
Full on, in ya face confrontation in the set pieces, because this is what they are good at and it will take our whole forward pack to contain them.
Two 1st fives, a right and a left footer, opposite to the way we organise it, but their distance on the kick will allow them to kick further into the pockets and then wait to pounce on our turnover ball.
They showed in the very first game that they can attack out wide, but they need to be close to our end, and have space to pull it off.
This is why I believe they used the cross kick tactic so early in the series, so that we would plan to deal with it and stretch out our backs defensive pattern and hopefully leave a hole.
This is an old fashioned test match, it will be brutal and Johnny will kick. Points on the board win test matches, the Aussies found that out the hard way.
But they do have an Achilles heal and I believe it will come in the form of J. Wilkinson himself.
I remember watching one of the lead up games in the last World Cup, I think it was Samoa V England and one of the Samoans did a Michael Jones on him and it knocked the stuffing right out of the man.
From that moment on in the rest of the Cup, it looked like the Poms were protecting him, even though he kicked the winning points in the final.
Then after the cup, he had a wee holiday (a year) then a string of convenient injuries as he tried to get his confidence back, personally I dont think it has returned.
Jerry Collins, step up here mate, Ive got a wee job for you to do.
And the rest of you buggers, get into the gap when Tana goes through and support him.
If the whole thing breaks down, make sure the ruck is right on top of Mr J Wilkinson Esq.
Someone book his tickets home now.
The forward confrontation needs to make Laing Park look like kindergarten, and it needs to happen right on top of wee Johnny.
Then run the rest of the fat old barristers into the ground.
Because this series will all come down to attitude and if were not in, we wont win.
We will take care of the Barmy Army on the way out the back gate afterwards.
By the time you read this, the Lions tour will be history, 3 zip I believe and the lights at Jade will be waiting for the next bunch of pretenders to appear. Bring it on
AND just for the record its really Lancaster Park, but you do have to support your sponsors, dont you.
But then, this is all just an old truckers point of view.
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