After getting Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry tour off to a less-than-stellar start, the All Blacks will be out to lift their game against the Sharks in Durban on Tuesday night (19:00 kick-off), writes Quintin van Jaarsveld.
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Dave Rennie’s men received a stern test first up courtesy of the Stormers last Friday night. While it was a fantastic occasion befitting the historical significance of the evening, with the All Blacks playing their first traditional tour match in South Africa in 30 years, the inaugural United Rugby Championship champions exposed several chinks in the Kiwis’ armour.
They were under the pump in the set pieces, struggled under the high ball, and were hampered by indiscipline, conceding three yellow cards. Considering the teams were deadlocked at 14-all after 66 minutes, the 38-21 scoreline flattered the triumphant tourists but also said a lot about their quality and ability to turn it on when it’s really needed.
Chances are we’ll look back on the tour opener in the Mother City as the closest call for the URC teams in their quest to become the first South African provincial team to beat the All Blacks since the Orange Free State’s famous 15-10 upset in 1976.
Why’s that? Because New Zealand will only get stronger from here. The poor Sharks, in particular, have a mountain to climb. If the Stormers’ challenge was akin to scaling Table Mountain, the Durbanites have to scale Mount Everest as Rennie has called on his big guns for the second leg of the tour.
The Sharks, in turn, have a long injury list in addition to being without their pool of Springboks. In that sense, the timing of Tuesday’s showdown isn’t great, but on the other hand, it is, as it comes days after the outfit’s big rebrand to Sharks Rugby Club.
Just the seventh-ever meeting between the teams, it’ll get a lot of extra eyeballs on the KwaZulu-Natal club and its new identity, as will the appearance of two-time World Cup-winning All Blacks legend Ma’a Nonu, who’ll front the Haka for the first time and make his Sharks debut off the bench after joining the club as a mentor last week.
The All Blacks are unbeaten against the Sharks predecessor, Natal, winning five of the matches and drawing the other. They recorded wins in 1928, 1949, 1970, 1976 and 1992, while they drew 6-all in 1960. The first two games were played at Alexandra Park in Pietermaritzburg (1928) and Kingsmead Cricket Ground in Durban (1949), with all the other games played at Kings Park.
The All Blacks are back in Durban for the first time in almost a decade. It’s a city they have mostly happy memories of, having won nine of the 15 games they’ve played there, including a 57-14 victory over the Boks on their last visit in 2017, their biggest win over their arch-rivals on South African soil.
It was also the scene of the Kiwis’ crucial win in the first Test of the 1996 series, with Christian Cullen, Jeff Wilson and Zinzan Brooke all scoring tries to set up a 23-19 victory. They lost five of the other six games there, with one draw, and have scored 336 points while conceding 233 points in total.
Captained by Nick Hatton, the Sharks won’t be lacking in effort but they will in class. The field will be heavy due to the floods, and rain is forecast for the game as well. That will dilute the All Blacks’ attacking potency and should help the hosts cover the spread.
Prediction: New Zealand by 28.
Suggested Bet: Sharks +38.5 at 1.87.
Quintin van Jaarsveld is a former MDDA-Sanlam SA Local Sports Journalist of the Year and a former three-time Vodacom KwaZulu-Natal Sports Journalist of the Year. Formerly the sports editor and Outstanding Journalist of the Year award winner at The Fever Media Group, deputy editor at eHowzit, editor at SARugby.com and senior staff writer at Rugby365.com, he boasts over 20 years of experience.
