Super Rugby Round 9 preview: Welcome back, David Pocock

Super Rugby’ reaches its halfway this weekend with Round 9 playing out across New Zealand, Australia and South Africa.

The action begins with the Southern Derby from Christchurch before the in-form Melbourne Rebels host the Stormers.

Read on for some of the key storylines across the three conferences.

AUSTRALIAN CONFERENCE

Can Pocock help right struggling Brumbies ship?

Welcome back, David Pocock.

After more than a month on the sidelines with a calf injury, Pocock will make his Brumbies return against the Lions in Canberra on Saturday night. And it couldn’t be timelier.

Having dropped their last two games, either side of a bye, and four of their last five, the Brumbies find themselves in a logjam of teams within the Australian conference, five points adrift of the second-placed Waratahs.

But further to the Brumbies’ predicament, is that they are 1-3 in conference play to date having twice lost to the Rebels before receiving a hiding from the Reds in Brisbane. That record has put extra significance on this non-conference clash with the Lions.

But just how will Pocock fare in his return from a calf injury? Instagram will tell you that the Wallabies back-rower has been working hard in the gym in his recovery, as usual, in both rehabbing his calf and further strengthening his neck to survive the cleanouts that have threatened to end his career.

While the likes of Lachie McCaffrey, Tom Cusack and Pete Samu have performed admirably in Pocock’s absence, there is no substitute for the veteran No. 7’s ability to get on the ball at the breakdown. He is able to turn the momentum of a match on a single steal, something the Brumbies could have used during the Crusaders’ second-half onslaught last weekend.

Coach Dan McKellar has already indicated Pocock won’t play the full 80 minutes on his return while a Wallabies spokesperson confirmed to ESPN last week that the two-time John Eales Medallist would likely have his World Cup resting plan altered, saying the key was to “have him back playing again”.

Pocock will need to hit the ground running, too, given the Lions boast another of world rugby’s best breakdown exponents in captain Malcolm Marx. While he plays hooker, Marx’s ability to get on the ball is equal to Pocock; the Springboks rake the owner of three steals and five further forced penalties already this season.

And he leads a side that will be stung by last week’s terrible performance at home in Johannesburg. The Lions delivered one of worst performances under Swys de Bruin in a 42-5 thrashing from the Sharks, only scoring a try themselves in the final play of the game.

They, too, are locked in a battle within their own conference; just four points separate second from fifth in South Africa while the Sharks are only three points clear on top.

But this is a game the Brumbies should win. They played some excellent rugby in patches last week, particularly in the run to halftime, and with Folau Fainga’a, Rory Arnold and Scott Sio also joining Pocock in the starting side, they have few excuses not to perform.

Suffer another defeat, however, and they can just about kiss this season goodbye.

NEW ZEALAND CONFERENCE

If you knew nothing about rugby, had never seen a game in your life, were introduced to Ben Smith and were told he was one of the world’s best, you’d probably choke on your crab-cakes.

But you could also then be excused for having your jaw drop when shown footage of the veteran Highlanders and All Blacks fullback in action, specifically his uncanny ability to beat defenders in heavy traffic.

One of the most dangerous counter attackers in the game, Smith on Saturday brings up 150 Super Rugby games. After debuting 10 years ago, Smith has been a lock in the Highlanders No. 15 jersey ever since, save for a few concussion-forced breaks, giving fans across the Otago region a lifetime of memories.

“For me, it’s always been a team [the Highlanders] that I’ve loved to play for,” Smith said in typically understated fashion.

“At the end of the day it’s been a really easy choice when it’s been contract renewals, to stick around and try and play for a team I’ve really loved.

“I’ve had some great memories playing for the Highlanders and I’m pretty excited about this weekend.”

Unfortunately, Smith’s milestone match comes further up the south island against the Crusaders, who last week surged to a comprehensive 22-point win over the Brumbies on the back of a superb second-half.

And having dealt with the emotion of their first home game since the terrorist attack of March 15, the Crusaders again look like the two-time defending Super Rugby champions history says they are.

The Highlanders’ hopes of marking Smith’s 150th aren’t helped by the fact that his All Blacks teammates are injured. Aaron Smith, Liam Squire and Waisake Naholo, the team’s three biggest attacking weapons outside Smith himself, are sidelined with an array of ailments, all with different timelines around their returns.

Further hurting the Highlanders’ case is the fact they haven’t won in Christchurch since 2011.

But they shouldn’t be short on motivation; having lost their last four games on the trot, a fifth successive defeat would push their playoff aspirations further from reach, too.

Supporters of both teams, and those neutral fans from across the competition, have come to expect a certain quality of rugby from the Southern Derby. Rightfully cancelled due to the attack in Christchurch earlier in the season, the two great rivals always bring the best out of each other, no matter the playing personnel, and with the additional storyline of Smith’s milestone, Friday night’s showdown is unlikely to be any different.

SOUTH AFRICAN CONFERENCE

Is this the week teams reveal their true selves?

South Africa’s Super Rugby teams have each produced some wonderful rugby this season — even the Stormers, who exceeded their obvious limitations in defeating the Jaguares with a tremendous performance before heading on tour to New Zealand.

Unfortunately the Stormers have since recorded a 0-3 record on tour, blighted by elementary result-changing mistakes, poor handling and decision-making ahead of their fixture against the Australian Conference-leading Melbourne Rebels, whom they face this weekend without Eben Etzebeth, Pieter Steph du Toit and Siya Kolisi, and that really is more akin to what we have come to expect from them; heart and effort, a great willingness to put bodies on the line, but a lack of craft, guile and execution.

And therein lies the rub about South Africa’s teams this season.

They each boast star quality, and they each can play, but they have each proved disappointingly capable of varying degrees of mediocre, often from one week to the next, and that’s a worry approaching the halfway point of the competition even if the Bulls, the Lions and this week’s South African conference-leading Sharks — are currently in the Super Rugby playoff positions.

So what to make of the teams, with the aforementioned trio each having a 4-3 win-loss record against the 3-4 Stormers and Argentina’s Jaguares? The Stormers might seem to be the least capable of the sides — at least the least threatening — but they remain just one victory behind their South African rivals, yet surely no one even remotely considers them to be near-playoff standard.

The Lions’ form and efforts are perhaps easiest to explain, as departures from the three-time runners-up at the end of last season, and injuries during the campaign, have seen them having to blood a number of players who probably aren’t yet ready to perform consistently at this level. That’s not saying the Lions’ cubs won’t be good players week in week out, but right now they, and the team by extension, have lacked a consistency of performance. But does that explain the manner of the Lions’ performances at home, where they have conceded massive halftime deficits against the Bulls, the Rebels and the Sharks? They have often lacked physicality and intensity, particularly in defence, and their stubborn (albeit admirable) insistence on trying to play their way out of territory has put them under unnecessary pressure.

They’re now away from home, on a tour on which they face the Brumbies, this weekend, the Chiefs and the Crusaders before returning to South Africa, but it’s hard to know what to expect given the manner of their performances through the season to this point; they’ll surely have targeted the Brumbies, but conversely their hosts this weekend will have targeted them and have territorial kickers to pin them back given the vulnerabilities they have displayed. The Lions’ season could begin to spiral quickly if they lose this weekend, but they will still back themselves; it’ll be interesting to see how this game plays out, certainly given the way the Brumbies stuck it to the Crusaders in Christchurch last week (at least for 40 minutes).

The Bulls, meanwhile, host Queensland Reds having blown what seemed a certain four competition points against the Jaguares last week through what coach Pote Human described as “the stupidity of the players”. Handre Pollard and Jesse Kriel return this week from Springboks-mandated rest, and R.G. Snyman and Marco van Staden each return from a long-term injury absence, but do they cover the absence of Duane Vermeulen on Boks-related R ‘n’ R?

More interesting than the Bulls’ ability to cover for Vermeulen will be the need to tweak their game plan given it hasn’t returned a victory this season against anyone other than South African opponents (much as they should have defeated the Jaguares).

They have done the job this season against local rivals — and they were impressive in claiming their first three wins against the Stormers, the Lions and the Sharks — but their intensity has dropped in recent weeks. Their points have come increasingly from their goalkickers — they have attempted 33 penalty kicks this season, 12 more than any other team — and they have not looked to have been so adventurous; they’ll say they’re playing to their strengths but such a game plane needs the opposition to “play ball” by conceding penalties. Meanwhile, the Reds arrive in Pretoria having conceded the fourth-fewest penalties of any team this season, and just seven penalty goals, so the Bulls might want to use the ball a little more; they might not be able to rely on the Reds gifting them opportunities, and it’s not like the Bulls don’t have talented players who know how to find the stripe.

And so we come to the Sharks, who host the Jaguares fresh off the most impressive performance by a South African team this season — 15 man or otherwise. They were less impressive the week before, of course, when they lost at home to the Bulls after a last-minute penalty, but the Jaguares play a less-confrontational style of rugby that should suit the Sharks.

There will always be a concern that the Durban-based side can go missing against big-bopping opponents, at least until they show they don’t, but there may be a sense now, after their performance last week, that they have the confidence to execute the 15-man game plan week in week out; there was previously a sense, perhaps, that they didn’t trust implicitly their ability, and that confidence and hence execution would drop at the first sign of a break wall that wasn’t for bending or breaking.

So we think we might now have a better feel for the South African teams… bring on Monday.