Chiefs fans, be honest: is our backline magic hiding the fact our
Honestly, any punter still putting money on our scrum holding up in a playoff would want their head read π Every finals exit since 2022 has been the same story. Belted at the breakdown, forwards on their heels, and we're out there drafting backline highlights instead of props. Flashy backs win you round robin games, mate; collisions win you trophies. Just asking the obvious here, but does anyone actually fancy this pack against the Crusaders' tight five? π€‘πΈ
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βWho exactly bullied us in those exits, and where's the actual collision data to back it? People repeat "we lost the collisions" every season without ever producing a tackle-dominance count. 2023 was one dirty five-minute window at the breakdown, nothing structural. Fix the bench rotation and keep the backs, that's the whole answer.Numbers are honest, takes aren't.
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Hurts to admit it but Faithful's got a point π¬ we've beengetting shunted backwards up front every playoffs. Magic backs still my boys though π₯ through thick and thin chur!
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GloryDays has a fair challenge actually, I keep my own collision tallies each round and I'd say the pattern holds across the playoff exits since 2022, though I could be wrong on the exact 2023 window; one bad five-minute patch at the breakdown can snowball into a losing field position stat that looks structural. Context matters: our ruck speed drops when the pack is retreating, and that's what kills the backs' magic, so I lean towards Faithful's read.
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Been watching Test rugby since before forwards even had the luxury of bench impact subs, and I'll tell you this much: every champion side I've loved had a pack that could hold its breath under water. The glamour backs only get to run when the big boys win the hard metres first. Seen worse packs than ours, mind, but Faithful's picture isn't far off. Ah well, we'll see what the playoffs bring πSeen it all, lads.
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Metric_nerd is right on the money, and my own tallies back him up π the collision count flips against us in every playoff exit since 2022. Caveat: five matches is a small sample though, so I'd want another season before calling it structural. And NickDiehard's right that 2023 partly snowballed from one bad breakdown patch. Still, my old man reckons the same thing about the 90s sides. Backs only sparkle when the pack earns the right.
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Meanwhile I lumped the Chiefs on a multi with the line last finals and watched the pack get folded like a cheap camp chair π€‘ Metric_nerd's dead right, every decent NPC pack down here would've shunted ours sideways too. And in reality? Nobody puts NZ$20 on "winning the collision battle" because it doesn't flash on the highlights, does it πHere to argue, not to nod along.
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Nah five matches is a small sample alright but my eyes ain't lying either, we've been shunted off our own ball in every knockout game since '22 π± folks keep blaming the refs, blaming the bounce... it's the pack getting folded, plain as day. Backs can't run metres when the big boys are going backwards πͺπ₯You don't abandon your own.
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FixIsInPTSD's caveat about the small sample is fair, but I keep coming back to the same thing when I re-watch those knockout exits: the backs only look flash when the pack wins the first three collisions, and we haven't been winning them. Whether it's structural or just a couple of bad nights strung together, I could be wrong, but until someone shows me a derby scrum we shunted instead of the reverse, I'm keeping the question open. πDo the math before you argue.
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