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NZU Rugby League Qualify for Final
Thursday, July 14th, 2005
The New Zealand Universities rugby league side qualified for their third Student World Cup final and second against Australia by comprehensively beating England 34-8 at the Arana Hills Rugby League Club in Brisbane last (Wednesday) night.
The first signs that the game was going to be a true battle came during the NZU haka when the English side crept up in linking arms-formation to be right in front of their opponents by its completion. NZU coach Trevor McLeod later said it may have been a good motivating factor towards his side being fired up from the kickoff.
The first half was a low scoring affair as NZU led 14-4 at halftime, before a hat-trick of tries by Otago’s George Taunga in the space of 15 minutes in the middle period of the second half saw the students in black regain the momentum to keep charging until the fulltime hooter was sounded. After having had to drop two playing members in Otago University’s Sam Jacobson and Sione Taunga to form a final playing squad of 17 from the 19 used in pool matches, New Zealand Universities gained an early territory advantage when England conceded five early penalties inside the first ten minutes of the game.
New Zealand Universities also collected the first points of the game when a Mike Craig bomb kick saw open space behind the English goal mouth to allow hooker Jimmy O’Brien to go over unmarked for a simple try which he also converted in the 12th minute. England however had a taste of revenge three minutes later when a pass from prop Simon Houston resulted in the right wing Alex Benson running back in on an angle and also going over unmarked for a simple unconverted try.
Some slippery conditions due to the dew under the floodlights resulted in some spilt ball by the New Zealand halves towards the middle period of the first half, before redemption came when a superb 30m run from O’Brien allowed him to free the ball up to his fullback Paul Aitkens, who in turn offloaded the ball to his inside centre Mike Nathan to go over the line at the start of the second quarter. O’Brien missed the conversion and again did the same a few minutes later when the left wing Scott Hurrell went over on the final tackle to bring the score up to 14-4, which remained in favour of NZU at the halftime break.
The turning point of the game came early in the second half when NZU successfully defended three sets of six tackles on their own goal line, before Taunga came on as a replacement for Daniel McGregor in what was an inspiring tactical move from coach Trevor McLeod. The frizzy mop haired Taunga rewarded his coach straight away by scoring the first of his three tries when a chip kick on the final tackle from scrumhalf Jamie McDonald allowed standoff Mike Craig to catch the ball on the full down the field, before he passed it onto Nathan, who then offloaded to Taunga with a few metres to go for a converted try. The best of Taunga’s try came a few minutes later when a miracle one handed pass by Craig from behind his back saw the ball pass along three sets of hands before seeing Taunga go over in the 57th minute for a second successive converted try to send NZU out to a commanding 26-4 lead. NZU widened the margin further at the start of the final quarter when O’Brien successfully kicked over his second penalty goal attempt of the match after missing his first at the start of the second quarter.
England gained its second and final unconverted try of the game when Andy Walker went over in the 62nd minute, before Taunga had the final say of the game three minutes later after being set up by a superb run from Aitkens down the middle.
The remainder of the match saw possession between the two sides see-saw and although O’Brien (who was named the NZU player of the match after the game) missed a penalty attempt with three minutes remaining, the Kiwi students had done enough to again keep their 1999 Student World Cup Final old foes at bay.
New Zealand Universities coach Trevor McLeod set the win was set up by a go forward platform from his forwards working as a unit in twos and threes. “We tried to do too much to early in the game with things like lobbed passes, but once our crisp passes started to come together, we stepped up a pace,†he said.
Although ill discipline cost England in giving away too many needless penalties, McLeod said the final scoreline did not give an overall reflection of the way that the way his opposition team took to NZU. England coach Paul Fletcher said New Zealand Universities had a “sensational†kicking game compared to his side and overall completed their sets of six tackles on a better ratio than his side, which was around 60%. “At this level you need to be up around at least 75 to 80% if you are to have any success at all and for us that never worked out,†he said. “I was proud of my boys for their overall attempt in the game, but we were just never able to manage the same go forward as the Kiwis showed throughoutâ€.
The other semi-final resulted in Australia beating France 22-nil in the main game at Arana Hills after leading 18-nil at halftime. Australian centre Jordan Atkins was the main contributor for the green and golds with two tries inside the first quarter over an opposition that showed plenty of resistance, but was ultimately thwarted by some superb sliding defence from the home side.
Australia will now play New Zealand in the World Cup final this Saturday at 3.15pm (5.15pm NZ time) at Langlands Park, while England will play France in the three versus four playoff at 1.30pm. It will be the first time since the inaugural World Cup final of 1986 that New Zealand Universities will play Australia in a final. On that occasion New Zealand Universities won 14-10 in Auckland by a team that was coached by former 1969-70 Otago Kiwi Trevor Patrick, who these days lives in Brisbane and who has been giving some tips to players of his old team during this tournament.
New Zealand Universities 34 (George Taunga 3, Jimmy O’Brien, Mike Nathan, Scott Hurrell tries; O’Brien four goals, penalty goal), England 8 (Alex Benson, Andy Walker tries). Halftime: NZU 14-4.
Australia 22 (Jordan Atkins 2, George Ghazal, Jonathon Crawley tries; Clint Lovering 3 goals), France 0. Halftime: Australia 18-0.
Full list of the NZ University Rugby League Team.
