RUGBY CHAMPIONSHIP: Tense fortnight ahead as a bonus point could decide it

The final fortnight of the most exciting ever Castle Lager Rugby Championship has arrived, and as a measure of how unpredictable it all is, those Springbok supporters who hope that the Wallabies win in Auckland on Saturday might well be backing the wrong horse in their assumption of what their team needs.

In normal years an Australian win would help the Boks. The All Blacks have dominated the competition down the years, while it is now well over two decades since the Wallabies have had a hand on the Bledisloe Cup, which is played for by the two Trans-Tasman rivals.

But a glance at the Championship standings with two games to play, with all teams having won two and lost two of the games played so far, shows the potential folly of thinking a win for Australia to break a 31-year Kiwi sequence of success at Eden Park will help the Boks. It could do the exact opposite, for it is only the Wallabies who can force a situation where the South African fate is not in their own hands.

The losing bonus point that the Wallabies grabbed with their late try in the defeat against Argentina in Sydney puts them one point ahead of the Boks and All Blacks, with the Boks holding down second because of superior points difference.

That means that technically the Wallabies are the one team in the competition who have their fate in their hands - in the sense that if they win their two remaining matches the other teams are going to have to pick up at least one bonus point victory to match them.

The return Bledisloe Cup game is in Perth a week later and a win in Auckland would ratchet up the Wallaby confidence levels for that final day of the competition - and they will have plenty to play for because they could well have an even bigger emotional connection with the Bledisloe as they have for the Championship. If not more.

PLAYING SECOND IS TO BOK ADVANTAGE

To win the one will mean winning the other unless the Boks can win both games against Argentina, starting with the one in Durban on Saturday, plus pick up a try scoring bonus point either there or in London a week later.

Argentina ceding their home ground advantage by playing their home game at Twickenham does help the Boks, who will also have the advantage in both games of knowing what they need to do as the games will be played after the ones in Australasia.

This week for instance they might know that it is critical to both win and score three more tries than the Pumas if either:

a) the Wallabies win in Auckland and then open a five or six point lead at the top or

b) the Wallabies suffer a blow out, as they have done at Eden Park in the past, and the All Blacks win with a bonus point.

In both those scenarios, the bonus point will become critical to the Boks in the Hollywoodbets Kings Park game, all of which adds to the tension and excitement of this final fortnight. It is not just about winning, it is also about what log points each team can get out of their games.

No team is out of it. Argentina have beaten both New Zealand and Australia once, and if they replicate that against the Boks, they will be right in the mix even though they start this last sequence of games in last place.

It is not beyond the realms of possibility, given the Wallaby improvement this year, that all teams could even end with the same number of wins - three. In which case the bonus points will decide it.

Given the Boks don’t have to travel to Argentina, and also taking into account the impressive momentum and confidence they would have gained from their 43-10 win over the All Blacks in Wellington, they are marginal favourites heading into the last two rounds.

They have the capability of winning with bonus points in both their remaining games, although the Pumas have grown too so don’t bet your house on it.

Much will depend on how the All Blacks recover from their record savaging at the hands of the Boks. The reaction in New Zealand to that defeat has been predictable - in the sense that the criticism has rained down on coach Scott ‘Razor’ Robertson and his charges.

It’s nothing new, as the All Blacks have lost more since 2019 than they tended to do before that, and the All Blacks have responded well before - such as when they recovered from their 26-10 mauling at the hands of the Boks in Nelspruit in 2022 to win in Johannesburg a week later.

If they respond with the kind of vehemence they are capable of and pick up a bonus point win over Australia that will not be a good result for the Boks. But then neither would a Wallaby win be good for the Boks for the reasons stated already.

So it is really up to the Boks to do what is in their hands, which is to chase maximum points in both their remaining games. A riveting 320 minutes of rugby remains in this Championship season.

FIFTH ROUND CASTLE LAGER RUGBY CHAMPIONSHIP MATCHES

New Zealand v Australia (Eden Park, Auckland, Saturday 7:05am)

South Africa v Argentina (Hollywoodbets Kings Park, Durban, Saturday 5:10pm)

Rugby Championship standings (after four games)

Australia 11, South Africa 10, New Zealand 10, Argentina 9