The Wallabies have held back the New Zealand All Blacks but walked away with a 12-12 draw in the Bledisloe Cup opener at ANZ Stadium in front of 68,627 fans on Saturday night. New Zealand was aiming at a world record 18th consecutive test match victory, but could not break through the solid Australian defences.
In a try-less match hampered by heavy rain, both sides struggled to control the ball in open play and resorted to scoring through the boots of Kurtley Beale and Aaron Cruden, both kicking 4/5 penalties.
The first half began with some ferocious rucking rugby, breaking down after only a couple of phases in the mush. Penalties for slowing down play were given to both sides by South African match official Jaco Peyper. The Wallabies made Peyper’s job easy in the first half, though. A number of school-boy errors saw them hand possession back to the All Blacks who made it 3-9 at half-time.
“We’ve made a few errors… we need to keep forcing errors,” was the message from Wallabies coach Ewan Mckenzie during the break. He would have been happy with the second half efforts of his team, who frustrated a world-class Kiwis outfit.
Peyper eventually ran out of patience with the Kiwis, who were doing their best to slow the ball down in the ruck. Both Wyatt Crockett and replacement fly half Beauden Barrett were binned, giving the Wallabies a one-man advantage for 20 minutes of the game. But the Aussies were unable to convert the numbers advantage, spending 67% of their time in the opposition half. Nevertheless they strung together some inspiring phases of rucking running rugby in the wet conditions.
The Wallabies must now win the remaining two games in the series to take back the Bledisloe Cup. Match two will be held next week in Eden Park, New Zealand and Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane will host the third.
