Andrew Kellaway steers new-look Rebels to another trial victory
Fullback Andrew Kellaway has marshalled Melbourne to a morale-boosting 26-21 victory over Fijian Drua in their final Super Rugby Pacific trial, ending a horror week on a bright note.
The Wallabies utility is set to start in the No.15 jersey for the Rebels' opening round match against the ACT in Melbourne next Friday night, after also impressing in their previous trial win over NSW.
Financially-stricken Melbourne's future appears on the brink after they entered into voluntary administration with debts exceeding $20 million and with chief executive Baden Stephenson among staff cut this week.
While they wait to hear if the club survives beyond this season the players, whose contracts have been guaranteed by Rugby Australia, got on with what they do best.
Although World Cup five-eighth Carter Gordon touched down for Melbourne, the home side trailed 21-7 at halftime after a scrappy performance despite fielding their first-choice side.
In the final minutes, exciting young winger Darby Lancaster - who's set to be part of Australia's sevens team at the Paris Olympics - fired a perfectly-timed pass to fellow winger Lachie Anderson for the match-winning try.
Gordon looked sharp in the halves with Ryan Louwrens, while other stand-outs included new recruits in winger Filipo Daugunu and lock Lukhan Salakaia-Loto, as well as backrowers Josh Kemeny and skipper Rob Leota.
Another ex-Red, star prop Taniela Tupou, clocked another busy first half among a monster Melbourne pack before mass changes for the second half.
Kellaway, who played the full 80 minutes, said his team tightened up their game in the second half rather than try to match the flamboyant Fijians.
"We probably played too loose to begin and put ourselves under a bit of pressure and our discipline, which is the same old story for us, needed to tighten up," said the 28-year-old, who was also part of the Wallabies' World Cup flop.
Kellaway said the players were able to stay focused on their final hit-out rather than being distracted by the emotions of losing long-term staff.
"Everything that sort of happened has been well and truly above our pay grade so we haven't seen a great deal of what's been going on, outside of what's been in the media," he said.
"Wednesday (the redundancies) was a pretty tough day for everyone but we're lucky that we're very protected from that ... although it's important to acknowledge the work that those people who have left us have done.
"But in terms of how that impacted the group, not as much as people might think.
"The emotional side of things is important because we're dealing with humans but the big work-on for our team is to take the emotion out of the game."
Latest Comments
Nah, that just needs some more variation. Chip kicks, grubber stabs, all those. Will Jordan showed a pretty good reason why the rush was bad for his link up with BB.
If you have an overlap on a rush defense, they naturally cover out and out and leave a huge gap near the ruck.
It also helps if both teams play the same rules. ARs set the offside line 1m past where the last mans feet were😅
Go to commentsYeah nar, should work for sure. I was just asking why would you do it that way?
It could be achieved by outsourcing all your IP and players to New Zealand, Japan, and America, with a big Super competition between those countries raking it in with all of Australia's best talent to help them at a club level. When there is enough of a following and players coming through internally, and from other international countries (starting out like Australia/without a pro scene), for these high profile clubs to compete without a heavy australian base, then RA could use all the money they'd saved over the decades to turn things around at home and fund 4 super sides of their own that would be good enough to compete.
That sounds like a great model to reset the game in Aus. Take a couple of decades to invest in youth and community networks before trying to become professional again. I just suggest most aussies would be a bit more optimistic they can make it work without the two decades without any pro club rugby bit.
Go to comments