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Chiefs beat Highlanders in thriller
By RugbyPass
The Chiefs stretched their winning run to four Super Rugby matches with a 27-22 victory over the Highlanders in Hamilton on Friday night.
Highlanders started the Aaron Mauger era with three consecutive victories, but they have now lost two in a row after Sean Wainui's try proved to be the difference in Hamilton on Friday.
Two Damian McKenzie penalties gave Chiefs a six-point advantage midway through the first half, but the clinical Waisake Naholo gathered a cross-field kick from Rob Thompson and sidestepped Solomon Alaimalo before going over to get Highlanders on the board.
Fletcher Smith, on for the injured Lima Sopoaga, added the extras but Alaimalo scored Chiefs' opening try on the stroke of half-time after Toni Pulu set him up following a clever kick from McKenzie.
Fly-half McKenzie converted superbly to make it 13-7 and Nathan Harris added a second Chiefs five-pointer, but the game swung back in Highlanders' favour courtesy of tries from Tevita Li and Paletasio Tomkinson either side of a Smith penalty.
Chiefs were not to be denied a fourth win in a row in Sam Cane's 100th Super Rugby appearance, though, Wainui finishing off a fluent move in the left corner 12 minutes from time and McKenzie converting to complete the scoring.
CHIEFS 27 (Alaimalo, Harris, Wainui tries, McKenzie 3 cons, 2 pens) HIGHLANDERS 22 (Naholo, Li, Tomkinson tries, F. Smith 2 cons, pen) HT 13-7
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There is nothing particularly significant about Ireland in this regard compared to other Tier 1 nations. To look at 'strategy' for illegal play its best to see what teams push boundaries with new laws. SA have milked two tries at ruck block downs. The strategy is to charge the first few before the ball is out at about 4 seconds but pull out and put up hands in reigned apology. The referees usually allow the scum half to clear without awarding a penalty in this scenario. The problem with that being that the scrumhalf is now taking over 5 seconds through no fault of his own. Having achieved a few slow balls > 5s , the SA forward can now pick a scrum to charge dead on 5s. Now if the scrum half waits, he will concede a penalty, as we saw against Scotland. With the new rule in place, any early charge should result in an immediate penalty.
SA also got an offside block against England which was pivotal again after a couple of 'apologetic' offside aborted charges forcing England to clear slowly.
Go to commentsYep, you're not the sharpest tool in the shed are you?
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