Waratahs scrum smashes the Bulls

I was very impressed with the NSW Waratahs scrum in Round 3 vs the Bulls. Destroyed them. Too early in the competition to judge the Bulls scrum, but traditionally they have been the gold standard. 

The scrum coach Michael Foley deserves the credit for this. In the past members of that pack have been the proud owners of highly used roller skates.

The ernomity of this task was not lost on the Sydney Morning Herald Journalist late last year when he wrote:

The former test hooker leaves the Wallabies coaching team after three seasons, during which he has been instrumental in achieving major gains in Australian forward play - to the extent that a pack which was often laughed at is now accepted as being of international standard.

But that challenge could be in the mini-league compared to getting the Waratahs pack sorted out next year, especially as they will be without three vital players - their lineout leader Dan Vickerman, and back-rowers Rocky Elsom and David Lyons.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/opinion/columnists/greg-growden/592444/i-Foley-focused-on-filling-big-gaps-in-Tahs-pack-i

Now all they need to do is become a winning outfit, something they have never been in the 19 odd years of Super Rugby History.

High scoring games

After 2 rounds one thing is clear - the way the rules changes are  being implemented, especially in the first few games of the year when the refs are anal (implementing the instructions  they have received in a highly compliant manner) - the scores are really high, both by winning and losing team.

A combination of excessive penalties (especially for slowing the ball down in rucks etc), more than average yellow cards, and general stand-off ness by the players in fear of infringing is causing massive scorelines.

Will be interesting to see if the players close the loop holes or otherwise work out how to 'work the system' and/or the refs get tired of stopping play - and the scores come back down. Or not.