They did not receive the high ball well
There was an obvious tactic from the Brumbies to play conservatively, test the Highlanders under the high ball and then back their defence to hold up. It was a tactic that had the South African influence of Jake White written all over it.
The Highlanders did not cope with it well, dropping three kicks and not returning a handful of others very well either. There were 14 points coughed up from these dropped balls, which in the end was costly.
The Brumbies defence was outstanding
The second part of the success of the kick and chase tactic was the tenacious defence the Brumbies brought to the table. They were well organised, smothering the Highlanders attack and making their one-off tackles.
The usual threats of Hosea Gear and Ben Smith were well contained, while the forward runners struggled to get much go-forward, particularly from the pick and go. George Smith was the stand out for the Brumbies, showing that despite having been gone for a few years, he is probably still one of the top two openside flankers in the world.
It really was a brilliant defensive display. But . . .
The offside lines were policed very loosely
The other side of the last point comes in how far up the Brumbies line was allowed to be. They were creeping up offside and prevented the Highlanders backline from getting any room to create anything.
It was this that saw the outside backs had little to work with and the forwards had a tough job of trying to get on the front foot. In saying this, you do what you can get away with and cannot fault the Brumbies for pushing the envelope as any good team will do.
There was a lack of creativity
The game plan on attack seemed to be very one-dimensional, looking to take contact every time and smash their way through the defence rather than look for gaps. Taking contact is not necessarily a bad thing, certainly you need it to a certain extent to draw the opposition defence in and to gain a bit of forward momentum.
But the problem comes when this is all that is happening, as was the case on Friday night. There needs to be some form of creativity to put someone into a gap and make the most of a lethal backline. The Reds, Chiefs and Crusaders do it well and consequently are three of the most
threatening attacking teams in the competition.
If the Highlanders can start giving Ma'a Nonu some room to move, or giving Hosea Gear the ball in a position where he does not have to smash his way through every time, they will become that much more dangerous.
TMO decisions
There were two TMO decisions that were touch and go, both of which went against the Highlanders. That is not to say they were right or wrong and whether they were is beside the point.
They were both decisions that could have gone either way and went the way of the Brumbies. On another night they could have gone the way of the Highlanders, which would have made a huge difference to the way the final 20 minutes played out.
Still too many mistakes
Dropped passes, missed one-off tackles, inaccuracies at set-piece. They are all basic things, but are all things win and lose games. It is all very well making the breaks and having these dangerous ball runners, but if you are going to drop the ball as regularly as the Highlanders did you cannot expect this to translate into points.
The term ‘little mistakes' has been thrown around a lot this season. But in reality, is even there such a thing as a little mistake at this level? The good teams will take the limited chances presented to them, while negating the chances the other team gets, with the winning team usually being the one who does these two things the best.
A dropped ball may very well just seem like a small mistake, or one missed tackle in an otherwise good defensive effort. But when they are costing points they become rather large mistakes and are the difference between the good teams and the not so good teams.
