Cape Town: New Zealand coach Steve Hansen has hailed his side’s displays in 2017 after they completed the Rugby Championship with a 100 per cent record on Saturday, making up for the disappointment of a drawn series against the British and Irish Lions.
“This year’s been a great year for us,” he said after the 25-24 win against South Africa at Newlands ensured the world champions maintained their southern hemisphere domination.
“This year, what with sabbaticals and injuries and everyone coming at us and playing the Lions early, there’s been quite a bit of pressure on,” Hansen told reporters.
“While we’ve played some rugby for 80 minutes and played really well, there’s been other games where we’ve played for 60 and clocked off. All of those things are learnings for a young team.” Hansen suggested the team were continuing to progress after an extraordinary 2016 when, with a team in transition, they set a record 18-match winning streak before finally tasting defeat to Ireland in Chicago last November.
“The young fellas all came in and we played extraordinary rugby, and it was a breeze,” he said.
“What I mean by that is mentally, for them, they were all coming in trying to test themselves and say, ‘Listen, we don’t need [retired captain Richie] McCaw and [Conrad] Smith and all these guys, we can still do this’.
“It became really apparent that they were all pretty talented rugby players, but none of them really got put under pressure until such time as Chicago.
“Even then they didn’t have to sleep with that rock under their towel for too long either, because they got to play them [and beat them] in Ireland, so there hasn’t been too much adversity.” Since winning the World Cup in 2015, New Zealand have amassed 19 wins, one draw and two losses: to the Irish in the US and the second Lions test in Wellington on July 1.
The All Blacks face Australia in Brisbane on October 21 in a Bledisloe Cup encounter, a trophy they have already retained, before they end the year with a tour of Europe in November.
In Mendoza, Argentina, Australia scored 17 unanswered points in the last quarter of the match to beat Argentina 37-20 on Saturday in the final game of the 2017 Rugby Championship.
Scrum-half Will Genia and winger Reece Hodge both scored late tries as the Wallabies pulled away to snuff out any chance of another Argentine comeback after the Pumas had clawed their way back to 20-20.
The result enabled Australia to leapfrog South Africa and finish runner-up to New Zealand in the final championship standings with two wins, two draws and two losses for 15 points.
Argentina finished bottom after losing all six championship matches and failing to secure any bonus points for the first time since joining the southern hemisphere competition in 2012.
Australia triumphed despite a mixed kicking performance from star fly-half Bernard Foley, who came into the match on a streak of 18 successful kicks at goal.
