Fair enough. If i pointed fingers at you i apologize. I was making a generalization.
I just perceive a massive, MASSIVE underestimation of the crusaders here. Gargantuan.
Again, hardly perfect or irrefutable evidence, i know, but ask bulls' fans who they'd rather face. Or Stormers.
One season, ONE SINGLE SEASON was all it took for the best SA teams (bulls, stormers, sharks and lions (apologies to cheetahs and kings, but that's unfortunately true)) to get two of them to the competition's final.
I can't see any (intellectually honest) bulls, sharks or stormers fans arguing they would like their odds against crusaders in 2022.
And let's not even get into things like consistency etc. They've lost only a handful of games since 2017 and every one of them is a nailbiter. So much that the only tournament they didn't win was 2021's trans tasman where
- they won all their games
- those who advanced to the final never faced the crusaders
They basically had to adjust SR's format to level the playing field. And i'm not taking about opposition like zebre or dragons.
This conversation makes me a bit uncomfortable as i probably come across as a saders rabid fan. Nothing could be further from the truth. But i find it hard to believe we are actually questioning whether they are the best club level team in the planet.
Well I definitely respect your view but I'm not seeing anything particularly strong in your argument that would lead me to change mine.
The consistency argument isn't really that relevant unless you can say that super rugby is the better tournament compared to the european cup. Leinster have been pretty consistent in pro 14 apart from a one point loss to the bulls where frankly I doubt they were up to it and the bulls are just the type of team, unlike the crusaders, that Leinster struggles against.
European cup? Sure they've lost to the winner a number of times now but I really don't think that's an inferior competition to super rugby, especially at the moment. We aren't living in the rennie, Joseph, Boyd, days or the days we were tested by South African opposition (not that any can attack like Leinster, not even the lions - although it's worth mentioning they would have beaten the crusaders if not for a red card). Europe actually defends.
And if you want to go off evidence that isn't just judgment based on what we observe, then you hear about those differences in defence from players, eg James Lowe saying The defence at Leinster is a completely different level (and Wayne smith was his defence coach at the chiefs), or Rob Kearney saying the main difference between European and super rugby (or at least Leinster and the force) is that I'm europe they spend half their training time on defence whereas in super rugby it's a minor after thought. Funny then that leinster is still far better in structured attack than any super rugby team.
I can't quote anyone right now, but you do hear the likes of isa nacewa and others saying European rugby is stronger than super rugby right now. Even the typically blind commentators in NZ are starting to acknowledge when they on the very odd occasion watch European rugby that the quality level is high and perhaps they have now surpassed us.
And then you look at the micro details. When I watch the best teams in Europe, both international and club level, they are just so efficient and well organised in terms of securing breakdowns, driving over the ruck, and securing the ball, but especially Leinster. Against some pretty good opposition like Toulouse Leinster can get lightning quick ball, much quicker than any of the crusaders opposition, and against high quality defence that the crusaders don't possess. The crusaders are probably the best NZ team at this, but their opposition can be terrible, so you can hardly say the crusaders record means much in terms of whether they'd beat Leinster. The chiefs are awful, they flop over and seal the ball. But they really should have beaten the crusaders in the semi this year given the opportunities they had. With a **** attack. Imagine what a good attack would do.
And then you look more into the detail of how the crusaders win. So often it's mounga doing something brilliant. The type of brilliant thing that he has be en totally incapable of against good rush defence, which he hasn't faced in super rugby but has faced in internationals (even when playing for the crusaders - against the British and Irish lions). And to further that regarding your arguments for crusaders players being great- look at how they've fared for the all blacks in situations where you can't fully blame the coach - their ability to challenge a ruck, their ability to dominate tackles, their ability to make ground. The likes of Ethan blackadder , after being The standout forward in super rugby last year, looked completely out of his depth against Ireland. Cody Taylor was easily the worst player on either team in any game of the series this year, missing a ridiculous amount of tackles on top of just being generally ineffective.
That'll do for now
