Rugby: A quest for triumph in adversity

Crusaders players celebrate a try. Photo / Getty Images

For years, the spirit of the Crusaders has been unbreakable - an unidentifiable force that others envied without knowing how to build it.

The strength of that character will now be tested in the most extreme way; the intangible will become the tangible, the entire season now dependent on the Crusaders' ability to deliver an overt and relentless display of defiance.

Adversity can both break and galvanise and the path the Crusaders tread will depend entirely on their ability to find their role in leading their city, their region, to a brighter future.

Defeating the Waratahs on Friday night indicates the Crusaders have the right tools to absorb enormous hardship, pain and stress and convert it into performance; to channel deep emotions into effective energy.

But in many ways, Friday night, while not routine, could be the easiest of the challenges the Crusaders face. The emotion was at its most raw - and intensified by commemorating a double tragedy. Some players cried during the minute's silence, the quiet so eerie and moving, and as long as they could avoid being overwhelmed, they had the fuel all there to blow the Waratahs apart.

Life won't be any easier for the Crusaders this week, or next - or for the rest of the season. The equation before Super Rugby kicked off was hard enough. It is now vastly different - infinitely harder and more complex.

Sports teams become the focal point of broken communities - they are the vehicle on which emotions can be set, dreams launched.

The Crusaders will also become a genuine source of escapism. To be surrounded by death and destruction is exhausting. To feel nothing but despair is overwhelming.

The people of Christchurch will need to cling on to something more uplifting; they will want to believe in the impossible - that their lives can be rebuilt. The Crusaders will carry the city and, placed under such an unbearable weight, they could easily collapse.

What they have suffered is more than emotional. They have lost their stadium - their spiritual home. They have lost their training ground and they have lost much of their city.

Humans are creatures of habit - none more so than professional rugby players whose lives are held together by routine. Home advantage is only that because of the familiarity and certainty it provides.

The psyche of an elite athlete is notoriously fragile. Change, in any form, has the power to unsettle, throw the greatest talent off their game. The unfamiliar is possibly now the greatest opponent facing the Crusaders.

They won't be playing home games in Nelson after this Friday. Alpine Energy Stadium in Timaru, Eden Park and Westpac Stadium in Wellington are the three most likely venues. There is no reason why they can't adapt and embrace the novelty - the irony even of calling Auckland home.

But what the Crusaders have been denied is the mental comfort of familiar routines. Each week will be a battle - a case of having to learn on the hoof, of adjusting. Ultimately the Crusaders could feel as much the away team as their opponents, despite the inevitable sea of red and black that will flood usually empty seats.

"Every home game is going to be an away game for us," says coach Todd Blackadder. "But we have talked about that and, while we are in an abnormal situation, this is going to be the new normal for us.

"Our mentality is that this can only make us stronger. We have got our heads around it and all it is, really, is a small change in philosophy."

If such a tragedy had struck at the heart of any other franchise, confidence would be low that they could keep their feet. The Crusaders, though, are seemingly made of an altogether more resilient moral fibre. Richie McCaw, Kieran Read, Brad Thorn and Dan Carter are four big characters, four pillars on which so much can be built.

Also, the Crusaders, more than any other New Zealand team, are rooted in their community.

"The people own us," Blackadder says. "The guys want to give back. We don't need to drum up a media circus - the guys just get out there and do things."

Following the 33-18 victory, Read talked of there being an emotional release; of there being a sense of relief that the victory for the people was delivered and that some of the weight of the last 10 days was lifted.

He, like Blackadder, also talked of the need to back it up this week and to return to Nelson on Friday to deliver the same result against the Brumbies.

The stadium might not be full this week. The occasion won't have the same hype, or build-up, and the Brumbies are in a bit of a fix themselves and could easily be underestimated.

The fact the Crusaders have already identified the potential pitfalls, have already planned and mentally prepared for the clash, engenders belief they are going to revel in adversity.

The backbone of this team is unlikely to be snapped by a process of readjustment. There is too much experience, too many level heads and unflappable personalities to be derailed.

And, above all else, there is just too much rugby ability. The potential of the Sonny Bill Williams-Robbie Fruean partnership is frightening.

Read looks every inch the next All Black captain; Carter is walking on water and Matt Todd and George Whitelock both played as if they realised a World Cup place was on the line.

Hard yards lie ahead. Every aspect of their home lives and preparation will be tough, yet, somehow, it already feels like the Crusaders wouldn't want it any other way.