Dave Rennie's Wallabies have beaten the All Blacks in an ill-tempered affair in Brisbane that saw Ofa Tuungafasi red-carded. Photos / Getty Images
Dave Rennie's Wallabies have beaten the All Blacks in an ill-tempered affair in Brisbane that saw Ofa Tuungafasi red-carded. Photos / Getty Images
ANALYSIS
A different plot, but the All Blacks suffered the same ending they did at Suncorp the last time they played there - and can blame the same reasons for it happening.
The All Blacks just weren't sharp enough or disciplined enough – which was the same problem in 2017.
They were provoked by the Wallabies and that seemed to spark a bit of red mist – not a fists and fury response from the All Blacks, just dumb moments that cost them.
The debate about how much the officials got right can wait for another day as the All Blacks have to accept that if they don't play or act like All Blacks on the field, they will lose plenty more tests.
And this was not an All Blacks-like performance. It was frenetic. Hurried and panicked. It was loose and disjointed.
When they needed calm heads and big plays they didn't have them and Australia had too much energy and urgency and in the end, that little bit more poise.
It will be an ultimately invaluable lesson for a young All Blacks side to get a sharp reminder that at this level, it's possible to be heroes one week and then not the next. Test rugby is an all the time thing, not some of the time.
Rieko Ioane scored the All Blacks' first try in Brisbane. Photo / Getty Images
The All Blacks never got anywhere near the required intensity or accuracy and their performance in Sydney looked a million miles away. Something from a forgotten era.
But that's how it is at this level. Things can change dramatically in seven days and the All Blacks played as if they honestly thought Australia wouldn't have much in them and would crumble fairly quickly.
And they have to look at themselves and not the officiating as to why they lost.
As much as everyone loves a bit of a whine about officials these days, test football works much better when they get through 80 minutes and their presence is barely registered.
That didn't happen in Brisbane - didn't even get close because the officials could hardly stand back and pretend there wasn't carnage all around them.
Referee Nic Berry had to inject himself – he was brought into a contest that had an undercurrent of spite to it from the first exchanges.
Both sides will proclaim their innocence and maybe the blame should sit more with the Wallabies who upped the ante on the off the ball niggle – a trait that was prevalent from the first test and now seems to be an accepted part of how they are going to play.
All that post-tackle lingering and tangling built the tension which exploded when Ofa Tuungafasi clunked the flying wing Tom Wright after 23 minutes.
Berry was adamant there were no mitigating circumstances to justify downgrading Tuungafasi's tackle to a yellow card. There was no dispute with his assessment that the initial point of contact was to the chin, but the argument is strong that Wright was falling after he was clipped by Ardie Savea, that his knees were bent when he was hit and his head was at least six inches lower than Tuungafasi was anticipating.
All Blacks prop Ofa Tuungafasi is red-carded following a hit on Tom Wright. Photos / SKY Sport
It will have to be looked at by a judicial panel who may end up disagreeing that it met the threshold.
But while not everyone is going to agree with the decisions made by Berry, in his defence, he was entirely consistent and that above all else, is what players, coaches and fans all say is what matters most.
He applied exactly the same ruling 10 minutes later when Lachlan Swinton hit Sam Whitelock on the chin with a no-arms tackle.
It's a moot point that rugby has opted to take a zero tolerance approach to head collisions – to ignore physics and rule with no empathy for the size and speed of the athletes and madly determine that 130kg players should be able to alter their direction of their mass at high velocity.
Moot because no one in authority wants to have the discussion and so Tuungafasi and Swinton – neither of whom struck with any malice – both suffered the indignity of a red card when surely yellow would have sufficed.
There's no point in World Rugby citing improved safety as justification when they continue to do nothing to cut down on neck rolls and even more crazily, they don't make it a mandatory requirement for players to wear mouthguards in test football.
