KEY POINTS:
Blues 38 Reds 13
Thank goodness no one really pays much heed to Reds coach Eddie Jones. Had the Blues bought into his nonsense, they might have shied away from indulging in a bit of Polynesian basketball last night.
If they had, what rotten fare we would
have been left with. The Reds don't have an ambitious bone in their collective bodies. They are a conservative version of England and if it wasn't for the ridiculously named Herman Hunt, they would have provided precisely zero entertainment.
Not so the Blues. They still don't quite carry the convincing aura of the years they won the title. But they are probably the only team in this competition that has consistently created opportunities and taken them.
The individual skill is starting to impose itself on proceedings. Luke McAlister looked for all the world like a young Carlos Spencer when he spurted across the Reds defence and tossed the ball blindly over his shoulder to Isaia Toeava.
It was that touch of magic that paved the way for Rudi Wulf to crash in at the corner two phases later and finally, after 30 colossally dull minutes, provide something to stay awake for.
Toeava, a few careless touches aside, was another to make a statement, making one arcing run early in the second half that left him agonisingly short of the chalk.
Ben Atiga provided certainty from fullback and with Isa Nacewa growing into the position week by week, the Blues had a potency and imagination the Reds are unlikely to match any time this millennium.
The Blues had the win secured after 55 minutes when Nacewa finished off for Toeava and McAlister banged over two long-range penalties.
There was never a sense, though, that they were going to be happy with just a win. Bonus points are starting to look like gold dust in this competition and with the Blues staring at a run of home games, they clearly want to rack up the championship points.
And there was also the not-to-be-underestimated satisfaction of stuffing a Reds side that deserved to be stuffed. It is almost bad manners to come to Eden Park, such a spiritual ground and a scene of so many fine rugby moments, and spend 80 minutes flopping on the pill like beached whales.
The Reds were almost exclusively responsible for the first half hour being seriously painful.
There wasn't a single memorable incident. Herman Hunt was sitting on the bench so we couldn't snigger at his name and there weren't even any individual errors of a slapstick nature to provide some reason to cheer up.
It was just dull football - big men wrestling and scrapping for the ball in mass huddles. Well, they didn't really scrap. It was more a case of orchestrated falling over with everyone landing in the same vicinity.
That was kind of what the Reds wanted. They kept it tight, recycled it to halfback Nic Berry who would take one look at the feckless saps lining up outside him and chuck it straight back to the nearest big bloke he could find. And off we would go again. Yawn.
To spice it up, just occasionally Berry would feed Berrick Barnes who, unlike Berry, didn't even bother to look at the feckless saps outside him and promptly booted the ball. Anywhere would do. He didn't seem to have any preferred destination.
To no one's great surprise, the Reds' try had nothing to do with their own creativity and everything to do with good fortune.
Troy Flavell, who otherwise had another storming game, flapped at a loose pass in his own half and it popped into the grateful arms of Charlie Fetoai. It was annoying rather than catastrophic, as was the Blues' shaky work at the set-piece, particularly in the scrum where the Reds used their greater weight well. The lineout, too, was less effective than last week, with Derren Witcombe struggling to lob the ball down the middle.
These can be easily fixed, though, unlike the problems the Reds have - those look terminal.
Blues 38 (R. Wulf 2, I. Nacewa, J. Kaino; Nacewa pen, 2 cons; L. McAlister 3 pens, con) Reds 13 (C. Fetoai tries; C. Schifcofske con, 2 pens) HT 13-6.
