One of the most welcome byproducts of the speed-the-game-up rules being consistently applied by most Super Rugby referees nowadays is: fatigue.
The hurry-up around scrums, lineouts, breakdowns and general play has had an effect discernible even after the first seven or eight games. Gone are the endlessscrum resets, slow walks and committee meetings before lineouts and the breakdown is being refereed to promote more ball in use.
Last year, after the first round, the opening six games (including the Melbourne Rebels, missing from this year’s competition) produced a total of 315 points at an average of 52.5 points per match. In 2025, the opening six games (including Friday’s Chiefs-Crusaders clash which opened round two) saw 400 points scored, a 27% increase, at an average of 66.6 points per game.
That will induce some sneers and lip-curling from the northern hemisphere – and there is some evidence to suggest their forward play at international level has benefited from the comparative closeness and slug-it-out nature of their competitions, back play less so (France aside perhaps).
However, Super Rugby’s goal this year is to reignite its entertainment value by speeding the game up, keeping the ball in play more – and it has revived the old element of fatigue. That’s important because fatigue levels the playing the field and means the use of bench players is becoming even more important than before.
Quinn Tupaea scored two tries in two minutes late in the Chiefs' win over the Crusaders on Friday night. Photo / Photosport
Fatigue has been evident in all matches but was perhaps most obvious in Moana Pasifika’s sad one-point loss to the Western Force in the first round, when a team down to a walk (metaphorically speaking) cracked. The Force won at the death by reeling off 26 phases of possession, capped by a 70-metre burst by first five Ben Donaldson, who couldn’t be caught by exhausted defenders.
They were again caught out against the Reds, losing 56-36 on Friday night. The Queenslanders ran out to a 21-0 lead in the first 15 minutes. Moana Pasifika, led by the first of two tries to eye-catching winger Kyren Taumoefolau, pulled back to 28-22 before the Reds scored four tries through threadbare defences as Moana Pasifika’s oxygen debt grew.
This is not to pick on Moana Pasifika’s fitness levels – they had 80-minute players like Miracle Fai’ilagi and Jonathan Taumateine still running strongly at the end – but rather to echo Dan Carter’s statement after round one that he would hate to be a defence coach these days.
It’s too early to be too definite about the game’s new structure in these parts but some conclusions can already be drawn:
The Chiefs are setting the pace because their defence has been the most effective and committed thus far – that 25-14 first-round win over the Blues was important as it demonstrates the new rules can still produce an old-fashioned arm-wrestle.
They are also top dogs right now because of their clever use of their bench. In both games so far, rotation has been cleverly employed, as has the use of the bench. Against the Blues, they had five All Blacks in reserve, who came on to telling effect; three against the Crusaders.
The Reds opted for a similar plan – they had two Wallabies on the bench and a third who seems destined to be in the national side (2m lock Angus Blyth). They came on to help produce that four-try burst that sank Moana Pasifika in the second half.
Fatigue promotes the value of smaller players who, through speed and agility, can exploit gaps in tiring defences – examples include Sevu Reece, Damian McKenzie, Leroy Carter and halfbacks Cortez Ratima and Tate McDermott. The latter were used differently – Ratima came off the bench, McDermott played almost a full game, but both prospered through tiring defences and the greater protection afforded halfbacks at the breakdowns.
The bench becomes even more important now, not just in terms of depth and “loading” but timing its use correctly. The Chiefs have pulled that off twice in a row, while the Crusaders took off the highly effective Cullen Grace early in the second half. It may have been injury-related, though it didn’t seem so at the time.
Players with perpetual motion engines, capable of lasting all through this exhausting new form of the game, are become even more valuable now. However, the extra toll on the lungs doesn’t make them invulnerable. Ethan Blackadder, for example, has a high work rate and remarkable endurance and scored a smart try against the Chiefs – but he was partly at fault for Xavier Roe’s try early on against the Chiefs. By the end of the game, it was possible to reflect he had been outplayed by Chiefs loosies Simon Parker, Samipeni Finau and Jahrome Brown, as well as Grace – the difference between effort and effectiveness.
In these early Super Rugby clashes, many will find reminders of the similarly high-scoring, multi-try matches that marked the first years of Super Rugby in 1996 and 1997 before defences tightened matters up.
Defence coaches will close many of the doors, there seems little doubt of that, but the reintroduction of fatigue may be a problem they can’t entirely solve.
