It’s hard not to feel just a little bit sad for Phil Waugh and his Waratahs. I know I’ve been critical in previous posts but it still hurts to see the the team miss out on the semi finals of this year’s Super 14 tournament.

I don’t go in for gloating but we also shouldn’t sit around feeling too sorry for the ‘Tahs though. We need to start asking the more important question - why have the team failed to make the final stages of the tournament?

Bonus Points made the difference

Even though the Waratahs won nine games to The Crusaders’ eight, it’s the Kiwi team who are going through to the finals. The Waratahs’ inability to secure crucial bonus points has come back to bite them very hard on the backside.

Over the last couple of Blogs on this website, I have questioned their game plan, as well as their skills under pressure.

Hard to sleep at night?

On these two areas I have been proven right. If NSW had scored just one more try they would have reached the semis. By the way their backline was improving in South Africa, who knows, they could have gone on to win the tournament.

Granted that’s a big statement considering how much negative press that has been directed their way this year, but there’s no doubt that Waugh and the coaching staff will be tossing and turning in their sleep, dreaming about the tries they bombed this year that could have been converted.

Waugh hits back at critics with a captain’s pride

Phil hit back at these critics stating that the team trained hard and played with enthusiasm and never gave up, and to be fair, these comments cannot be denied. So a significant proportion of the blame has to rest then with the coaching staff.

The NSW Board must surely sit down with Chris Hickey and re evaluate the statement he has constantly said this season, “that he is happy with winning ugly.”

By winning ugly, he is losing die hard supporters with numbers declining at home games, as well as possibly denying many players Wallaby selection. If they had made the play offs with his negative approach throughout most of this year, the best it would have been is a sad indictment of modern rugby.

Surely now it’s time for a change

NSW should employ a proven backs coach who knows something about attack and not some make-shift skills coach, because it was clearly the backs who constantly let the team down.

Nobody could blame the forwards who after the loss of a couple of high profile forwards at end of last year, really stood up to be counted. It was their bumbling backs who couldn’t make a first phase break if they were playing against a team of statues.

Final fumble

So while we console the Waratahs on how close they came and celebrate their great achievement on winning their three games in South Africa, it could only be said that they had their own destiny in their hands, and they dropped the ball.