{"id":139676,"date":"2025-09-13T07:46:10","date_gmt":"2025-09-13T07:46:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/139676\/"},"modified":"2025-09-13T07:46:10","modified_gmt":"2025-09-13T07:46:10","slug":"rugby-as-god-intended-but-wallabies-cant-conjure-a-miracle-this-time","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/139676\/","title":{"rendered":"Rugby as God intended \u2026 but Wallabies can\u2019t conjure a miracle this time"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Right on cue, the Argentines are shown a yellow card of their own and within seconds, Suaalii\u2019s surgeon\u2019s knife probed through weakness again, slicing through and put fullback Andrew Kellaway over under the sticks. We\u2019ve closed to 28-14!<\/p>\n<p>Two minutes later, Suaalii does it AGAIN, breaking through on the left to release winger Filipo Daugunu, who goes over the in the corner. Unconverted, the score stood at 28-19, and we all took it back. Maybe there is a God, after all!<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\" Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii was a constant threat.\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/5c4eca0ce81dd0acd3696aacde9c3dd9c903370a.jpeg\" height=\"390\" width=\"584\" \/><\/p>\n<p> Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii was a constant threat.Credit: Getty Images<\/p>\n<p>At this point, it seemed obvious to this little black duck, at least, that the go was to take a leaf out of the book of the little Kiwi boy who once sent a fax to the All Blacks on the eve of the World Cup Final of 1995, saying: \u201cRemember, rugby is a team game, so all 14 of yers pass the ball to Jonah!\u201d In this case, with the Pumas still missing a man in the backs and Suaalii on fire, the go was to get the ball to \u201cHis-name-is-Su.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Instead, unaccountably, halfback Tate McDermott \u2013 who is normally fantastic in the second half darting from the base \u2013 tried a couple of box-kicks, neither of which worked. Get thee behind me, Devil!<\/p>\n<p>Loading<\/p>\n<p>Still, again the Lord smiled, and with just two minutes left on the clock, Daugunu goes over once more in the corner after a little more slicing and dicing from Suaalii on the left. Converted, it gave the Wallabies \u2013 now down by just two points, 28-26 \u2013 just 30 seconds to work their magic.<\/p>\n<p>All we needed to do was get the ball from the kick-off, avoid errors, work our way downfield and either win a kickable penalty or go over for another last-gasp winner.<\/p>\n<p>And they tried, they really, really tried. For well over a minute, they kept the ball in hand, despite fierce hammerings from the visitors, until, right on full-time, in extremis, something had to give. Alas, instead of the Argentine defence, it was the Wallabies\u2019 sang-froid, and the ball was spilled.<\/p>\n<p>Game over. Victory to the Pumas, 28-26.<\/p>\n<p>Oh, what might have been!<\/p>\n<p>Despite the disappointment, it confirmed the news of this wonderful international season: the Wallabies are indeed a very good side, and scored four tries to one, exhibiting some wonderful play throughout. But Argentina, too, have genuinely arrived on the international rugby stage and are not only fabulous competitors, but play the game in the spirit was intended. Bravo the lot of them.<\/p>\n<p>For the Wallabies, onwards to the All Blacks in a fortnight!<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.stan.com.au\/watch\/sport\/rugby\/the-rugby-championship\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Watch all the action from the 2025 Rugby Championship on Stan Sport<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Right on cue, the Argentines are shown a yellow card of their own and within seconds, Suaalii\u2019s surgeon\u2019s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":139677,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-139676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=139676"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/139676\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/139677"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=139676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=139676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=139676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}