Never-say-die Cheetahs break NZ duck
The Cheetahs upset the Wellington Hurricanes 47-38 in a helter-skelter 10-try Super Rugby thriller on Saturday to record their first-ever win in New Zealand.
The victory also meant the Cheetahs had just completed their most successful tour of Australasia.
It started with a heartbreaking one-point (23-24) loss to the Brumbies, then a come-from-behind (33-26) win over the Rebels, followed by another close (21-28) loss to the Crusaders – before Saturday’s bonus-point victory in Wellington.
It meant they had collected 11 points on tour, easily beating the six they had secured last year.
Both sides, the Cheetahs and Hurricanes, had a four-try bonus point by half-time – the Hurricanes getting theirs inside 30 minutes, but as the game progressed the Cheetahs’ forward power made the difference when they cut their turnover rate.
They scored three tries in the closing 10 minutes of the first half to level the scores at 32-all at half-time – after trailing 11-32, and when they took the lead for the first time soon after the break they never looked back.
“It’s a credit to the guys they’ve got a never-say-die attitude,” Cheetahs captain Adriaan Strauss said.
“It’s something we work on very hard. I’m proud of the big guys,” the Springbok hooker added.
Hurricanes captain Conrad Smith said he never felt comfortable even when his side built up a 21-point lead.
“We were up on points but we hadn’t done a lot with the ball, they were all counter-attack tries,” Smith said.
“They were making all the play so I think that told. To their credit, they stuck at it and we weren’t getting the turnovers we got early in the game.”
Hurricanes coach Mark Hammett lamented the ease with which Beauden Barrett, Andre Taylor and TJ Perenara scored three sparkling counterattack tries.
“We were up 32-11, but I’m not sure how hard we had to work to score those points,” Hammett said, adding: “Sometimes in a young group that mindset gets a wee bit relaxed.”
The Hurricanes’ defence was simply too high in the close quarters.
“You go high against big African boys and the metre becomes easy and the next one easier, so we struggled with that.”
