Why Tony Brown will not be fretting following one other Highlanders loss

One other week, one other defeat for the Highlanders.

The Highlanders have now performed all 4 of their rival New Zealand franchises and regardless of holding affordable leads in two of these 4 matches, they’ve been unable to safe a single win and solely managed a solitary bonus level to point out for his or her troubles.

As such, they sit tenth on the general ladder, forward of solely the hapless Melbourne Rebels and new boys Moana Pasifika – who’ve managed to play only one match this season as a result of Covid.

Is that this the most effective uncapped participant in New Zealand?

Is that this the most effective uncapped participant in New Zealand?

Regardless of all that, nevertheless, they’re not regarded fully off the tempo in any of their matches thus far all through 2022.

Their greatest loss got here by the hands of the Crusaders, 34-19, however even in that match, the Highlanders had at one level held a 13-0 lead. It’s not that they’re being persistently outplayed throughout the park, they’re merely making essential errors at key moments in matches – whereas accidents haven’t helped their scenario.

Head coach Tony Brown instructed following the Spherical 3 loss to the Hurricanes that his facet could possibly be going through a “fairly robust season” in the event that they couldn’t discover their “mojo” within the coming weeks and whereas the southerners once more struggled to place collectively a cohesive attacking efficiency towards the Blues, it received’t all be doom and gloom within the Highlanders camp, who’ve a run of residence matches developing of their schedule.

“It’s a younger Highlanders group,” Brown mentioned following the sport at North Harbour Stadium. “We’ve misplaced lots of management so we’ve simply gotta make it possible for when’s the sport on the road, once we’re having to cope with strain conditions, we keep calm and we execute. If everybody executes their function then we’re high-quality.

“For me, 0 and 4 towards all of the New Zealand groups – particularly three of them away from residence – it’s not the tip of our marketing campaign. It’s a bloody robust competitors. We go residence now and we play three of our subsequent 4 video games at residence. Once we end these, we’ll know the place we’re at.”

Whereas Brown is technically right in that three of the Highlanders’ matches thus far have been ‘away’ video games, solely two have been performed outdoors of Highlanders territory as a result of Queenstown bubble in place firstly of the season.

Regardless, Brown shall be hoping his facet execute higher at set-piece time, particularly with a tight-five unit that’s on par with the most effective sides within the competitors, a minimum of on paper.

“We’ve simply gotta compete for longer,” he mentioned. “Clearly, we obtained put underneath strain there at lineout time, didn’t fairly execute round our roles there. The scrum contest was fairly even however once we’re getting put underneath strain there, we will’t give away penalties.

“I feel we’ve simply obtained to get higher proper throughout the park, keep within the recreation longer, [at] key moments, execute our roles.”

There’s additionally a big ray of hope the Highlanders can clench onto which ought to show affluent sooner or later: trans-Tasman fixtures.

If final yr’s Tremendous Rugby Trans-Tasman marketing campaign is something to go by, the Highlanders ought to a minimum of be capable of safe a handful of competitors factors later within the season once they sq. off with the Australian sides, who they went unbeaten towards in 2021. With eight groups qualifying for the play-offs, the Highlanders shouldn’t wrestle to make the knockout phases of the competitors, even when does take them some time to search out their kind.

So whereas Tony Brown shall be trying to find methods to unlock his facet’s potential, the 4 losses to kick off the Highlanders’ marketing campaign shouldn’t be retaining him awake at night time. As Brown mentioned, the Highlanders’ season remains to be very a lot alive and the way they’re performing within the ultimate rounds of the competitors will show significantly extra necessary in measuring the success of 2022 than how they’re acting at this stage of the match.