Off the back of a dominant forwards performance and Carter Gordon pulling the strings, the Rebels have kept their slim finals hopes alive by smashing the Western Force 52-14 in Melbourne.
Needing to win to keep their season alive, the Rebels did it in style by registering their highest score at home.
While Sam Spink’s second try after 60th minute sent flutters up in the coach’s box after months of second-half fadeouts as the Force cut the margin to 31-14, three tries in the final 14 minutes saw the Rebels run away with it.
Sam Talakai was one of the Rebels’ best during their record home win over the Force. (Photo by Robert Cianflone/Getty Images)
Their second-half surge came off the back of a dominant scrum.
Having kept the Force’s rolling maul at bay, the Rebels had their opposition’s scrum on roller skates without their Test front-row duo Tom Robertson and Santiago Medrano as halfback Ryan Louwrens kept the ball at the back of the scrum and let his big men drive forward to the 22 metre line.
Then Louwrens set off, reaching the halfway line before the Force scrambled. But on the back foot, Gordon went to the left and found more metres and then went back to the right and unleashed Lachie Anderson to send his much-improved winger into score.
“The reason why this try is scored, once the forwards had that scrum, was the depth of Carter Gordon off a couple of plays,” two-time World Cup winner Tim Horan said in commentary for Stan Sport.
For Brad Wilkin, who had watched his side struggle in the second half all year, the openside flanker was ecstatic about his side’s 80-minute effort.
“It was the performance we’ve been looking for all year,” Wilkin said.
“Just being able to put away a team once we’ve started well and got on top. Yeah, very happy.”
The victory saw the Rebels move to within striking distance of the top eight, as they moved into 10th spot on 21 points – one point behind the ninth-placed Force, two points behind the Highlanders and three behind the Reds.
But they will still need to head to Canberra next week and take down the Brumbies to have any chance of qualifying for the finals.
The 38-point defeat was a disaster for the Force.
After keeping their unbeaten streak alive at home by knocking over the Brumbies last weekend, the Force came to Melbourne intent on coming away with four points. They left with none.
It leaves them needing to topple the ladder-leading Chiefs next weekend to have any hope of making the finals.
“There’s no use getting bitter about it. We need to get better because we’ve got a big challenge next week trying to salvage our finals hopes against the current ladder-leaders. There’s no use dwelling on it, we got outclassed,” said Force skipper Michael Wells, who played his 100th Super Rugby match.
“Obviously our home form’s been good and a lot of that gets attributed to our fans, they’ve been great for us there and we’ve been doing a job. We’re going to need to get exponentially better to reach that challenge next week.”
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