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Slow starts for the Chiefs or just fast finishes?

Brad Weber. (Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)

Christopher Reive/NZ Herald

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Another week, another win sparked by a second-half comeback for the Chiefs.

It’s becoming something of a habit for the club, whose 51-14 win over the Waratahs in Wollongong on Friday night was the third time they’ve won a game in which they trailed in at halftime.

Even in their decimation of the Sunwolves in round three, the Chiefs found themselves behind on the scoreboard early. Now with a 4-1 record through six rounds, which included a bye, their sole loss to the Brumbies — a 26-14 loss in Hamilton — might have shown the blueprint for how to beat them: score early and often, and hope your defence holds up late.

So far this season, the Chiefs have scored 121 of their 170 points in the second halves of games. In their loss against the Brumbies they were down 19-0 at halftime.

“It doesn’t matter who you play and at what level, usually in the first 20 or 30 minutes they’re going to be pretty tight contests and you just have to stay focused for that whole period,” Chiefs coach Warren Gatland said.

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“At this level you know you’re going to be in an arm wrestle probably in the first half. It’s just about addressing a few things at halftime, getting it right, taking a bit of a break and building on that confidence.

“We’ve been very strong in the second half so we feel like we’re in a pretty good shape from a conditioning point of view.”

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Against the Waratahs, the Chiefs came out of the gates firing and ran out to a 13-0 lead. However, a couple of soft penalties opened the door for the hosts to hit back, and come halftime the Chiefs trailed 14-13.

The second half as a different story, as the Chiefs ran in 38 unanswered points to come away with a dominant win. Despite having to make more tackles and having just 40 per cent of the possession, the Chiefs outscored the Waratahs seven tries to two to claim their first win away to the New South Wales club since 2007.

“Even for the first half I wasn’t that unhappy with it,” Gatland said of the match. “I thought we started well and that was a whole focus.”

The Chiefs will now head back to Hamilton and turn their attention to their third local derby of the season against the Hurricanes on Friday.

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This article first appeared on nzherald.co.nz and is republished with permission.

WATCH: Cheslin Kolbe attended training with the Stormers during the side’s bye-week.

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Flankly 2 hours ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

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