Northern Edition

Select Edition

Northern Northern
Southern Southern
Global Global
New Zealand New Zealand
France France

'When we're at our best we're going to be very hard to stop'

Quade Cooper proved to be a hit in his Melbourne Rebels debut. (Photo by Tracey Nearmy/Getty Images)

Melbourne playmaker Quade Cooper says the Rebels don’t need to change anything to make the Super Rugby finals and just need to believe in themselves.

ADVERTISEMENT

The Rebels host the Chiefs at AAMI Park on Friday night wanting the win to secure their first-ever play-off berth.

Currently eighth, a loss with a bonus point in the final round clash could also see them possibly sneak in.

Cooper, who won the Super Rugby title with Queensland in 2011, said the Rebels didn’t need to add anything to their game for the crunch encounter.

He said they just needed to bring their best rugby.

“For all the players to be able to be in the position that we’re in now, we’ve played some great football,” Cooper said.

“There’s been some times where we haven’t played the best football but we’ve put ourselves in a position to hold our destiny in our own hands.

“That’s what I’ve been saying to the boys – just continue to believe in yourself, believe in the team and what we’re doing and we’ll come out and get the right result.”

ADVERTISEMENT

One area he conceded required attention was their defence after a rampant Crusaders outfit posted 66 points in a humiliating defeat last round.

The Chiefs have plenty of potency in that department, upsetting the Crusaders in their recent clash in Fiji.

“Every team has to tighten up their defence going into playoffs and the Chiefs are a great attacking team but so are we,” Cooper said.

“I think for me it’s not so much focusing on slowing them down, it’s just us being our best and when we’re at our best we’re going to be very hard to stop.”

ADVERTISEMENT

Cooper only played the final 10 minutes of the Crusaders loss while his halves partner, Test halfback Will Genia, sat out under the Wallabies rest policy.

Both players could be playing their last games in the Rebels strip, although they indicated they would like to re-sign if a deal could be done.

Cooper said he didn’t want to think about contract negotiations.

“I’ve loved my time here in Melbourne but I just want to focus on beating the Chiefs.”

The Waikato side have made three changes with hooker Nathan Harris returning from All Blacks leave, co-captain Brodie Retallick back at lock and Angus Ta’avao the new tighthead prop.

They can also potentially make the top eight finals with a win.

– AAP

ADVERTISEMENT

LIVE

{{item.title}}

Trending on RugbyPass

Comments

0 Comments
Be the first to comment...

Join free and tell us what you really think!

Sign up for free
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest Features

Comments on RugbyPass

F
Flankly 1 hour 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?

4 Go to comments
N
Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

Very poor understanding of what's going on and 0 ability to read. When I say playing behind the gain line you take this to mean all off-loads and site times we are playing in front of the gain line???


Every time we play a lot of rugby behind the gain line (for clarity, meaning trying to build an attack and use width without front foot ball 5m+ behind the most recent breakdown) we go backwards and turn the ball over in some way. Every time a player is tackled behind the most recent breakdown you need more and more people to clear out because your forwards have to go back around the corner, whereas opposition players can keep moving forward. Eventually you run out of either players to clear out or players to pass to and the result in a big net loss of territory and often a turnover. You may have witnessed that 20+ times in the game against England. This is a particularly dumb idea inside your own 40m which is where, for some reason, we are most likely to employ it.


The very best ABs teams never built an identity around attacking from poor positions. The DC era team was known for being the team that kicked the most. To engineer field position and apply pressure, and create broken play to counter attack. This current team is not differentiating between when a defence has lost it's structure and there are opportunities, and when they are completely set and there is nothing on. The reason they are going for 30 minute + periods in every game without scoring a single point, even against Japan and a poor Australian team, is because they are playing most of their rugby on the back foot in the wrong half.

43 Go to comments
LONG READ
LONG READ Are the All Blacks doomed to a 70% flatline? Are the All Blacks doomed to a 70% flatline?
Search