Banking on the banker

Up until 2007 it was easy to just bank on the banker when it came to making predictions as to who would come out on top in a Super Rugby season.

With the exception of a couple of years of Blues dominance and a small flurry from the Brumbies, the Sanzar regional trophy had spent most seasons after the tournament’s inception in 1996 living under lock and key at Jade Stadium in Christchurch, the home of the Crusaders. During the Robbie Deans years, in particular, it was considered foolhardy to bet against the team from the south island.

Those times have changed somewhat, however, and since the Bulls broke the South African duck in the competition in 2007, the Crusaders have had their name inscribed on the trophy only once. That was in 2008, also Deans’s last season in charge before taking up the reins of the Wallabies. Since then the Bulls have won it twice more and the Reds did the trick last year.

The Crusaders have remained competitive, and in terms of where they have finished each year on average, you could say they are still the most consistent team in the competition after being part of the play-offs every one of those four seasons (five in a row if you count 2007). That’s a phenomenal record, but then you do a bit of scrutinising and you discover that it means they have lost three semifinals and one final.

Okay, not quite enough to earn them the label of chokers, and you do have to factor in the not insignificant fact that three of the semifinals they have lost since 2007 were games played on the Highveld. Going to Pretoria (or Orlando Stadium) a week after playing in New Zealand is a much bigger ask than what they were asked to do last year, when they played their play-off game at sea level in Cape Town.

But regardless of how they were knocked out, they were knocked out. So while they remain the banker, and they are my pick to go all the way this year, making that prediction does require more bravery than it has in the past. If you pick them ever year and did so during the past five years, then you would boast just a 20% success rate.

There may be good reason too to cast doubts over the Crusaders’ right to be considered pre-tournament favourites this time, not the least of them being the loss of Sonny Bill Williams to the Chiefs and also the departure of former All Black second-row stalwart Chris Jack.

There is also the small fact of the anticipated absence of star players Richie McCaw and Dan Carter for significant parts of the initial stages as they come back from the injuries that troubled them in the World Cup. And if the Crusaders were to cast their eyes over the Cook Strait and the dairy cattle farming country that separates them from Auckland, they would have noticed that their north island rivals have strengthened considerably since 2011.

Indeed, the Blues were strong challengers for most of the way last year, and were left in the end to lament a late-season slip which included a give-away to the Stormers in a game that they appeared to have had wrapped up at halftime.

But while the Blues pushed the Crusaders for New Zealand conference honours in 2011, it was the Crusaders who won it, and what sways me in their favour this year are the obstacles they had to endure to get to last season’s final against the Reds.

The devastating earthquake in Christchurch robbed them of a home ground, and they had to spend much of their campaign virtually living out of aeroplanes. Along the way they were decimated by injury, and took on one of the tournament’s top dogs, the Stormers, with what was essentially a second-string team. Yet even though the game was in Cape Town, the Crusaders won.

That mettle, that mental toughness, is what makes champion teams, and even without the leadership and experience of McCaw and Carter initially, and the wizardry of Williams, they look a better bet to me than any other team.

They may start slowly, and it wouldn’t surprise me were the Blues to beat them in the tournament opener on Friday, but with a home ground to play from this year, and one year further into their rebuilding program, they have the material to go one better than 12 months ago, when they were undone by having to fly from Cape Town to Brisbane for the final.

Oh, and I hadn't gotten round yet to mentioning their 'beardy weirdy' pack. It was all those hirsute fellows in their front row that prompted me to back them during the play-off stages last year, particularly against the Stormers in the semifinal. They destroyed all comers in 2011 and I see no reason why that mob should not do it again, perhaps with even more devastating effect, in 2012.

My conference winners:
SA: Sharks
NZ: Crusaders
Australia: Reds

My top six in finishing order:
Crusaders
Blues
Reds
Sharks
Waratahs
Stormers