KEY POINTS:
These are tough times at the Chiefs. They have some big problems and I am not sure they can see how to fix them. They seem to have no game plan, no pattern and are tentative.
Okay, they have lost a few key players overseas and to injury but this just doesn't seem like a Chiefs outfit. You can see it in a player like Liam Messam - highly skilled normally, he couldn't have caught a flea on Friday night. They seem like a team who know something is wrong but don't know what to do.
You could see it in their running in the backs - there was a lot of jinking and jiving behind the advantage line and not much else. And you could see it in the form of Mils Muliaina - obviously a class player but, if you were picking the All Blacks right now, you wouldn't have him at fullback or centre.
Whose fault is it? I'd say 99 per cent would have to be levelled at coach Ian Foster and his staff, including Craig Stevenson and Keith Robinson. You have to blame the players, too. But this mob look like a team responding to a management who have run out of answers.
I was in the Waikato for the game and it was interesting talking to some of the locals. I suggested the Chiefs need help. But I was told Fossie won't let anyone else in - that he has surrounded himself with 'his people'. Everyone else can see inadequacies but nothing is being achieved in fixing them.
You can see the problems best in the forwards. They were done over at scrum time and in the loose; at the breakdowns. Both are prime Chiefs strengths, or they have been in the past.
But I think Foster and his people have got some of the forwards doing jobs that aren't theirs. Take lock Kevin O'Neill, for example. His key role is lineout ball and kick-off ball and he does those basics well.
But somehow he has been turned into a ball carrier, hitting the ball up - and it is not a job he does well. In fact, there are not many locks in New Zealand who perform that role well.
So why make him? What's wrong with using ball carriers like Sione Lauaki - who seems to have developed this upright running style where he is leaning so far backwards, it's a wonder he doesn't fall over before he gets tackled.
There are too many of the forwards doing other people's work. Let them do their own jobs, I say, and let them do the basics well and the other stuff will follow. But they aren't anywhere near doing the basics well at this stage.
You can see it at the rucks and mauls. Players are not cleaning out well. They are not getting to the breakdown and contact areas with vigour and aggression.
You can see that by halfback Brendon Leonard. Again, no question he is a good player - but he has developed Danny Lee Disease by taking several steps backwards before he releases the ball; that is partly because he is not getting the protection from the forwards doing their job.
Anyone who has ever played the game knows that often you miss scoring tries by just a few centimetres. So why would you give away ground? Especially when you have a good pass like Leonard.
Their defence is ordinary - the Chiefs used to be hard to score against - and have a look at some of those tries scored against them by the Stormers.
These are all little things but they add up to a team with big problems. After the game, I went to the Fraser-Tech club and listened to people saying morosely that they hoped the club rugby the next day would be more entertaining.
I hope so too. There were very few people at the ground to watch the Chiefs. As I say, big problems.
