Photos: Super 14 kicks offKEY POINTS:
It's a truism that a week is a long time in sport. And if the Chiefs can't rustle up a scrum from somewhere, 14 of them will feel an eternity.
That will be the priority for their coach, Ian Foster, after his side were crushed in the set piece and battered into submission at the fringes of the rucks during Saturday night's 32-14 defeat by the Blues.
The Chiefs headed home to Hamilton where they will take on the Warratahs on Saturday night. Having been unable to get their game-breaking backs enough quality ball against the Blues, they will need to improve dramatically up front to test a Warratahs side that demonstrated plenty of tactical acumen in defeating the Hurricanes.
"The next seven days are vital for us," Foster said.
"But, in the same breath, the next seven days are vital if you win. It is not enjoyable coming off a loss but at least we have a very clear picture of where we sit in a couple of areas."
That picture is not pretty. The Blues dismantled the Chiefs' scrum and also won the contact at the fringes of the rucks. The Chiefs' tight five looked lightweight but Foster seems likely to stick with his first-choice selections for the next round.
"It is not a personnel issue. We know that we have got to be at our best in our tight five and I don't think we were [on Saturday night]. It is going to be an area that we have to put some hard work into.
"We were well beaten at set-piece time and we gave them too many soft yards by giving them a real good platform to kick from."
Foster was fairly upbeat. "It wasn't all bad," he said of a Chiefs effort that saw them scramble and defend well enough to lead 11-8 at halftime. But he admitted his team's performance at set-piece time was a major concern.
"The Blues are a very strong set-piece team. They have probably got one of the best scrums in the competition and we knew that. We just weren't able to get what we wanted so unfortunately it is well done them.
"We knew how they were going to come at us. They picked a very physical team, they wanted to win the collision and they wanted to do very well at set-piece.
"We are certainly going to go away, lick our wounds and regroup and come back a bit stronger in that area."
The Blues' set-piece dominance snuffed out the threat of key Chiefs number eight Sione Lauaki and also laid the platform for two second-half tries, which came directly from scrums inside the Chiefs' 22.
Foster said the new laws put extra emphasis on having a strong scrum.
"Sione was under huge pressure at the back of the scrum. There was no go-forward at all and it is very hard to operate when you are not getting that platform.
" I think you saw that if a team are able to scrum strong and get the side they want or keep it nice and square it becomes quite hard to defend."
