Former All Black Andrew Mehrtens believes the Australian Super Rugby teams lack the depth and skill level required to seriously compete with their Kiwi counterparts.
Through two weeks of the trans-Tasman competition, Aussie sides are virtually all out of the running for the final, sitting 0-10, with an average losing margin of 20.2 points.
And in his role as an Australian-based rugby pundit, Mehrtens can clearly see where the New Zealand outfits have the wood over their rivals from across the ditch.
“What we’ve seen from the competition so far, having watched all the [Super Rugby] AU, what they’re lacking, really, is the depth, and the skill level – particularly of the forwards, to be able to just make those good decisions and transfers,” Mehrtens told former All Blacks team-mate Justin Marshall on Sky Sport.
“There’s still some really good players, I just think across their depth they don’t quite have the skill level of the New Zealanders.”
Marshall noted whether the Australian sides could match it was the big question when this competition started.
While he feels “in general, they are competitive”, he said it’s been somewhat hard to predict just how lopsided some of the matches were going to be, none more so than the Crusaders’ 63-28 belting of the Reds in Brisbane last weekend.
