High-risk blitz puts England in charge
JEREMY GUSCOTT
OUTSPOKEN AND UNMISSABLE… EVERY WEEK
There’s nothing not to like about England’s blitz defence. It’s bold, gutsy, and good to see because it makes rugby exciting. A blitz defence is all-or-nothing – there’s no half-way, no ‘just about’.
It’s about stopping the carrier dead in their tracks, and even turning ball over, or at least slowing it down.
If there’s a half-measure in the blitz the attacking side will find a dog-leg and succeed in getting over the gain-line.
Another big pitfall in the blitz is if the defensive winger doesn’t follow the rush led by the outside-centre. If the winger hesitates you’re in trouble. All players in the defensive line have to understand that the blitz is the battle of the gain-line, and you have to be all-in and co-ordinated.
The aim of a side operating a blitz is to move the gain-line back towards the attacking side, the further the better, and stop them getting into the outside channel. The outside-centre is the key, pushing up to spearhead the defensive line with the aim of forcing the opposition attack to come back inside.
The reason it is so crucial for the defensive wing to follow the 13’s lead, so that they are aligned, is to block or intercept a long overhead pass reaching an attacking player in open space towards the touchline – or, if it does get through, to tackle them immediately. If the winger ends up in no-man’s-land and the attack gets away, the blitz is undone.
It’s the most exciting form of defence because of the risks involved, and the aggression, timing, and communication required. A drift defence, which uses the touchline as the last defender, is a much more gentle model.
The way Henry Slade has adapted to the blitz introduced since defence coach Felix Jones’ Six Nations arrival has been impressive. What we saw from him in the first Test against New Zealand in Dunedin last weekend was encouraging because of the way he pushed up and trapped All Black midfielders man-and-ball. To do that you have to go in hard and committed, or you will be bumped.
Slade has done that really well at 13, and because of their familiarity as Exeter team-mates, wing Immanuel Feyi-Waboso seems to understand the system and stays connected.
Slade is essentially the defensive co-ordinator, and it means constant communication. What I don’t understand is if some teams, say, Northampton or Bath, do not have an understanding of blitz defence. Every international or professional back should be familiar with it – in just the same way that players in scrums and lineouts have to be on the same page.
The only differential is frequency, because you are called upon to defend time after time during a game – and that’s why it’s so key.
The blitz is probably at its most effective off second or third phase possession. You have to be brave to do it off first phase, when you are lined up one back against another. You cannot blitz on your own unless you nail the carrier, otherwise you look like a donkey and leave everyone in the lurch. If the tackle is missed you are very exposed because your scramble defence will be limited, and any lapse will therefore probably result in a try.
However, the upside of using a blitz defender to target a specific attacker off first phase – or a maverick decision taken in the moment – is that if it pays off in a turn-over the defensive team will be quids-in, with a good chance of scoring themselves.
That’s why beating a blitz defence is almost as difficult for an attacking side as running a blitz is for a defending side. A method we used at Bath to beat a blitz was for me to drift just outside the opposition 13, and have Stuart Barnes send a harder, wider pass which hit me on an arc outside them. The danger then is a defending winger reading it and smashing you – so we used our blind-side wing to run a close supporting line to provide an offload option.
A blitz defence is the ultimate test on both sides of the ball, whether it is the team executing it, or the team attacking it. The easiest way to undermine a blitz is to beat the tackler, especially the 13 who leads the rush. If a tackle is missed it puts the defence behind the ball carrier rather than in front of them, and blows the blitz apart, as England found out with a missed tackle that led to Ardie Savea’s try in the first Test.
Another way to undermine a blitz is a kick-pass or chip-kick over the top with the aim of slowing it down. That’s why, when people say that South Africa have won two World Cups on the back of the blitz it’s only true in part, because you also need a 9-10 combination who can read the opposition kicking game, and have the kicking skills to put the pressure back on them.
The other critical factor when a blitz goes wrong is that you must have a very effective scramble defence – like South Africa and New Zealand. It is essential you have that wave of scramble tacklers, and it only happens if players on the ground get back to their feet rapidly. In a blitz you are busting a gut to get up because you cannot be the weak link. It is a battle of wits, athleticism, and ultimate commitment.
New Zealand use the blitz automatically because they like intense, fast games, and they back their fitness. If you look at New Zealand over the years, from Michael Jones at the beginning of my era to Savea now, they know better than anyone when to turn the ball over, and when you play hard attack and hard defence, you need ultimate fitness. England are more competitive in that area than they have been, but they are not yet the best at it. On the plus side no tackler stops people in their tracks better than Sam Underhill, and they have found a ball-carrier who is hard to stop in Chandler Cunningham-South.
I applaud their blitz, and Slade’s role in it. He is a very good footballer who can read a game, and is quick enough to be effective. He’s not renowned as a big hitter, but he’s stopped the All Blacks in their tracks on more than one occasion. Slade deserves praise for the way he has come back and got on with business after being left out of the 2023 World Cup squad.
England’s blitz is still a work in progress, and it’s high risk. The main blitz fault-line is eight times out of ten a missed tackle – and the more phases the higher the risk of players not being in the right place at the right time. Even so, the Felix Jones’ defensive system is having a big impact. The next question is how much more can it improve?
