Mallett: All Blacks are cheating

Nick Mallett says the All Blacks are deliberately collapsing the scrum to negate the Springboks’ advantage up front.

The Boks won the second Test in Cape Town last Saturday to level the Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series at 1-1, but their dominant scrum did not get the reward it deserved.

Australian referee Angus Gardner repeatedly failed to penalise the All Blacks for collapsing the scrum, while warning the Boks not to walk around their opponents.

The latter had become a talking point during the week after All Blacks coach Dave Rennie raised his concerns following the first Test at Ellis Park.

Bok coach Rassie Erasmus vehemently rejected that suggestion after the Cape Town Test, while scrum coach Daan Human dismissed it again on Tuesday, insisting the Boks’ objective has always been to scrum straight through their opponents.

DAAN: Boks don’t want to walk around scrum

Speaking on the Talking Boks podcast, Mallett said the difference between the two packs ultimately comes down to the quality of the respective front rows.

“Personnel is vital. It’s the personnel you have.

“If we go in with Malcolm Marx, Ox Nché and Wilco Louw, I don’t really care who they have at hooker or tighthead, they’re in for a really tough afternoon.

“And Wilco – let’s not underestimate how powerful that guy is and how technically correct he is. He’s absolutely dead straight, rather like [Frans] Malherbe.

“Malherbe was better around the field, made more tackles, cleaned more rucks, but Wilco has got the same scrummaging power as he had.

“So when we get Wilco, Ox and Marx in the front row, I challenge any front row in the world to match those guys. They can’t. There’s no one who can match those guys.

“The All Blacks haven’t got the personnel,” the former Bok coach added. “I don’t care what they say. They haven’t got a tighthead, nor have France got a tighthead, nor has England. We dominated them as well.

“We smashed Ireland in the front row. No one accused us of walking around in any of those games. We just got penalty after penalty because those are the laws.

“Let’s hope on Saturday that if we get that same dominance [we get rewarded].”

ALSO: Rassie fires more shots at Rennie

Mallett claimed the All Blacks’ response when being driven backwards was to take the scrum to ground, making the referee’s decision more difficult.

“What they do now is they don’t want to stay up because if they collapse, they force the referee to make a decision between one or the other side. So you have a 50% chance of getting it right, of actually getting a penalty.

“Whereas the referees should be good enough to see who is actually pancaking, who’s going down.

“So this Saturday, we’re going to come as hard as we can in the scrums and hopefully we’re going to get better reward for our dominance in that area of the game.”

WATCH: How All Blacks cheat at scrum

Mallett was particularly critical of the way Gardner handled the scrum in Cape Town.

“If Rassie is correct in saying the first six scrums went down and there was only a penalty in the 35th minute when Marx and Ox came on, then that’s inexcusable.

“You’re not refereeing the laws of rugby correctly and you’re turning it into, basically, a joke because the side that puts the ball in just collapses the scrum.

“How can you go forward if the scrum is lying on the ground? You can’t.

“So, in fact, they are basically cheating to stop themselves giving a penalty away.

“If the ref says play away at No 8, but you’ve put pressure on them, started to get them going back and they fall to the ground, it’s a penalty.

“Unfortunately, we didn’t get that last Saturday.”

Photo: Ashley Vlotman/Gallo Images