{"id":10156,"date":"2012-04-21T16:22:09","date_gmt":"2012-04-21T14:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/04\/rugby-rocky-returns-in-waratahs-win-over-rebels\/"},"modified":"2012-04-21T16:22:09","modified_gmt":"2012-04-21T14:22:09","slug":"rugby-rocky-returns-in-waratahs-win-over-rebels","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/rugby-rocky-returns-in-waratahs-win-over-rebels\/","title":{"rendered":"Rugby-Rocky returns in Waratahs&#8217; win over Rebels"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span class=\"articleLocation\">April 21<\/span> (Reuters) &#8211; Former Australia captain Rocky Elsom<br \/>\nmade his long-awaited return to the New South Wales Waratahs<br \/>\nside in a 30-21 home win over the Melbourne Rebels on Saturday.<span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Elsom came off the bench in the 65th minute to make his<br \/>\nfirst appearance for the Waratahs in his second spell after<br \/>\nmissing the start of the season with a hamstring injury.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>However, the powerful flanker&#8217;s appearance came as the<br \/>\nWaratahs fell into defensive mode to protect a lead, a common<br \/>\nfault this year, as they squandered a 30-7 advantage to make it<br \/>\na nervous last few minutes as the Rebels sniffed an unlikely<br \/>\nwin. The home side clung on to record their fourth win from<br \/>\neight games this year and move top of the Australian Conference.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>&#8220;We started very well and strung a few good phases together<br \/>\nbut I think in that second half we let it get away from us, too<br \/>\nmany penalties again,&#8221; Waratahs captain Benn Robinson said in a<br \/>\npitchside interview.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Waratahs were quick out of the blocks and opened the<br \/>\nscoring with a try after 26 seconds. Having recovered their<br \/>\nkickoff, they progressed forward and a neat handling move<br \/>\ninvolving several backs and forwards set fullback Bernard Foley<br \/>\nclear to cross the line<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Scrumhalf Brendan McKibbin converted and added another three<br \/>\npenalties in the first half as the Waratahs bossed the game<br \/>\nagainst a Rebels side who were guilty of numerous handling<br \/>\nerrors.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Rebels did show some positive signs in the first period<br \/>\nand they came up with a 23rd-minute try when hooker Ged Robinson<br \/>\ncompleted the easy job of touching down after his forwards had<br \/>\ncaught a lineout and driven over the line.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>Wallaby utility back James O&#8217;Connor kicked the tricky<br \/>\nconversion from the touchline as the Rebels went in 16-7 down at<br \/>\nhalftime.<\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n<p>The Rebels were again slow to start the second period and<br \/>\nWaratahs hooker Tatafu Polota-Nau scored a clever try in the<br \/>\ncorner in the 47th minute after exchanging close-range passes<br \/>\nwith number eight Wycliff Palu off a lineout for the home side.<br \/>\n\u00a0 <span class=\"label\"><strong>Continued&#8230;<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>April 21 (Reuters) &#8211; Former Australia captain Rocky Elsom made his long-awaited return to the New South Wales Waratahs side in a 30-21 home win over the Melbourne Rebels on Saturday. Elsom came off the bench in the 65th minute to make his first appearance for the Waratahs in his second spell after missing the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[1],"tags":[830,2370,183],"class_list":{"0":"post-10156","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-south-africa","7":"tag-news","8":"tag-reuters","9":"tag-south-africa-2","10":"entry"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10156","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10156"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10156\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10156"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10156"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.myza.co.za\/press\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10156"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}