Wallabies must get rid of All Blacks complex

Simnikiwe Xabanisa: For those who struggle to comprehend how the Wallabies can comprehensively beat the Springboks one week and get smashed by the All Blacks the next, here's a snapshot of Australian rugby.

It's 2005 and the Aussies are playing the Springboks at Ellis Park.

The Wallabies are on the attack and are in the middle of one of their elaborate Brumbies-style moves when Stirling Mortlock gets the ball and suddenly finds himself in a gap.

Instead of powering ahead, he sends a speculative pass, which gets intercepted by Jean de Villiers, who engineers a Bok try from just inside his 22.

Mortlock should have taken the gap, but because the game plan dictated that the ball be off-loaded to the next player, he threw the pass for the 14-point turnaround.

For all their intellectual approach to rugby, the Aussies have always been a little attached to structure and tend to plan 10 phases in advance.

With George Gregan, Stephen Larkham and Tim Horan in their backline, it worked when they last won the World Cup, in 1999.

Eleven years later, it is the main hindrance to Robbie Deans making them the team to beat at next year's World Cup.

Contrary to popular belief, Australia aren't as short on talent as many make them out to be. Benn Robinson, Ben Alexander, Stephen Moore, Tatafu Polota-Nau, Nathan Sharpe, David Pocock, Rocky Elsom, Wycliff Palu, Will Genia, Luke Burgess, Quade Cooper, Berrick Barnes, Matt Giteau, Adam Ashley-Cooper, Drew Mitchell, James O'Connor, Digby Ioane, Cameron Shepherd, Peter Hynes and Kurtley Beale aren't exactly the most useless players around.

But Deans's biggest problem in moulding them into a fearsome unit is the mentality which courses through their game.

Having long been lauded for its intellect, the Australian game has been encouraging its players to think no further than where they need to be at the next phase.

This goes a long way towards explaining why a gifted player such as Giteau is struggling when he should be thriving under Deans.

"Gits" is too used to trusting either the game plan or his instincts, and seems not to have the ability to analyse what's in front of him and come up with a solution.

The players who can - Pocock, Genia, Cooper and Barnes - are still developing, with Barnes a little guilty of stagnating after bursting onto the scene at the 2007 World Cup.

Perhaps because rugby is out of the spotlight in Australia, their players can sometimes be lacking in ambition.

It is said that, when Deans first spoke to Dan Carter at the Crusaders, he asked him what his goals for the team were, to which the answer was, allegedly: "To replace Mehrts [former All Black flyhalf Andrew Mehrtens]."

Deans is understood to have identified Pocock and O'Connor as the Aussies' Richie McCaw and Carter.

Pocock, who was not born in Australia, has already pursued and replaced the incumbent George Smith, but O'Connor appears to be taking the scenic route to taking over from Giteau.

Another aspect of the Aussies' mentality that is hindering them is their hero-worshipping of the black jersey. When they play the Boks, the Wallabies make plans for a rugby team. When they play the All Blacks, they plot for Mission Impossible, which explains their eight-game losing streak against the All Blacks.

If they are to win the World Cup next year, and I think they can, the Aussies are going to have to change their mindset.