’30-love’: Crusaders end Reds’ season with amazing stat

[Pelican Press 0]

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’30-love’: Crusaders end Reds’ season with amazing stat

The colossal Crusaders have enhanced one of world sport’s most remarkable records to ruthlessly end the Queensland Reds’ Super Rugby Pacific season.

Surpassing tennis’s 30-love scoreline, the Crusaders improved their perfect record in home finals to 30-0 with a 32-12 victory over the Reds at their Christchurch fortress on Friday night.

Needing to become the first *********** side in three decades to win a play-off match in New Zealand to make the semi-finals, the writing was on the wall for the Reds well before they kicked off at Apollo Projects Stadium.

Adding to the odds stacked against Les Kiss’s side, the Reds had lost 13 of their previous 14 games against the 12-times Super Rugby kings, while the Crusaders were also riding a 16-match winning streak in finals stretching back to 2016.

Queensland had at least been the only *********** team in 21 trips across the Tasman to upset the Crusaders.

But the Reds’ class of 2025 proved their own worst enemies, conceding the first five penalties of the match on Friday night.

The Crusaders, typically, made the ill-disciplined visitors pay with the only two tries of the first half – to injured prop Tamaiti Williams before he hobbled off, and his All ******* captain Scott Barrett – to take a 12-0 lead into the break.

The deficit could have been greater if former Reds and Wallabies playmaker James O’Connor hadn’t blundered with an errant kick for touch as the Crusaders threatened to post a third try in the shadows of halftime.

Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt may have taken note, but O’Connor’s unforced error mattered little to the Crusaders, who resisted an early second-half challenge to put the Reds to the sword.

If the Crusaders’ third try, to livewire halfback Noah Hotham in the 55th minute, didn’t all but end the contest, a penalty goal to Rivez Reihana most certainly put the Reds out of reach, trailing 27-0 and running out of time.

The Reds’ exit from the finals leaves the ACT Brumbies as Australia’s last team standing.

After finishing third in the minor premiership, the Brumbies host the fourth-placed Brumbies in the third and last quarter-finals on Saturday night.

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