Luke Buttigieg in Brisbane
Australian assistant coach John Cartwright has warned that predicted humidity could make ball handling in Saturday night's World Cup final against New Zealand a lottery.
Brisbane has copped a deluge this week with 400mm of rain drenching the Queensland capital, and the Kangaroos have had to train at Langlands Park a couple of times as Suncorp Stadium has been left to recover.
But while Cartwright isn't perturbed by predictions of further storms and heavy rain on the evening of the tournament decider, he believes the expected humidity could be a factor that goes a long way to deciding the result.
"It is a World Cup final, the conditions aren't going to be the best, it could come down to a bounce of the ball," Cartwright said. "If it's like this and it's very humid and greasy and if we get storms like we did last night, it's a big evener."
"The side who handles the conditions the best generally wins the games in those situations, (it's) not generally the best side on paper or who prepares best, it's who handles the conditions on the night."
"Generally it doesn't matter what the conditions are before the game, if we get a clear night the grounds are so good these days they drain pretty well. It's probably more the humidity that will bother us than the condition of the ground."
The spectre of the 2005 Tri Nations final looms large ahead of the game, when the Kiwis thumped the Kangaroos 24-0 in one of the biggest upsets in the international game for a long time.
But while that result has been mentioned this week, Cartwright says all it shows is that the hot favourites can be beaten if they don't arrive at Suncorp Stadium ready to play.
"It was mentioned earlier in the week but we've tried to stay positive right through it all," he said. "You've got to have a little bit of fear of failure, (so) that's definitely been mentioned."
"It's a World Cup final, against the arch enemy New Zealand, so it's going to be tough. There's enough experience in the side to know that all these types of games come down to a bounce of the ball so there's no real need to mention it."
Cartwright echoed the theme that has been common from the Kangaroos camp all week, that while their tactical preparation may not have been ideal after playing Papua New Guinea and then Fiji, from a physical perspective they're more than ready.
But he also admits that he thinks New Zealand's back-to-back wins over England mean that its preparation for the game has been better against a Lions team that wanted 'credibility' after it had 'copped a bit of a bagging' following its 52-4 loss to Australia.
As for the Kiwis' go-to man, five-eighth Benji Marshall, Cartwright said it's no great secret that the Kangaroos will direct much of their defensive focus the way of the Wests Tigers star.
"He's their main game breaker, he can set up tries from anywhere, he can score tries from anywhere, and it's no different to how we've approached every game in the tournament, the guy that sets up the opposition's plays, we've got to stop him," he said.