OK, let's talk about second rowers.

No, no, stay awake, this is important. Really!

Quick, bring the verbal smelling salts: "running rugby, ball in hand, passing not kicking, Quade Cooper, Will Genia, naked Kate Beckingsale buys you a beer."

There we go. I knew Genia would get you going.

Come on, let's prop you up against that still smoldering effigy of Berrick Barnes (actually, just his right boot) and talk this through.

Would it be better if I called them locks? No? Alright then, let me just blurt it out and then we can discuss something more scintillating such as when it's appropriate for a man to wear velour.

So, here it is: the fate of the three Australian franchises in contention for a playoff spot going into the penultimate round of the Super 14 this weekend -- and perhaps that of the Wallabies' 2010 campaign -- rests in good part with the second rowers.

What? I hear you scream girlishly. That's like giving Tiger Woods the responsibility to drive your daughter home or hiring Brian Waldron to audit last week's chook raffle ("yeah mate, we still haven't sold ALL the tickets") or allowing George Bush to run America. They're just not the people you want in those positions of responsibility.

Come on, truly, I know most locks are failed basketball players, devoid of motor skills, but they deserve the respect we all expect, sort of.

In fact, it's my addled brain's contention that the game day fate of the Aussie teams this year has been closely tied to the strength and performance, or lack there of, of their first-choice second rowers.

Perhaps it's the lack of depth in Australia's second row stocks -- if a team loses a couple of locks, they immediately look pedestrian and their game plan is shredded. Compare that to the South African and New Zealand sides that apparently benefit from secret second rower breeding programs. There's only 43 people in NZ and at least half of them are 6ft 7in.

The current dearth of quality locks is akin to the lack of depth in Australian front-row stocks four years ago.

The notable irrelevance in this argument, as it has been in any discussion all year really, is the Western Force club. The Force's lockmeister and skipper Nathan Sharpe who surely is as old as my glorious, though dead mother, has been truly wonderful.

However his injury-plagued team was awful for the first two thirds of season and has been sent to South Africa to do penance in empty stadia.

Guess they needed two aged second rowers.

Sharpe should be the first guy picked for the Wallabies. The mongrel -- and indeed they need a mongrel -- who is selected to be his locking partner for the start of Wallabies' Test campaign against Fiji, England and Ireland in June should be decided by performances in the rundown to the Super 14 playoffs.

So let's get to it. Depending on how you look at it, three Aussie teams are either on the cusp of playoff berths (glass half full) or facing oblivion (a triple shot of Glenmorangie).

Most likely one of the three sides, the Waratahs, the Brumbies and the Reds, will make it through to the final four. Queensland is in pole position, sitting in fourth on 34 points, but in a mess with key injuries. NSW (fifth, 33 points) had the best run in on paper but slaughtered fan support and maybe self belief with their awful loss to the lowly Highlanders last week.

The Brumbies (sixth on 32) have momentum, but an ultra tough final game against the Crusaders away from home and clearly a bunch of internal problems with players and coaches apparently fighting over everything from what move to call to who should be screaming the loudest at Steve Walsh.

Regardless, all three teams have in the end, a single uncomplicated purpose; win their remaining two games, preferably with bonus points. Unfortunately, if the annoying second row theory holds, the entertainers of Queensland look to be on the shakiest ground.

If ever there was a dramatic illustration of why second rowers matter, it was the Brumbies-Reds game last week. For the first time virtually all year, Canberra's tall timber clicked, Mitchell Chapman and Mark Chisholm playing abrasive, in-your-face footy and creating a platform for guys like Rocky Elsom, Josh Valentine and Matt Giteau to have their wicked way with the Brissie boys.

The Reds on the other hand lost their two starting locks in the first quarter of the game and never looked a chance after that. (The locks looked totally lost in Queensland's other ugly-ish loss this year to the Blues, four tries to two, in week 3).

Much has been made of the Reds' ball in hand flair, but the efforts of Van Humphries, Adam Byrnes and Rob Simmons to get in and do the fifth, in concert with their hardworking front row, has allowed the Queenslanders to do that showbiz stuff they do so well.

Now, with Simmons and Byrnes injured it'll be up to the returning Humphries and former Wallaby Radike Samo to stop the Hurricanes on Friday in Wellington.

Man, that's a big ask -- Humphries is 34 and coming back from a bad ankle injury and as much as Samo, 33, is a joy to watch in open play, he's never been renowned as a get down and dirty type lock.

Meanwhile, the Hurricanes (7th on 32 points), despite injury worries of their own, are hitting their straps and play the kind of game -- not altogether dissimilar to the Blues -- that can hurt the Reds. They have enormous power at impact meaning the Queenslanders, who are also missing Daniel Braid, will have to be like rabid dogs at the breakdown just to have a chance to get on the front foot.

Coach Ewen McKenzie has stacked the bench with forwards (a 7-2 split) but the Queensland second rowers will be walking the tightrope without a net. Nothing short of a player of the match type display from one or both the locks will be required.

The Brumbies play the Highlanders, victors over an awful Waratahs outfit last week in game played somewhere near the south pole.

Canberra Stadium isn't Bora Bora but the Brumbies believe it to be paradise and are always difficult to bully there. The Highlanders haven't got much going for them, except that direct approach, so Chapman and Chisholm will have to take care of business again in order for their bickering backs and loose forwards to do what they should do and win (with a four-try bonus point). They'll need it because the Crusaders follow.

And onto the ‘Tahs, away against the Chiefs. Was there any doubt they'd lose in that car crash fashion last week after their first two kicks -- one from Barnes the other from Drew Mitchell -- went long? Perhaps it was the loss they had to have, to prove to them, without a shadow of doubt that their first impulse is to kick and it is WRONG.

Bringing Barnes into five eighth this week (at Daniel Halangahu's expense) to chase Luke Burgess's volleyball passes could be a positive, if he puts the boot away -- and surely he will with Tom Carter at inside centre. It's not just the fact Carter is a straight runner, he's also as slow as wet week in Hamilton so there's no use Barnes punting the thing and expecting the bloke next to him to run after it.

The second row theory applies to the Tahs too -- in fact, I'd suggest they wouldn't have won half the (7) games they have had Dean Mumm (pictured, above) and Kane Douglas not been amongst the best locks in the country all year.

It's a miserable, perhaps terminal waste. Put Mumm and a fully fit Douglas in the Reds backrow they'd be pressing for a home semi rather than struggling to keep the light flickering.

Even against the misery guts Highlanders last week, Mumm was at it again making 14 tackles and being all potty-mouthed and abrasive in the set pieces and at the breakdown. Douglas, on the other hand is carrying an injury and it shows. That's got to be a worry against the Chiefs -- last year's finalists and surely still one of the most gifted sides in the comp, despite underachieving all season.

With line breaking Cliff Palu injured, the Waratahs have gone back into their attacking shell and against the potentially brilliant but mistake riddled Chiefs the temptation may be to wear ‘em down.

However with Rob Horne back at outside centre and Kurtley Beale threatening to fire up as we've been waiting for him to do for a few years, now is the time to throw doubt and caution out the window and play mindlessly-beautiful, aggressive rugby, and if justice is to be done, let it be Mumm who scores the bonus point try.

Right, so enough about second rowers.

Tell me, for how long have you had that shocking pink, velour sloppy joe?