For a ninth time this season Darren Coleman and Jake Gordon entered the post-match press conference hurting and beaten men.
Given a sniff in the closing 10-minutes to pull off a shock victory over the Brumbies and claim just their third win of the season, the Waratahs once again were unable to hold their nerve or find accuracy in their execution as they fell short 29-21 in their ninth defeat of the year.
Coleman cut a shattered figure as he fronted the media at Allianz Stadium following the match. Not for the first time he was forced to question just how deep the injury crisis could go and how close isn't quite close enough for his Tahs.
Already without five contracted props, the Waratahs were slammed on Thursday when Harry Thompson-Stringer went down with a Grade 3 medial ligament tear. But the worst was still to come on Saturday, when Harry Johnson-Holmes clutched at his lower calf 35-minutes into the match.
"No, it wasn't a good day or good two days," Coleman said post-match. "We lost Hayden Thompson-Stringer on Thursday to Grade 3 medial ligament and then unfortunately, looks like Harry's ruptured his Achilles. That's all seven done now, all seven props and four hookers all done."
Rocked by Holmes' injury, Coleman was seen with is hands thrown over his head in disbelief as he watched his seventh prop limp off the field. He becomes the 15th player to suffer a season-ending injury joining the likes of Angus Bell, Dave Porecki and Max Jorgensen on the sidelines.
Flanker Charlie Gamble also added to Coleman's woes after he was taken straight from the ground to surgery after the match for an ugly gash on his calf. He too could be ruled out for several weeks.
Forced to hunt down proficient scrummagers ahead of the match, Coleman brought in another pair of Shute Shield players in Ben Sugars and George Thornton late in the week to join Lewis Ponini and Jay Fonokalafi who've found themselves thrown into the starting lineup just weeks after coming into the squad as injury replacements.
"We'll regroup over the next three weeks. We've done a pretty good job at it of late; hurting and rebounding.
"I think if we summarise it, they [Brumbies] just seem to score their points easily, more easily than we do. We had long periods in their 22, in the first half we made quite a few line breaks, and we just don't have the accuracy at the moment to finish off the energy and intent we're showing.
"You can't under sell the cohesion aspect of the front row and what flow on effects it has there. Like scrum penalties for just not being able to balance well before engage. You have to change your whole lineout strategy because you got a new thrower coming in that's behind, so potentially that confidence in something that should be a strong point in our team, if you look at our roster, it maybe seeps in."
Meanwhile, the loan deal to bring Pone Fa'amausili from the Melbourne Rebels to the Tahs is already over with the 27-year-old to return to Melbourne on Sunday, leaving Coleman to rely on loan Argentina prop Enrique Pieretto and Shute Shield players for the coming weeks. But he still remains desperately short for talent prompting a call out to other coaches for help.
"We've got to think through that [situation]. We've had Brad Amituanai who played with us the last two weeks, he'll be back in the mix. George Thornton who played tonight. Enrique's here, so he'll be available next week.
"We'll need to find another one or two, you need to travel with five and train and things like that.
"I don't know if there's any Super Rugby coaches out there willing to lend us a prop, we would definitely look at it, but I don't think any are going to be forthcoming, everyone's got their own things to work on."
It's almost enough to break any coach, but Coleman insists there's still light at the end of the tunnel with a top eight finish still, amazingly, on the cards.
"I guess you guys only see us here straight after a heartbreaking loss," Coleman said. "It's a different group [during the week], I don't walk around like this seven days of the week.
"I do tonight and tomorrow usually and then Monday my mood sort of has to reflect the group's and lead the group, but yeah, Mondays are not great, they're getting better, it's just there's just constant little flesh wounds when you're losing rugby games.
"We know how important it is. We know how important it is for our state, we know how important it is for players' livelihoods, all that stuff. We do appreciate the job we have and the responsibility we have.
"But you come into HQ on Tuesday, there'll be smiles and there'll be blokes training hard and ready to go again, so this image you see now isn't us seven days a week. It's just generally after a loss.
"I don't mind that. If the losses don't hurt, they don't hurt deep, then you don't care. They're not getting any easier, but the boys will front up again and they do what they did again tonight on Saturday over in Perth and I know that if we can combine a little bit more accuracy with the energy and intent we show we can win games of football."
Despite the horror situation he and his team find themselves in, he still reached for the positives in a night that saw the conditions on the pitch reflect the turmoil surrounding the Tahs as the skies opened up late in the match to send a steady downpour and turn the field into a mess of puddles.
"[I've] nothing but respect for Lewis Ponini and Jay [Fonokalafi]. Lewis played 67-68 minutes and Jay played 79. Three weeks ago, those folks were on job sites," Coleman said of his young props. "George [Thornton], we called in on Thursday when Hayden went down. And Ben [Sugars], he met his teammates for the first time this week.
"I've got respect for those blokes, and I thought there was some good wholehearted individual performances scattered or pushed through the team there.
"I thought Miles Amatosero played tough and physical, Jed in his 100th did some nice things with ball in hand and did a really good job under tricky circumstances calling line out. They've got some genuine world class locks there and with us with a rookie thrower and some doubt around his teammate's knowledge, to get the line out pay we got was good.
"I thought Lalaki got back to some good form. I thought he was really physical. He ran hard and tackled hard, which we've been looking for a while, so put all those things together and ridiculously, we're still in the hunt for the playoffs.
"We'll do what we've done in the last most of this season, we'll hurt tonight, we'll review, and we'll get over to the Force and have good energy and good intent and do our jersey proud and try and finish on a positive with a few wins to get us home."