The sim looks at each players individual skills to determine whether they make it to the ruck in time to contest the ruck. So, yes... ,aye your loosies are just too slow, bud.
I tried to set myself up as speedy too with my centre skills, but sadly I happen to be capable of ordinary performances at any time. You were good Hurricane, topped the tackle count.
Gutted I missed this, top performance though. Force h4x ftw. Athlai vs Howe and Spark in the thread was hilarious to read as well.