Pain before gain as All Blacks plot long-term conquests
OPINION: This has not been a vintage All Blacks year, but it may yet turn out to be a pivotal one.
That’s the great imponderable as season two of the four-year World Cup cycle draws to a close in Cardiff on Saturday evening (Sunday NZT). Regardless of what happens under against a vulnerable looking Welsh lineup, there has to be some ambiguity about the state of the All Blacks at this important juncture of their 2019 evolution.
Have they come back to the pack, from their exhilarating highs of 2016, as their results this season would indicate? Or are they just undergoing a mid-race correction, regathering themselves, taking stock, working through some issues, before they settle back into their stride and kick clear when it matters?
Kiwis will be hoping the latter. Northern folk are keenly anticipating it’s the former.
To continue the analogy, it appears the back-to-back world champions are no longer competing in a race of their own. England, Ireland and Australia are all now playing on a very similar level to the New Zealanders, and Scotland and maybe even Wales (when healthy) might also be working up towards that giddy territory. Of course South Africa and France are rebuilding giants who are eminently capable of turning things around within two years.
If 2017’s goodish, but not great, season has taught us anything, it’s that the All Blacks are now beatable. The British and Irish Lions demonstrated that palpably. The Wallabies too (apart from the first half in Sydney, they went toe-to-toe with New Zealanders over 200 minutes of Bledisloe footy). The Springboks nearly achieved it in Durban. And the Scots went within one play of claiming their first Kiwi scalp at Murrayfield just last week.
There are two reasons for this. The All Blacks’ game has stagnated a little in 2017 (perhaps deliberately, as the canny Hansen builds with an eye on the big prize; and partly because of a massive injury rate), and their rivals are undoubtedly evolving. The stodgy northern kick-chase game appears to have been shelved, and teams up here now are embracing, and executing, ball-in-hand football. That alone is a mind-shift worth celebrating.
Mix in the defensive line-speed that the All Blacks’ challengers have all identified as a key factor in limiting their attacking prowess, and you have a rival group who appear to have the tools to at least trouble the world champions.
But there is another side to the coin. Hansen has used 55 players this year and has had 44 involved in some form on this tour. He is building incredible depth. If you think that Ben Smith, Jordie Barrett, Izzy Dagg, Nehe Milner-skudder, Brodie Retallick, Joe Moody and Owen Franks all missed this tour - that’s a massive injection of talent and experience to come back in.
In the meantime Hansen is building more or less an alternate All Blacks side. By the time the World Cup rolls round he won’t be just twodeep at every spot, but three or four in some. Competition just to make that squad is going to be as intense as it has ever been.
Hansen knows this. After the Scotland near-miss, this is what he had to say: ‘‘It’s about how we learn from this year. This is a road bump, a little bit like 2009. We had a few road bumps that year and kicked on to become a pretty good side. There are seven people from the ‘15 World Cup final team in this squad, and only three starters. So a hell of a lot of experience has gone out the door.
‘‘It’s been a good year for the team. We’ve had to grow and learn ... and other people have had to stand up and take ownership and responsibility. We always knew at some point these guys would have to do that, and it’s probably come a year later than we expected.
‘‘We’ve got 10 guys out as well ... but on the positive side we’re getting a lot of guys exposed to rugby they wouldn’t necessarily be exposed to, and we’ll be better for that.’’
Just how much better we may not know till 2019 in Japan. Remember, no-one plays the long game quite like Hansen.
"We need to take it out of the referee's hands, and we need to be better at what we do." Ian Foster, All Blacks assistant coach, above
‘‘We need to take it out of the referee’s hands, and we need to be better at what we do.’’
In other words, the All Blacks need to be less cynical, more clinical. That’s been the big focus this week, with attitude fingered as a shortcoming in Edinburgh, and now discipline.
Foster wasn’t making excuses, but he pointed out that last week, with its Paris-lyon-edinburgh route, was ‘‘unique’’, and might have challenged a few minds with the disruption to the normal test buildup.
‘‘Large parts we felt we got right ... but we probably didn’t finish any of those games to the degree we wanted to.
‘‘Did we prepare well? I think we did. Did we prepare as well as we could? Probably not. The fact we were up 12 against Scotland with five minutes to go, and opened the door was frustrating.
‘‘It’s not a matter of pulling the whole game apart. It’s figuring out what the critical parts are we need to sort out. This week we’d quite like to start a little bit better and finish a bit better. Smart idea, eh?’’