Naholo mixes thrills, spills with a key try
at Eden Park Waisake Naholo doesn’t do dull, at least not on the evidence of last night’s test against Wales.
In a performance that matched sensational efforts with moments when he appeared all at sea — especially under the high ball in the still night air above Eden Park — Naholo made a bit of a mixed bag of his second test in New Zealand, and fourth altogether.
He was in the spotlight so often it seemed inevitable he would play a part in the dying moments of this match, and so it proved. Naholo took Aaron Smith’s quick tap as the game entered its final quarter and bowled through Welsh first-five Dan Biggar to score the try which gave the All Blacks a lead they never lost.
His mate on the left wing, Julian Savea, was also a bit hot and cold, but it was the No 14 from the Highlanders who really caught the eye, either by gliding past his opposite with the merest hint of a head fake and a whole lot of pace in his grey-and-salmon-coloured boots, or by dropping the ball cold with no one around him.
The All Blacks’ first movement of the match had them steaming up the field, with Naholo on the right and in space, only for lock Brodie Retallick to dummy and burrow his head in a group of red jerseys.
Naholo threw up his hands in despair.
It signalled the start of a few difficulties laced with moments of pure sensation.
Apart from his show of strength in dotting the ball on the line through Biggar’s attempted tackle, the 25-year-old’s next best moment was when he finished off Ben Smith’s superb break. His Highlanders teammate had leapt for the ball in his own territory then shot past the Wales defenders like a bullet from a gun, before Aaron Cruden provided the pass on the inside for Naholo to beat the scrambling Welsh defence.
That sequence occurred before he came in off his wing and was caught in no-man’s land to provide the space for Taulupe Faletau to score in the corner, and before he again made an outside break only to ignore the call from his mate Smith on the inside, unmarked and 5m from the line.
The 43rd-minute replacement of Savea by Beauden Barrett, therefore, was a bit of a surprise. Savea was caught out a few times on the left by George North, but had had his moments, including a try from
Cruden’s pinpoint bomb. Barrett went to fullback, with Smith moving to the right wing and Naholo swapping to the left.
He missed a kick up the left sideline on attack which went into touch but, fortunately for him and his team, passed a test under the high ball straight after. There was almost an audible sigh of relief from the crowd of 46,000.
With the All Blacks down, every mistake was magnified by Welsh pressure, so his success at defusing the bomb was imperative.
He got outside fullback Liam Williams only to be dragged into touch by hooker Ken Owens, but then came his big moment, a show of pace, strength and confidence that perhaps proved coach Steve Hansen was right to leave him out there.