Poor All Blacks come up Donald Trumps
The big question for Steve Hansen now is should some of them start?
Japan rattled South Africa by smashing them north of the gain line and competing hard for the turnover ball. For the first 60 minutes of the match the All Blacks were too passive. They made very few dominant tackles and they rarely went in after the ball. It is going to be hard to win a World Cup if you sit back and let the other side play.
Richie McCaw said after the match: ‘‘We have to assess where we are at. We have to make a lot of improvements.’’
The most obvious place where Hansen needs to make changes is in the front row. The All Blacks scrummage was dominated by Argentina. Tony Woodcock is a fading force and Owen Franks is perhaps the weakest link in the side. Whenever Argentina squeezed, the All Blacks crumpled. Physically they were dominated at times.
It is not just the front row’s scrummaging that is a problem, it is their tackling. The top teams will have noticed that the two props present the weakest seam in defence. Franks again failed to fill the inside hole when the All Blacks were stretched and missed a couple of glaring tackles. Surely this has gone on too long.
The other ongoing worry is Kieran Read. The No 8 was one of the great players in the world a couple of years ago. He then suffered a sickeningly severe concussion and has never again reached the same heights. There are sporadic moments in the game when Read makes mistakes that he never used to. It is as if he cannot quite sustain his levels of concentration over 80 minutes.
When the All Blacks were under the pump towards the end of the first half Read missed a straightforward tackle on the Argentine ball carrier. He scrambled to recover but when the Pumas drove again they scored over the top of Read’s second ineffectual tackle.
Read also dropped a ball in contact when the All Blacks looked like scoring. The most worrying part of that was it was not as if he had been hit by one of the Argentina mastodons. He was hit by a winger. Not a good look for a No 8.
McCaw has much to think about, not least the need for a charm offensive. His team needs to wow the crowds in the next couple of weeks. McCaw’s sly trip on Juan Martin Fernandez Lobbe was a disgrace. It was unworthy of the man and will now give Britain the villain that it wants for the tournament.
Chelsea manager Jose Mourinho, the master of the dark arts, was watching in the stand. What would he have said about McCaw’s trip? ‘‘I don’t know what the controversy was. For me there was no controversy. Normally the best team wins and we were the best.’’
No, sorry, Mourinho just said that after Chelsea’s win over Arsenal. McCaw of course was far more polite, praising the 90,000 Wembley crowd at the same time as they were giving him the bird.
Now might be the time for some humour from the New Zealand team. Mourinho does siege mentality, but that attitude has hurt the All Blacks in the past. Britain will now be gunning for New Zealand and their captain. They need to smile. It’s time to lighten up and get amongst the people.
McCaw needs to look into the lens, raise an eyebrow and say how much he is enjoying the trip.