At a glance

All Blacks: Damian Mckenzie, Nehe Milner-skudder, Ryan Crotty, Sonny Bill Williams, Rieko Ioane, Beauden Barrett, Aaron Smith, Kieran Read (c), Sam Cane, Liam Squire, Scott Barrett, Sam Whitelock, Nepo Laulala, Dane Coles, Kane Hames. Reserves: Codie Taylor, Wyatt Crockett. Ofa Tu’ungafasi, Patrick Tuipulotu, Matt Todd, Tawera Kerr-barlow, Lima Sopoaga, David Havili. opportunities in those games at some point.’’

In the meantime, Matt Todd is the reserve loose forward, with Patrick Tuipulotu again the spare lock. Tawera Kerr-barlow is Aaron Smith’s halfback back-up, with Sopoaga assuming the spot Ngani Laumape had on last week’s bench.

Hansen said there was nothing that could be read into the omissions of TJ Perenara and Anton Lienert-brown, other than that it was their turn to rest. ‘‘They’ll be back in.’’

On the back of a tough 36-10 win over Argentina in Buenos Aires, and plenty of travel, this week is regarded as the most difficult on the All Blacks’ schedule. That’s where Whitelock, Cane, Crotty, Squire and Sopoaga come in.

‘‘They’re a lot fresher and they’re excited to be here,’’ said Hansen of the five players given the Buenos Aires leg off.

‘‘Whenever you’re not in the group, and come back into it, you can noticeably tell people have missed it and aren’t taking it for granted.

‘‘That freshen up for them has worked well for us because they’ve just lifted everybody else up.

‘‘We’ve had a good week. Whilst we haven’t sweated a lot, we’ve done some good work on getting our clarity done and a lot of relationship meetings and a lot of mental stuff done for getting that clarity that you need to be able to hook into it on Saturday.’’