All Blacks wary of effects of rust
Rust never sleeps – but neither do the All Blacks. Steve Hansen’s men take the first step down their World Cup yellow brick road against France tonight at Eden Park intent on unleashing a modernised game equipped to handle the in-your-face defensive lines ubiquitous in test rugby.
Of course there will be rust. There always is in June. This is their first match of the season. They have been together less than a week. A couple of brief mini-camps in the midst of Super Rugby were helpful, but cannot stave off the corrosion process.
This will not be the free-flowing All Blacks of the Rugby Championship or, hopefully, those seismic clashes of the hemispheres at Twickenham and the Aviva Stadium in November. That is inevitable.
The All Blacks, even with a relatively settled group, will take time to get the parts all operating in unison. That process has been aided by picking relatively established combinations. The back three has a fresh look about it, but the Ryan CrottyAnton Lienert-Brown midfield has played plenty of test rugby together, as has the Aaron Smith-Beauden Barrett halves combination.
Up front Luke Whitelock and Liam Squire know each other’s games backwards, and an allCrusaders front five should ensure the set piece is fluent.
And, let’s face it, these blokes have had plenty of rugby under their belts this year, and are, for the most part, playing very, very well. Props Joe Moody and Owen Franks are the exceptions in terms of time in the saddle, and new skip Sam Whitelock and Crotty are just back from head knock spells. Their minutes may have to be managed.
Then there’s this new playing style to be bedded in. It’s a process. And in no way will what we see tonight against the French be anything resembling how the All Blacks will play in Japan in 18 months.
With just a week’s buildup, Hansen has truncated the tactical tweaks as much as possible. Some new principles are in place, but the subtleties are yet to be installed.
‘‘Our job has been to create a week where we haven’t overcluttered our guys, and I think we’ve been successful with that,’’ Hansen said. ‘‘The camps have been useful in getting work done we haven’t had to do this week. But we haven’t tried to go too fast; we’ve tried to crawl before we walk, and walk before we run.’’
That was endorsed by first fiveeighth