SAM’S BIG TEST
All Blacks block out the critics, writes Gregor Paul
The message is so consistent over such a long period that it must be true that the All Blacks don’t feel or react much, if at all, to external pressure. Ask any of the regulars of the past 20 years and they all say the same thing — that the pressure they feel comes from within.
The emphatic performances that have tended to follow a defeat or sequence of defeats are not the consequence of social media badgering or media critiques.
The outside world can rage against the machine and mostly it will be white noise, if any kind of noise at all, within the team. That’s how it has been for an age and certainly how it is now.
As senior lock Sam Whitelock said yesterday, he learned as a young All Black to ignore what was written and said about him and the team. When he first came into the team, he was an avid follower of media but it sent him up and down emotionally — confused him when he came off the field feeling he’d played poorly and the next day he’d read a glowing review, and likewise, it was unsettling to have his coaches patting him on the back for a job well done and column inches devoted to his inadequacies. So he did what most long-serving All Blacks have done the past two decades and shut out the outside world in test weeks — throw away the phone, leave the newspaper unread and don’t turn on the TV or radio. There’s a purity to that in regard to the pressure it builds because the only judge is the expectations that the team sets itself. The one noise the All Blacks can’t block out is the voice inside themselves, telling them from the heart when they have failed to deliver on the standards they have set.
That’s the most powerful driver in all of international rugby — the All Blacks’ collective conscience, because it refuses to allow them to accept mediocrity or ignore failure.
For the past 10 days or so, the discomfort inside the team has been acute and that has nothing to do with public pressure and everything to do with a highly-driven group knowing they didn’t play anywhere near the standard they can. And that’s where the pressure is coming from and why there needs to be a response this week against the Pumas.
There are a few big-name players whose reputation won’t necessarily withstand a third consecutive poor performance. Another shocker in Sydney, and the summer will be hot and bothersome for a few senior players who have gone missing in the last two tests.
Whitelock is one in that category. He was excellent in the record win against the Wallabies and has played well all year, but he looked tired in Brisbane and even more tired against the Pumas.
It would be reassuring for everyone if he could not only find some more dynamism in his ball carrying in this final test, but also get back to being the aggressive lineout force he was in 2015.
At his peak, Whitelock wasn’t just a ball winner, he was a ball stealer, and the All Blacks will go a long way towards breaking the spirit of the Pumas if they can disrupt their possession from the touchline.
Patrick Tuipulotu is in much the same boat as Whitelock. He might not even start this week, given how quiet and inaccurate he was against the Pumas, but if he does, the destructive ball carrying that defined his Super Rugby season needs to be rediscovered and a sharp reminder provided that he can be a damaging force at the highest level.
Ardie Savea’s path to being considered one of the best in history is currently blocked by his inconsistency. Brilliant one week, quiet the next — that pattern doesn’t work for the All Blacks and he’s been told as much.
Dane Coles needs to find a way to bring all his competitive edge but not let it descend into indiscipline. There’s no more room for dumb acts.
And Beauden Barrett needs to find a way into the game no matter how it is playing out. A bit of brilliance is overdue. A bit of control and accuracy is also overdue and Barrett, like all his team-mates, understands this perfectly without ever having to read it here.