Goodhue, centre of attention
The race between the All Blacks midfielders to grab a starting spot is like one of those contests involving the great mare Winx.
There are some great contenders, and then there’s Jack Goodhue.
It really is that simple. It may not be reflected in the All Blacks’ selections this weekend, with Sonny Bill Williams and Ryan Crotty also holding obvious attractions, but the form horse is the Northlander.
In fact, Goodhue holds the distinction of being the only All Black among the top 10 players in five key Rugby Championship attacking categories – tries scored, offloads, metres carried, clean breaks and defenders beaten.
He has beaten more defenders than Beauden Barrett and scored more tries than Ben Smith. Those statistics don’t even take into account the opportunities he has set up for others.
Like all youngsters, there is a bump or two on the track ahead for Goodhue.
He’ll have to overcome those at some point of his career but at the moment he is making the difficult look easy and has the potential to take the All Blacks’ game forward in the same way Karl Tu’inukuafe can on the loosehead side of the scrum.
Tu’inukuafe’s trademarks might be his moustache and massive scrummaging but his ball-carrying might round out a trifecta: he’s like a big boulder rolling down a steep hill.
As for Goodhue there was a moment in the game against Argentina that really stood out – when he fended off defenders with different arms on the same run and still kept the legs pumping.
With due respect to Conrad Smith, whom Goodhue has been compared to, Smith was never the attacking threat that Goodhue is.
In some ways they are completely different footballers.
Goodhue played on the wing at times for the 2015 New Zealand under 20s in a team that featured TJ Faiane and Anton Lienert-Brown in the midfield, and while he has probably given up a bit of pace for size since then (he also suffered a serious knee injury in 2015) he’s still athletically blessed.
Some grumble about a lack of topend pace.
Perhaps this goes back to being beaten on the outside by Ben Lam in Wellington earlier this year. But be fair – give Lam some grass to gallop into and no one is catching him.
Goodhue also has something that ‘quicker’ players would swap their fast-twitch fibres for. Along with Damian McKenzie, no one hits the ball better than Goodhue.
Perhaps the All Blacks will go back to Williams and Crotty as a partnership this weekend, when they name their team today. They invested a lot of faith in it last year.
However, with No 12 being Crotty’s best position the All Blacks can get most attacking uplift from changing the picture at No 13. That’s part of what makes Goodhue so appealing.
Has the time come to make the first big unforced selection shift in 2018 and revisit the pecking order in midfield?
* Stats provided by Opta