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'A lot of tweaks': All Blacks confident in rejuvenated game plan against Springboks

Rieko Ioane and Jordie Barrett In Cardiff. Photo by Ryan Hiscott/Getty Images

The All Blacks dominated Los Pumas in the opening 40 minutes of their 2023 international season, pulling out to a 31-0 lead at the halftime break. The win kicks a World Cup year off on a positive note for the New Zealanders and showcased some different tactical play from what we saw from the team last year.

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It was a turbulent 2022 season for the team but one where a new coaching staff gradually implemented their expertise and vision for the World Cup. Now, with a full offseason to develop that vision, Ian Foster has a team starting to connect those dots on the field.

The midfield partnership of Jordie Barrett and Rieko Ioane looks to be locked in as the future centrepiece of the backline and the pair put in an impressive performance in Mendoza.

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Ioane credited the coaches and the playmakers for masterminding and executing the game plan.

“There have definitely been a lot of tweaks from last year to this year, and it’s things we identified as a team towards the end of the year, and the start of our year,” he said.

“Schmidty [Joe Schmidt] and Foz [Foster] are at the forefront of that, and they’re really leading the charge. And like I said before, our game drivers…Richie, DMac and Baz bossing us around, they’re masters of their craft and we’re just trying to play off of them.”

As for the midfield partnership, Ioane was pleased with how his latest inside half was going after playing alongside a number of midfield options since claiming the No 13 jersey.

“It’s good,” Ioane said of the partnership. “Jordie’s an outstanding player and last Saturday was no different. You saw the type of player he is, very physical and very confrontational.

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“I’ve always said that it helps my game as a No 13, because we’re two bigger bodies, and I’m sure that’s what the coaches expect from us.

“He was phenomenal last week and looking forward to it.”

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Round two of The Rugby Championship offers the crème de la crème of southern hemisphere rugby, a battle between the two sides who have won the most Rugby World Cups and boast a fierce rivalry, South Africa and New Zealand.

The Springboks opted for a split-squad approach to The Rugby Championship schedule meaning much of the team they’ve named for the match has been in New Zealand preparing since last Tuesday.

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The All Blacks are boosted by the return to fitness of Will Jordan and Mark Telea, while Leicester Fainga’anuku and Sam Whitelock remain questionable.

An impressive outing from the Springboks backline in Pretoria spoke to the depth and talent the South Africans possess, Ioane though shared no doubt his teammates had the skill to go toe to toe with the World Champs.

“Hopefully we can post 40 again, that would be good,” Ioane said. “But I’m not too sure what’s going to unfold, but we know that both teams are preparing to put out their best performance, and hopefully it’s a cracker.

“I don’t watch too much footy, but definitely their wingers…I think [Moodie] played against us last year and caused us a bit of havoc under the high ball.

“We’re going to have things in place to counter that, but we don’t look too much at individuals, as we do team v team, and I back our boys.”

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2 Comments
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Helmut 481 days ago

Post 40 again? You will eat those words.

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Flankly 1 hour ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

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N
Nickers 1 hour ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

Very poor understanding of what's going on and 0 ability to read. When I say playing behind the gain line you take this to mean all off-loads and site times we are playing in front of the gain line???


Every time we play a lot of rugby behind the gain line (for clarity, meaning trying to build an attack and use width without front foot ball 5m+ behind the most recent breakdown) we go backwards and turn the ball over in some way. Every time a player is tackled behind the most recent breakdown you need more and more people to clear out because your forwards have to go back around the corner, whereas opposition players can keep moving forward. Eventually you run out of either players to clear out or players to pass to and the result in a big net loss of territory and often a turnover. You may have witnessed that 20+ times in the game against England. This is a particularly dumb idea inside your own 40m which is where, for some reason, we are most likely to employ it.


The very best ABs teams never built an identity around attacking from poor positions. The DC era team was known for being the team that kicked the most. To engineer field position and apply pressure, and create broken play to counter attack. This current team is not differentiating between when a defence has lost it's structure and there are opportunities, and when they are completely set and there is nothing on. The reason they are going for 30 minute + periods in every game without scoring a single point, even against Japan and a poor Australian team, is because they are playing most of their rugby on the back foot in the wrong half.

43 Go to comments
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