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Former All Black No 10 throws support behind Mo'unga as 'number one' option

(Photo by Joe Allison/Getty Images)

Former All Black first five-eighth Carlos Spencer has backed Richie Mo’unga as his ‘number one’ option for the All Blacks‘ World Cup bid later this year in France.

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The 35-Test All Black, who took the side through the 2003 World Cup, has seen enough from the early rounds of Super Rugby Pacific to hand the No 10 jersey to Mo’unga.

The Crusaders pivot was the All Black five-eighth in Japan at the 2019 event which ended with a semi-final defeat to England.

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“I have already got confidence to pick my number one right now – and that’s Richie,” Spencer said on Sky Sport NZ’s The Breakdown show.

“I just think he’s earned that. I think he’s the form first-five at the moment and has been all year, for me.”

“He’s [Mo’unga] more of a threat. Beauden to me at the moment looks hesitant. He is lacking a little bit of confidence.

“It looks like to me he doesn’t want to take contact, so he is not taking the ball to the line.”

Spencer’s backline selection would include Chiefs playmaker Damian McKenzie at fullback, pairing up a Mo’unga-McKenzie axis that has not been seen yet for the All Blacks.

In 2018 a Barrett-McKenzie option was used but a serious knee injury to McKenzie for the Chiefs derailed the All Blacks plans for 2019.

That opened the door for Mo’unga to move into the starting side, shifting Barrett back to fullback for the World Cup.

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“Okay, Damian has been pretty good as well but I think we have to go for an outright first-five with the World Cup,” he said.

“But in saying that I would also like to also have D-Mac there, on the pitch as well, as my second No 10 but playing at fullback.

“We can set up a double-sided attack with those two either side.”

The former Blues great would select Barrett on the bench to steady the ship where needed and bring his experience closing out games.

“Beaudie has got to be in there somewhere,” Spencer added.

“I think we are going to need that experience, we are going to need his composure, we are going to need his leadership.

“Especially in big games and tight games.”

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J
JW 27 minutes ago
How law changes are speeding up the game - but the scrum lags behind

Very good, now we are getting somewhere (though you still didn't answer the question but as you're a South African I think we can all assume what the answer would be if you did lol)! Now let me ask you another question, and once you've answered that to yourself, you can ask yourself a followup question, to witch I'm intrigued to know the answer.


Well maybe more than a couple of questions, just to be clear. What exactly did this penalty stop you from doing the the first time that you want to try again? What was this offence that stopped you doing it? Then ask yourself how often would this occur in the game. Now, thinking about the regularity of it and compare it to how it was/would be used throughout the rest of the game (in cases other than the example you gave/didn't give for some unknown reason).


What sort of balance did you find?


Now, we don't want to complicate things further by bringing into the discussion points Bull raised like 'entirety' or 'replaced with a ruck', so instead I'll agree that if we use this article as a trigger to expanding our opinions/thoughts, why not allow a scrum to be reset if that is what they(you) want? Stopping the clock for it greatly removes the need to stop 5 minutes of scrum feeds happening. Fixing the law interpretations (not incorrectly rewarding the dominant team) and reducing the amount of offences that result in a penalty would greatly reduce the amount of repeat scrums in the first place. And now that refs a card happy, when a penalty offence is committed it's going to be far more likely it results in the loss of a player, then the loss of scrums completely and instead having a 15 on 13 advantage for the scrum dominant team to then run their opposition ragged. So why not take the scrum again (maybe you've already asked yourself that question by now)?


It will kind be like a Power Play in Hockey. Your outlook here is kind of going to depend on your understanding of what removing repeat scrums was put in place for, but I'm happy the need for it is gone in a new world order. As I've said on every discussion on this topic, scrums are great, it is just what they result in that hasn't been. Remove the real problem and scrum all you like. The All Blacks will love zapping that energy out of teams.

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