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Michael Hooper reacts to Scott Barrett’s controversial late-game call
By Finn Morton
Wallabies great Michael Hooper was asked to comment on All Blacks captain Scott Barrett’s controversial call in the nail-biting 30-29 loss to France. New Zealand were awarded a penalty with about six minutes left, and what happened next has generated a lot of debate.
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Damian McKenzie had already kept the All Blacks in the fight after converting three penalty shots at goal after being injected into the Test off the pine. In the 74th minute, the replacement lined up another pivotal shot at goal with the visitors trailing by four points at the time.
McKenzie sent the ball through the middle of the uprights, which set the stage for a grandstand finish between two international rugby heavyweight contenders. But it wasn’t all sunshine and rainbows, with the three points on the scoreboard coming with a sense of risk.
France sent the restart deep into the All Blacks’ half, and the visitors wouldn’t emerge from their side of the field in the final five minutes of play. Les Bleus’ wall-like defence stood tall while the All Blacks were instead left desperate for a moment of heroics from one of their own.
With time up on the clock, fullback Will Jordan was held up by some French defenders before the ball was deemed unplayable from the maul. That brought an end to the match, and so too the All Blacks’ hopes of going unbeaten on their blockbuster Northern Tour.
“Yeah I mean, we’ll never know, that’s the thing that sucks,” Hooper said on Stan Sports’ Between Two Posts when asked about whether the All Blacks should’ve kicked for touch instead of taking the shot at goal.
“I’m sure they’re probably saying now, ‘Now that we know the result, maybe we should have kicked to touch.’
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“But what if they take that three points, all they’ve got to do is get down within 50 again and they’ve got another shot at the victory which is probably a higher probability than scoring a try sometimes from 20 out.
“But we’ll never know.”
As Hooper suggested, hindsight is a fascinating concept. Barrett could’ve been looked at as a captaincy genius if the All Blacks had scored after kicking for touch, just as he would’ve been criticised for not taking the points on offer if they had turned down the shot at goal.
It was clear not long after full-time that this was going to be a big talking point of the All Blacks’ next Test against Italy, with coach Scott Robertson addressing the moment during a post-game interview on the Sky Sport NZ broadcast.
“I’ll talk to Scott (Barrett) a little more about it,” ‘Razor’ said. “It was his call.” Barrett was also asked about the moment during the post-match press conference, with the skipper admitting he was “really torn” about what decision to make in that moment.
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“You kick that penalty goal then you’re one scoring play,” former Wallaby Morgan Turinui added on Stan Sport.
“Even when they’re on their own line, two metres out from their own try line after the bell trying to punch away, they know if they can get anywhere near halfway and get a penalty, they can win the game so it does do that.
“There had to have been a moment where they thought, ‘We can win the game here but going to the corner.’ There are lots of little decisions in the backend of that game too that decided the winner but also saying that France were very well deserving winners.”
The All Blacks had beaten Eddie Jones’ Japan, England and Ireland since leaving New Zealand’s shores for their end-of-year tour. Following the loss to France in Paris, they’ve already turned their attention towards an upcoming clash with Italy in cold conditions.
Go behind the scenes of both camps during the British and Irish Lions tour of South Africa in 2021. Binge watch exclusively on RugbyPass TV now
The dominant pack should be enforcing their superiority with maximum points and the psychological advantage of taking the lead.
You don’t get that by saying we’ll settle for three and try again you get it by scoring seven and trying again. Doesn’t come off every time?
No.
But if you’ve asserted dominance letting the opposition off and not trying to build a double score difference is wrong minded.
All blacks have traditionally played to build the unassailable lead not meekly win a single point victory.
kick for touch ....try to get a win . if didn't get the try then its all the forward team fault 😅 ...but at least we would be having this talk about SB decision making 🙃
Pure and simple, the kick was the right option - statistically, it's far more likely to get a penalty anywhere in the opposition 50, than it is to score a try
Eddie Jones ..still coaching England?
There is a lot of discussion about the penalty in the 73rd minute and the decision to go for the posts. What about the penalties awarded to NZ in the 52nd, 61st and 66th minutes?
In those instances, they were behind by 3 points, 7 points and 3 points, respectively. In all of those opportunities, NZ was deep in French territory and was breaking the line with relative ease. Every time they were in the French 22, they took the easy option with the 3 points. A try was needed to take the lead and apply scoreboard pressure. And it felt like if they just kept the pressure on in the French 22, it was going to come.
But instead, the cycle kept repeating where NZ took the 3, France kicked deep into NZ territory and got unlucky with dubious calls against them (2 by the TMO), which kept them in front.
Scott Barrett is a great player but lacks the confidence to be captain. It was so obvious in real time that they were the wrong calls, and that's why Razor berated him in the immediate on-field interview.
Lose by 4 instead of 1 doesn't make a lot of difference. A kick to the corner would at the very least set up a try scoring opportunity. In actual fact it was TMO interference that cost NZ this game. I would love to see a referee overrule an over officious TMO intrusion occasionally.
He actually did just that on one of NZ's final possessions - the one that results in the break down the left hand field when Jordan throws the intercept that the ABs win back immediately, the TMO was calling the ref back for an NZ infringement at the previous ruck and he just completely ignored him and played on. Had the ABs scored from that play and won it would have been very contentious.
Why can't any rugby analyst remember the final 6 minutes of play? After exchanging kicks we broke their line and got into their half, Jordan had 1 man to beat with Clarke outside and threw it to a Frenchman. We then won the ruck and had numbers wide to the right only for rieko to drop it cold. The revisionist history is astounding.
Exactly, we marched straight back into their half and but for Jordan throwing that poor pass, and the Reiko/BB knock on, we are in possession in their 22 as a worse case scenario, but if either of those had gone to hand more likely we score of that play.
Against SA, Ireland, or even England who use more aggressive defence it might have been a better option to go for the corner because it's harder to get back down field against those teams, but France are way more passive on D and we had been carrying for big meters all night.
We were also owning their scrum, so even a knock on could have resulted in a penalty.
Well said. The old saying, if the dog hadn't stopped to s..t it would have caught the hare.