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Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors
By Ben Smith
The All Blacks three tries to one victory over England came with plenty of missed opportunities as errors and handling plagued the side when searching for the final touch.
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The visitors finished with 23 turnovers lost as they chanced their arm with a lot of ball-in-hand rugby against England’s defence.
When they did find open pasture, often through workhorse Wallace Sititi who made three line breaks, they weren’t able to make England pay often squandering the opportunity with turnovers or kicks that weren’t regathered.
There was audacious rugby at times, with Will Jordan attempting an offload coming out of his 22 that fell short of Ardie Savea running on his inside hip. The turnover gave England prime attacking ball which was celebrated widely by their forwards.
Head coach Scott Robertson was consistent in his message, backing his players decision-making and instinctual reads but also said it’s bigger than that, forming the identity of New Zealand rugby.
“If you see it, do it, back yourself,” Robertson told media.
“I think, it’s part of our skill set and part of our DNA, you know, we want to play footy, if it’s on we will take the opportunity in front of us.
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“We’ve got some great tries and but more importantly, showed a lot of grit to stay in that from behind.”
Part of overplaying led to the deficit New Zealand fell into, with attacking from within their own half leading to cheap turnovers and scoring opportunities for England, while their one try came from a Marcus Smith intercept that flipped the game on it’s head.
Robertson admitted that some of their play wasn’t good enough at this level, but he didn’t want his team to stop taking opportunities when they see something on.
“Understand why we’ve sort of made that error. But like I said, because you can see it, let’s do that,” Robertson.
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“You know times this year, we haven’t trusted ourselves. We did a couple of new kicks to shape the backfield. Some came off, some didn’t, it let us get some kick meters later on.
“But, you know, keeping the ball alive is pretty important in our game. And some came off, some didn’t, but we will always keep fine tuning it.
“Some of the stuff’s not good enough for Test level, we’ll be honest in our review, even though we’ve got the result, we’ll still go deep.”
Captain Scott Barrett was happy with the endeavour shown by the team to keep attacking despite falling behind by eight points at one stage.
“I think we potentially just played a little bit more than rugby than them,” he said.
“There was a few arm wrestles, but yeah, I was pleased with how we just our endeavour to play, and that created an opportunity with Mark to put us in front.”
As they prepare to face Ireland in Dublin this Friday night, Robertson concedes that they will have to be better.
“We need to tidy up that discipline, some execution errors, but keep creating, keep being brave. It’s small margins but we will definitely have to be better.”
Keep at it boys. We can forgive errors when they’re having a go.
They will get there .... Almost I feel
Agree with Razor, keep playing to our DNA
The ABs attacking game is totally chaotic at the moment. Robertson is over-indexing the tries we have scored attacking from behind the gain line, and the opposition they were scored against.
Sititi demonstrated the best of it against England. He took a chance from inside the 22 when there was a very clear opportunity with very little downside - A developing gap, a disconnected defensive line, and a player he knew he could beat. Will Jordan, Clarke, and a couple of others demonstrated the worst of it, essentially backing themselves to pull off some magic in a 50/50 situation with big downside risk.
At times they seem unwilling to accept the defences in international games are better than SR, and are often designed to lure them into the type of amateur gambles they are taking. When the defenders are numbered up, with little space to play with and the backfield well covered pushing 2 more passes wider is relying on a basic defensive error happening to not put them team under huge pressure.
Every time we play rugby behind the gain line it goes badly. It feels like this should be a simple thing to coach but it's not a lesson we have learned in 9 outings so far this year. Razor seems to be alluding to it in his comments, but the players are consistently doing the exact opposite.
We will have to be twice as good this week to not get rolled by 20+ vs. Ireland.
Agreed, I'm getting sick of poor field position that's been created with little dink kicks, etc. Need to go back to really working hard to be inside the opposition half.
Agree with regard to WillJordan’s offload, tha offload wasn’t really on.
Depends on conditions but when the All Blacks get this style of play firing they can potentially put anyone away by 20 +points.
That’s worth the risk. They just need better skill execution and they won’t improve that by playing with fear or hesitation.
“Pick up your sack and have a crack” as one of my old coaches used to say.
Very poor understanding of what is going on, and 0 understanding of what makes NZ good at rugby.
The team is finally starting to show its identity, which isn't playing behind the gainline, but rather in front of it. Offloads and flowing rugby, drawing defenders, and quick simople hands, along with a little flair, is how the ABs are shaping up to play.
And it works. Everytime the ABs get an offload, there is usually an overlap outside of them due to the extra defenders drawn in, and now they are having issues with making use of those chances.
Its more muscle memory from the players during the Foster era than it is to do with Razor.
Also, expect some big changes, but also better oppurtunities against Ireland. Ireland are not as quick on the rush (since they aren't always offside) and rely a lot on their lineout, which we should be able to damage since we have so many defensive operators.
Either way, I like the way the ABs are tracking, puting up strong showings against good opposition, good player finds this season, and, most importantly, learning lessons and building identity.
The game, and razor's comments are a damning indictment of our lack of a proper test match 10. This isn't sevens or a game of touch down the park. BB and DMac can both run brilliantly but have really aimless tactical kicking games. Game management is sorely lacking.
Beauty kicked really well in the first half tactically. Listen to some of the English and Irish analysis Jonny Holland on RTE did a great analysis and so did Ben Youngs on For the Love of Rugby.
Did you watch the game.or just a sore loser
Need Richie Mo, or maybe Ruben Love next season depending on how he is going. Plummer is possibly the most boring 10 we have, but he does manage a game pretty well.
It is great to see Robertson on the world stage as he's a revelation in his conversation, really unique. An absolute enthusiast for the game.
What's truly remarkable though is his teams are becoming known for literally playing ninety percent of the games best and worst elements. Like a rugby version of the Harlem Globetrotters mixed with a bunch of talented ten year olds.
In many ways sides like England this weekend are bystanders, they may as well be joining the spectators in the stands for seventy five minutes and be subbed with fifteen club players.
The solid lead built with power and pace would've been larger but so too would've been the inevitable collapse and loss of the lead.
England could then come back on and play five minutes to decide the contest.
How long before the Allblacks play a professional grade eighty minutes?
Do you want them to play as professionally as England and lose? Im very happy with the way they are trying to play. In that last match they score if Sititi gets his pass right, If Clarke could have linked better with one of his runs and if Ioane's offload had gone to hand also. 11 test in to a completely new playing system, coaching system, player selections etc... Im pleased so far and cant wait till they get better at what they are doing.
And what do you call a professional grade. Explain how you would coach them. It's very obvious you've been there done that. So let us all into your secret
ABs are currently playing the Baz Ball of rugby. Highly commendable but naive with the exact results you would expect.
We need to develop a plan to get possession of ball in good field position. We do not have one at the moment and it is hurting us badly.
Ire, Sa & Fra would've put this DIRE All Black team away in the first 40.
Terrible handling & discipline. England playing exactly like a team 5th in the rankings.
So is that why SA had to rely on a ref and TMO not seeing a blatent knock-on for them to beat THIS ABs side? Must have been a DIRE SA team.
Whos your team bud? Assume SA
England have got the opposite problems but the same challenges. It's no wonder so few points separate these two teams at the moment.