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Slaughtering the Wallabies will make the All Blacks real contenders
Eddie Jones is half-right.
Jones, the Wallabies coach, was quoted this week saying the All Blacks haven’t been put under pressure in the opening two rounds of The Rugby Championship.
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He’s spot on there.
Argentina were blown away in Mendoza, while the greatest pressure exerted upon the All Blacks against South Africa came from themselves.
Having led 20-3 at halftime and played genuinely scintillating rugby, the All Blacks went defensive. From tearing the Springboks apart by having men and the ball in motion, New Zealand invited their opponents into the game by kicking the pill away and allowing a stop-start, set-piece orientated game to replace it.
It’s to the All Blacks’ great credit that they weathered the South African comeback, but they could have killed the game off much sooner than they eventually did.
Where Jones is wrong, is in his belief that the Wallabies can apply a type of pressure that Argentina and South Africa has not.
Australia is not a good side and the All Blacks should beat them comfortably in Melbourne on Saturday night.
The only pressure on New Zealand is the fact they know that too.
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I’ll be intrigued to see how the All Blacks go.
I was pleasantly surprised by the ferocity and skill of their performance against the Pumas.
Thinking back, I shouldn’t have been taken aback.
This team needed to put a marker down, if it was to have any hope at this year’s Rugby World Cup. It had to show it’s no pushover and that opposing teams won’t be able to dictate terms.
The All Blacks never allowed Argentina into the contest, demonstrating the immense desire the team clearly has to impose itself this year.
Against South Africa, they were too quick, too clever and too relentless at the breakdown to ever be in danger of losing.
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Again, to me, that showed the hunger of this All Blacks side.
The Springboks, if not quite the absolute benchmark, are regarded as an elite side. Pummeling the Pumas was one thing, but New Zealand had to show it can play that calibre of rugby against a world cup contender.
In the process, they perhaps showed this Springboks squad is slightly on the decline.
Australia is harder.
They are nowhere near a benchmark side. They might be a storied foe, but they don’t appear to be much competition at the moment.
In international rugby, where the margin between good and average is a fine one, that presents a challenge for the All Blacks.
So I want to see them be ruthless on Saturday. To treat Australia as a team of consequence, rather than one in the midst of a massive rebuild.
If mentally the All Blacks aren’t quite at the level they were against Argentina and South Africa, then winning at the Melbourne Cricket Ground might prove more difficult than it needs to be.
But if the All Blacks can dispose of Australia in an emphatic fashion, then I might have to take back some of the unkind things I’ve written and declare them absolute world cup contenders.
I neither need to see nor want to see a slaughter of the Wallabies to affirm the All Blacks are world cup contenders.
An accurate, disciplined, clinical performance will be more impressive than piling on a big score.
If the All Blacks can finish the test as emphatically as they've started the last two then we'll know they've selected a better bench.
All Blacks will have been boosted by resisting the Springboks second half fightback, they know they can defend an early lead.
If they demonstrate the ruthless instinct, the best teams are characterised by, they will know they can keep the squeeze on the opposition.
We need to smash them because the Springboks should demolish Argentina and collect lots of bonus points - if we lose they win the RC and that is NOT what anyone wants moving toward the World Cup. However just look at last years match [https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KI4EXwjZzZE]k] they have some world class players and Skelton is a monster. Koroibete and Kerevi are very very good. Will test us
Haha this article is hilarious. I was wondering to myself reading some of the wording in here "which icon of All Black rugby wrote this?"
Oh, a journalist. LolFor most of the ABvBok game it appeared the ABs were under so much pressure they had to kick constantly. If that part of their game wasn't on song I think the Boks could have had a comeback in that game.
The notion that the All Blacks ‘went defensive’ and ‘kicked the ball away’ in the second half against the Springboks is not correct. They kicked the ball more in the first half than in the second half - indeed most of their attacks were based on a series of clever kicks designed to circumvent the Springbok defences.
The difference in the second half largely came from the Springboks bringing on their so called ‘bomb squad’ as we all knew they would, which essentially turned the tide of possession from source. Once the Springbok set piece improved, and they started winning collisions, they could then build attacks.
The real flaw in the second half, from the All Blacks perspective, were some uncharacteristic defensive errors that let in tries and they will need to work on that. The eventual comeback, when the ABs brought on their own ‘bomb squad’ largely did its job of providing a late surge to win the game, however.
Disrespectful article header, the Bled is a new campaign & the Aussies want it as bad as we want to keep it. If ABs get distracted with the RWC "trial" nonsense like this article, they'll fall short. I predict an arm wrestle & would be happy with a 3-0 win.
I've seen this so many times when NZ has gone into a Bledisloe confident of smashing the Wallabies; only to suffer a nail-biting loss. Yes - they should be 25 points better. But, Oz, backs to the wall, nothing to lose and everything to gain... it's kind of what they live for.
The sooner the Wallabies usurp Cooper and replace him with Carter Gordon; the better their chances of seriously threatening and unlocking opposition defences. Case in point: his brilliant try against the Bokke at Loftus in rd.1.
He is arguably the best all-round 'flyhalf' in Australia.