Weekend Round-up: Nick Evans takes his bow at the Stoop

When the All Black teams were in their golden period of greatness from 2010-2015, there was no “dual playmaker” BS. Dan Carter (or Aaron Cruden, when Carter was unavailable) ran the show. Nonu would pop up as first receiver only when Carter was buried in a ruck. Nonu did often make clearance kicks outside of Carter at second receiver, but very rarely as first receiver.

The dual playmaker was a flawed concept created after the the 2017 Lions series was tied to overcome a blitz defence. Based on the All Blacks failures in 2019 and 2023, it failed.

As Steve Hansen would say, “time to flush it down the dunny” (the dual playmaking concept) rather than create revisionist history of how the Carter era played.

Dominance also really has to be a about effort and ability. It's getting harder to dominate, so you're not as likely to see "clear" dominance, but that doesn't mean such a team isn't the same head and shoulders distance above the others in areas like effort and ability. The full team, organized offense and then defense, of that Ireland era hits both marks for me well ahead of everyone on what they were doing, if not done with the ease or such wide margins in the outcomes.

So 10's shouldn't be replaced, except of course Marcus Smith who had the Poms in a winning position, for a guy coming back from injury who hadn't played recently.

Riiiiiighhttt.

Ma'a benefitted from having legends around him, this team is virtually rebuilding from the floor. JB has lost Mounga & Smith & we have yet to nail in a 9 or 10 for him to consistently "kick, pass, run" outside of. Wasn't the ENG test the first he & BB have played 10/12 combo?

Also, the process to embed Jordan at 15 is barely underway. This will be his jersey under Razor as it was for the Crusaders. One obvious benefit is it allows the dual threats of Telea/Clarke to join him onfield.

Much has been made about JB going to 12 in 2022 but 12/13 has always been his "preferred position". His words back in 2015.

He played 12/13 for Lincoln Uni Club interchangeable with Jack Goodhue in 2015/16. Both teens were targeted as the next Crusaders' midfield combo.

Razor selected JB as a 10/12 for NZU20 in 2016 & as a "2nd 5/8th" for Canterbury, the same year. In 2017, JB turned down the Crusaders for the Canes, where he became a 15, wing, wherever they needed him.

It's no secret that Foster was reluctant to play JB at 12 even saying in media that he's "not a 12". After selection he justified it through injuries. I suspect JB will be Razor's man at 12 for full tenure, so yes, the future looks immense if we can nail 9, 10, & 13.

Also would say that England have built a very aggressive defensive system, which is likely to keep opponents to low scores, especially as they settle into it. The NZ tries were well executed, and it is going to take that to create scoring chances against this England team. We will no doubt see more of that when the Boks go up against them.

But the overriding message for me is that they could not execute on the basics in the last quarter. Whether or not England should have been in that position, the fact is that they were positioned to win and could not do the basics well enough to close it out. The reason I find that really problematic is that this is exactly what I thought Borthwick was all about - that he was not targeting the flashy stuff (at least not yet), and was really putting in place a core that could be built on going forward.

Unfortunately what we saw was a team that was clearly unable to raise their game enough to win the arm wrestle in the last few minutes. That feels like a coaching miss.

Having watched the game twice, I don't think Smith missed a kick to touch. Rushing out of the line is the 10's role in the England defence, something that should have been obvious, not a mistake. Has been that way even before this system, hence Farrell's high missed tackle stats (not a criticism). One of the drop goals at least was with advantage, followed by a penalty and cost 0 points.

NZ could have won by more. England could have won. Neither happened. But England had momentum when Smith went off and immediately lost it.

I think he's got room for improvement still too, so happy that he's been told that he needs to perform better if he wants to come straight back in.

In other news campo reckons his Aussie team of 1984 could beat the current Aussie team. Have a look at the size of the players in the old footage most under 85kg…he is having a laugh

I'm eager more to see if he can take the bull by the horns. To go from having your local area baking everything you do to have the hold country questioning everything you do is a big change and has been far more than just a speed bump for him.