ODT Online rugby writer Jeff Cheshire identifies some key
points from the All Blacks' win over Argentina at Wembley
this morning.
Last 30 minutes, again
In an inevitable fashion, the All Blacks powered past their
opponents with a dominant final 30 minutes. That has become
the pattern in All Black games in recent times. Their
outstanding fitness level sees them wear teams down and
continue to play at a high intensity while their opposition
is tiring. That was the story here. After being in a scrap
for 50 minutes, the All Blacks began to get front foot ball,
had more room to work with, found a few gaps and dominated
territory and possession.
More open game
Whereas many teams thus far have looked to use the maul as
their primary attacking weapon from the lineout, the All
Blacks opted for a more open game. They used off-the-top ball
regularly, before crashing in the midfield through Ma'a Nonu
or a forward runner. From there they would go a couple of
phases of pick and go, then look to go a couple wider again
towards the opposite sideline.
Attacking with width
The midfield crash was the favoured tactic off the lineout,
but that did not mean the All Blacks were limited to just
that. They were happy to play with width and did so to great
effect at times. The second try came from going wide from
set-piece, bringing the defence across to cover. Then they
used a couple of runners coming in on narrower channels to
draw the defence in, creating the space out wide which
allowed them to score.
Argentina line speed
Argentina defended well in the first 40 minutes and while
they gave up a lot of penalties, they were able to limit the
damage they had. They slowed the All Blacks ball down well
and gave the defensive line time to set, which gave them the
chance to get up fast and shut down the All Blacks space. The
All Blacks struggled to break through this, as their runners
were chopped down early and the threat Ma'a Nonu can pose off
second and third phase ball was effectively negated.
Slick lineout
Of the positives to come out of the All Black performance,
the lineout was surely close to the best. It operated well,
as they kept it simple, got the jumpers up quickly and the
hookers found their targets. That gave them a stream of
possession, which allowed them to either play the crash ball
game to launch from midfield, or to use the lineout drive.
Pumas' attacking threat
Argentina's backs showed that this is not a team solely
revolved around a big forward pack. They ran dangerously and
exhibited good footwork when running at the bigger All
Blacks, trying to unbalance them to force either missed
tackles or at least gain some go-forward. The All Blacks, for
their part, defended poorly at times. That led to Argentina
making some easy metres up the middle and their backs making
some good breaks out wider.
Discipline needs to be better
The Richie McCaw foot trip was dumb and he has acknowledged
that himself. Conrad Smith meanwhile may have believed he was
legal in what he was doing when he was yellow-carded, as
pressure can do that. That pressure came from some average
defence, which saw the All Blacks end up well and truly on
the back foot. They have to cut these instances out of their
game, as in the knockout stages you cannot afford to be a
man, or two men, down for that long.
Impact players
You could say that the reserves came on when Argentina
started to tire, but you cannot deny the impact some of them
had upon their introduction. Sonny Bill Williams was
outstanding, offering more than Nonu on this occasion with
his ability to offload accurately adding a dimension that was
missing to the All Blacks game. He ran into gaps well too and
would have set up a try had Nehe Milner-Skudder not put down
a simple catch after a piece of individual brilliance from
Williams.
Out the back Beauden Barrett got involved and had some nice
touches, while Charlie Faumuina added some spark in the
forward pack and Victor Vito looked good in his limited
minutes.