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The All Blacks have gone down to the Springboks 36-34 in Wellington after conceding a record number of points at home and bombing a chance to steal the match late. Here’s how they fared individually.
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1. Karl Tu’inukuafe – 7
Again featured with ball in hand. Tidy scrum work. Can be happy with another solid performance in the black jersey.
2. Codie Taylor – 7.5
Showed off quick hands to set up early Ben Smith break. Handy at lineout time and scored a try to boot. Made his tackles.
3. Owen Franks – 6.5
Typical solid performance in the front row. Nothing stood out for better or worse.
4. Sam Whitelock – 6
Great work as a lineout target and had a couple of handy carries. Made his tackles also.
5. Scott Barrett – 5
A real mixed bag. Mishandled a pair of kickoffs and knocked on in contact close to the line. Redeemed himself by winning back another kickoff but ultimately failed to make a positive impact.
6. Liam Squire – 5.5
Penalised early and looked like he didn’t want to be there after copping a stinger from a charging Frans Mahlerbe. Despite this, his seven tackles led the team.
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7. Sam Cane – 6
Solid if unspectacular. Knocked on early inside the Springbok 22 but had a few nice moments around the breakdown.
8. Kieran Read – 7
Led from the front winning a pair of turnovers and making an impact with ball in hand.
9. Aaron Smith – 5.5
Started well with a key tackle on Aphiwe Dyantyi and great support line to score a try. Fizzled out after a couple of bad judgement calls and uncharacteristically slow delivery. Faf de Klerk had his number on more than one occasion.
10. Beauden Barrett – 4.5
Showed great hands early to put brother Jordie in for an early try. After that, tactical kicking was woeful and errant goalkicking may have cost the game. Definitely one to forget for Beaudy.
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11. Rieko Ioane – 7
Scored a pair of tries including one effort a contortionist would be proud of. Opportunities were limited.
12. Ryan Crotty – 6
Fairly pedestrian performance in his comeback. Finished as the top tackling back but was shut down on the other end.
13. Anton Lienert-Brown – 5.5
Tested the line early and ran great supporting lines. Quick hands put Ioane away for a try but a bad read and intercept to Cheslin Kolbe cost the All Blacks seven points.
14. Ben Smith – 7.5
One of the All Blacks’ best backs as per usual. Finished with 74 metres from eight carries and beat six defenders. Made a few key line breaks including a wrapping run to put away Aaron Smith.
15. Jordie Barrett – 6
Another Barrett mixed bag. Showed flashes of attacking potency early and ran an excellent line to score the first try of the match but a poorly judged quick throw-in cost a Willie Le Roux try under the posts.
In other news:
Comments on RugbyPass
If a coach having Crusaders heritage is so sacrosanct, why did the Crusaders not pursue Vern Cotter as Scott Robertson’s replacement?
16 Go to commentsFinau is definitely operating on razor thin margins. He hasn’t done anything wrong… yet. But a player going into contact 6 inches lower than he is expecting, without him even knowing, will end in disaster. You can imagine a situation where the pass dies on Edmed and he has to bend down a little lower to catch it at the last second. Finau’s hit would have been catastrophic. The margins are just too fine. He needs to study how PSDT, at 6’7”, manages to drop his tackle height and exert just as much force with close zero danger of taking someone’s head off. Given how poorly NZ has adapted to lower their tackle height, and that this issue which has plagued the ABs for years and played a big part in them not winning the World Cup, I thought NZR and all SR coaches would be prioritising sorting this issue out. If I was Razor I would be on the phone to Clayton MacMillan and Samipeni Finau saying exactly that. Finau is a monster and shaping up to be the closest thing to Kaino since Kaino, but I wouldn’t risk selecting him for the ABs at the moment.
18 Go to commentsThe surprising stat I saw in the Blues game when showing Sotutu equaling the Blues forwards record was that Akira has not scored a try since 2019. Now my memory is pretty bad when it comes to those sorts of the things, I can remember his AB try though, but anyway I can’t see I can remember his last blues touchdown or any in recent years. Surely that still has to be a bogus stat. Maybe excludes SRA games?
3 Go to commentsDude to me looks pretty fast for a big man, nearly 2m and 130kg, in his workout vid he was signed off. Possibly a bit slow on his reads movement wise though, but I’ve not got anything to compare him to. Hope the dude nails it and finds his sport, could have been a devastating lock in rugby if he wasn’t a footballer growing up.
4 Go to commentsWell, does that make it every year Moana has lost it’s best player the following year? Normally it’s more immediate I guess, at least there best player had a follow up year this time.
1 Go to commentsFinally, an answer to Dan Carter.
1 Go to commentsNever read such tripe. He was hit just as he passed the ball which was reviewed and deemed legal by yes the Australian TMO and referee
18 Go to commentsTerrible idea…will be too hot, no one will travel, fan zones will be promised nice cold guinness and last minute will get water. Also how do you squeeze this into the already busy battle rhythm, Prem, summer series, 6 nations & world cup….if, and its a big IF you’re going to do this, do it in a rugby nation.
2 Go to commentsWell let’s hope world rugby doesn't read some of this nonsense, because next on the agenda will be…“players will only tackle other players deemed to be in their weight class, and only with moderate velocity”.
18 Go to commentsI was never allowed to adjust boots, or ever replaced, while I was playing and staying on the field. If I had issues, I had to go to the sideline and fix them myself. Then I would ask the ref to get back in. That would really make you deal with it FAST!
4 Go to commentsGreat point. It would be terrible to have a card for poor tackling cost the all blacks a world cup. Oh hi all blacks captain Sam Cane, how you going?
18 Go to commentsI like Andy’s critical approach to all hot issues especially when it comes to the rugby big “bosses”. However, sorry Andy, I don’t support your “we shouldn’t be questioning the integrity of Karl Dickson or any other official”. May I ask why? They do have a lot of responsibility, but they are people like us with all their sins and weaknesses. We have to respect their decision during the games, but why they became untouchable afterwards and people cannot even criticize them and the ones, who does express their concerns, got punished for publicly analyzing their mistakes and asking questions. If they believe they did right, there shouldn’t be a problem for any of the refs to answer these “questions” publicly. I don’t really remember such cases. However, I do remember how Craig Joubert shown his running skills in 2015 or Pascal Gauzere shined in Cardiff in 2021. I do believe that Rassie, as anybody else, had a full right to share his vision of Nic Berry’s performance the same year. I do not support the hate in any form especially in public one, but creating the cast of untouchable refs and rugby bosses is not for me. As for Karl, he had all means to question his appointment for the game and since I don’t now whether he did it, blaming just RFU wouldn’t be quite correct at this moment. I love the game of rugby and almost every time I watch it I don’t support any team, I just wanna see the good game and fair referring. Sorry, Karl. last Saturday you got my Craig Joubert”s award of the round. It is up to Karl to prove that I am wrong, not to Andy or RFU’s corporate bla-bla-bla. Something like that…
1 Go to commentswell remember the blues had a guy called jed rowlands for a season. remember scott took his coaching team with him give him time
16 Go to commentswell maybe he needs to be introduced to darcy swain then who never got anything much and put a cheifs ands allblack player out injured and made him miss a season recovering
18 Go to commentswell maybe the match offficals should sort it out if they are worried about it and stop the clock
4 Go to commentsI totally agree. I also believe that minor injuries unless dangerous must be treared OFF the field of play and the game continue with a temp replacement if necessary.
4 Go to commentsSend the bill to McLennan.
3 Go to comments2 out of 3 were perfect. TMOs love jumping in on anything outside the law. The fact they saw nothing wrong speaks volumes. You want to see what a late blindside hit looks like, watch Kepu take out Carter in the 2015 World Cup final. Completely different to the Tah’s tackle.
18 Go to commentsverkeerde kant van die gereg lol
5 Go to commentsJust like John Plumtree at the Sharks he has had a poor start to this season’s coaching gig, but now it looks like he is starting to pull them back also having won 1 game in the first Eleven games they played. It obviously helps that 11 of his fifteen are Springbok players. But now they are starting to improve. No ways they can make it to the playoffs this year but they probably used this season as a way to figure out their game plan. One query I have and I think quite a few people have is: Are they playing better simply because of their international players are back or is it the team strategy led by Rob Penney that is starting to tick? Well I guess we wait and see. Also if it doesn't work out this season, it might be that Rob Penney is using this season as a way to organize himself for next season. Getting all his combinations sorted, his team strategies sorted and figuring out who is best is which position. Now I don't follow Super Rugby any more having now a full focus in the URC but I was surprised about the current Crusaders stats.
16 Go to comments