Analysis: How the All Blacks could outsmart the rush defence
“The shrewd guess, the fertile hypothesis, the courageous lead to a tentative conclusion – these are the most valuable coins of the thinker at work. But in schools, guessing is heavily penalized and is associated somehow with laziness.” – Jerome Bruner
If you have ever assembled a puzzle before, you know there’s a set process to it. You find the edges, and the corners, assemble them all up, after which you fan out the remaining pieces and look for the colours that match with areas what you’ve assembled. Once you have the colour, you then look for the shape and lines within it. Rinse and repeat as you get further in, seeing more and more of the picture form.
As we can start to see the flavour of the picture, it is often far easier to see where all the little pieces can fit together. Before you know it, we’re using elimination rather than observation to find the correct piece and, instead of finding the piece for the picture, we’re looking at the intent of the picture, to find the piece.
It’s all about looking at what fits the finished product, which means today we will be doing a little guesswork.
Today’s article is about trying to guess what New Zealand have up their sleeves to counter the rush defence. I need to re-iterate strongly that this is opinion and guesswork, nothing more and nothing less. We can look at the setups and dynamics New Zealand have introduced in the past and look at how they could be effective in the latter stages of the World Cup.
Continue reading below…
The Possibilities
Threading the needle
A natural continuation from my prior article, it feels like this is something New Zealand aren’t showing their full hand on.
It could generate a high likelihood of success against so many teams due to the form of rush defence they employ. New Zealand decision making at 10/15 is affected by the picture the defence present outside of the “2 pod” in their new system.
The majority of the guesses come from the use of the wing.
In this case, we can see the shield pod has stopped the defence and, as such, given Barrett time to assess his options.
As we discussed earlier, the shoot defence overextend to cut off the “3 pod”, meaning gaps can appear for Barrett. There is a call that means the closest winger can be brought in to track the 1st receiver – Barrett, in this case. I don’t believe this has been shown in this tournament yet.
It’s exacerbated against England as well to a massive degree.
If Barrett calls the winger to him, this means two men striking at this target, and as we can see above, this is very valid as a target. This could lead to line-breaks with a variety of attacking plays, the tracking option being one which could potentially work.
The reason being is that we’ve seen the winger follow the 10 in before to strike this gap off set piece. This is a textbook example of this gap being exploited:
Jack Goodhue’s line holds/blocks Remi Lamerat. Wesley Fofana rushes up to smash McKenzie, overextending the defence and resulting in Ioane going straight through.
More importantly however, we’ve seen the winger follow the playmaker in open play.
Though the structure is different, with New Zealand’s use of a 2-3-2-1, we can see the shield pods effect in the 3 and what McKenzie and Ioane try to do with it.
If we also take into account where the 1-2-3-1-1 attack starts near the sideline, it’s a perfect position for the winger to “connect” with the 10, and leads me to believe the All Black wingers will be brought in off their wing to attack this gap upon instruction of the 10.
A variety of plays could be used for this, such as the tracker option that was shown in the stills above. However, there’s one that I feel we may see at some point, as it could be perfect for this.
The Brumbies were among the first to use the league tactic of screen runners.
The defenders in this example are fixed by the Brumbies 10, 12 and 11. By running under the 12, David Knox leaves behind his defender, and takes a line that slices through the gap between the defenders lining up 12 and 11.
The way the Brumbies were set meant this hole was not exploitable until Knox reused himself on this line.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B3ofUKLA4JP/
Present day stand-offs usually take east-west run’s on plays like this to release their wide men.
The combo of Knox reusing himself with a north-south line against a numbered-up defence meant he could target a gap between defenders that the defence didn’t even consider to be exploitable.
The reason I think New Zealand would use this is because we’ve seen it in training:
Whether they’d use it at this strike point is circumstantial but theoretically, as a move against this point, it could be perfect.
The 3-pod Splitter
As we can see in threading the needle, we can see how the “Triangle” push operates outside of the shield pod. It rushes up to pressure the pod, inadvertently forming the dogleg.
If we have a look here, I think New Zealand have an option to exploit this.
The midfield pod is often the target of the shoot defence, as was seen particularly against South Africa. In response to this, New Zealand often have separation between at least one of their forwards in the pod, with the wide option receiver in behind. Not only that, but this receiver is often very powerful or fast with Sonny Bill Williams, Beauden Barrett, or Anton Leinert-Brown all filling the role.
In addition to filling the wide option role, I believe that this runner can also be a tracker option, much like we referenced in the previous article.
If the defence number on the forwards themselves, the separation within the pod combined against the natural dogleg can make this a very exploitable point. The receiver behind is often so close to this gap, that it makes sense that they can perform this option. If we look above, the wide receiver is on the inside of the gap in both examples, in perfect tracking position.
We know this is an effective tactic, as we’ve seen it before.
Hurricanes 2017
We can see the exact same move here run by the Hurricanes. Using the exact same 10 – “3 pod” – 15 axis to strike it, with Beauden Barrett to the 3 pod to unlock Jordie Barrett.
The structure has been added, and structure is only ever be there to provide players the platform to showcase and enhance their talents.
The reason I feel this structure and option will be used, is because this was performed against the Bulls defence. The defence at the time, coached by John Mitchell, the current England defence coach whom has employed very similar elements with England.
A reshuffle has been reported in the Ireland ranks ahead of their quarter-final versus New Zealand https://t.co/idAorbmCiM
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The high pressure, triangle defence employed by England and South Africa, can be manipulated by the pod, the image above is near identical to the Bulls push, with the gap targeted by some of the most powerful backs in the New Zealand arsenal.
We haven’t seen it, but the New Zealand management are too smart not to have noticed this. Not only do they employ a similar rush and have also been victims of this weakness, but the proximity and positioning of the wide receiver to the gap combined with New Zealand’s tracking is too coincidental for me. It ripped apart England’s defensive system at Super Rugby, and I would be surprised if New Zealand hadn’t thought of embracing it at the international scene.
The Switchy McSwitcherson
Named after a back story for another time, this alludes to a potential New Zealand scissors dynamic, that is certainly the most reaching of them in all terms of guesswork.
It all started with the New Zealand vs Australia game hosted in Japan in 2018, when we saw that brilliant first phase try in which New Zealand switched the point of attack to target the blind.
Quite a brilliant try, and something that teams including South Africa, France, and Ireland and potentially plenty of others have in their arsenal. Not to mention this has the look of the old Brumbies play from earlier, with Barrett cutting the tracking line the same as McKenzie.
The switching dynamic from open to blind however, is something that is seeing increased usage off set-piece.
We then saw something against England in November last year.
To combat England’s triangle rush in the second half, New Zealand started cutting back inside the point of the triangle. As we discussed in a prior article, the fringe defence often drift immediately after the ball is in the hands of the 10. This means this area can be spaced and we can see this for sure in the England examples.
McKenzie targeted this area multiple times to great effect. He managed a huge gain in the example below, where we can the spacings opened by the drift and created a try scoring opportunity above.
My theory is that New Zealand have come up with a dynamic to exploit this point.
They no longer have McKenzie, and this turned out to be so effective against England, that they created another dynamic to strike here.
It involves the 15/10 behind the 3 pod coming through as a scissors option to the 1st receiver.
For me, it fits. The crab run of the 10 assists the drift as they expect the 3 pod to be the intended target the shield pod is able to sit in the line, forming some semblance of obstruction or mischief to either hold their defenders, or help them along. Then you have one of the world’s fastest and agile fullbacks in Barrett, coming from a hidden position to take the late scissors pass to strike at the weak point as shown earlier.
If this isn’t on and it’s obvious for Barrett to see, there will be space elsewhere. The key for New Zealand is developing and enhancing these accelerated decision-making processes, to be able to take the right option every time as the play unfolds.
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— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) October 16, 2019
These are some tactics, that to me make sense and explain some things New Zealand have done. I thoroughly admit I could be wrong. This is pure and complete guesswork, but whilst rush defences have shut New Zealand down, they also reveal weaknesses. I’m like to believe they have developed and thought of ways to combat these weaknesses.
The knockout stages begin this weekend, where teams will start revealing their hand. If they can pull some of these off, their opponents will be left grasping air.
They’re designed to put all the considerable skills and talent of the All Blacks to use against the very weaknesses inadvertently created by other teams to stop them.
The irony is not lost on this writer, as these teams will not know what hits them.
Ireland forwards coach Simon Easterby has a few ideas how to stop the All Blacks:
Comments on RugbyPass
What’s new its a common occurrence, just the journos out there expecting a negative spin. The outcome will be beneficial to jordie and Leinster. The home grown lads hav got some experience to step up to and be more competitive, that or spend the 6 months keeping the bench warm.
9 Go to commentsI’m all for speeding up the game. But can we be certain that the slowness of the game contributed to fans walking out? I’m not so sure. Super rugby largely suffered from most fans only being able to, really, follow the games played in their own time zone. So at least a third of the fan base wasn’t engaged at any point in time. As a Saffer following SA teams in the URC - I now watch virtually every European game played on the weekend. In SR, I wouldn’t be bothered to follow the games being played on the other side of the world, at weird hours, if my team wasn’t playing. I now follow the whole tournament and not just the games in my time zone. Second, with New Zealand teams always winning. It’s like formula one. When one team dominates, people lose interest. After COVID, with SA leaving and Australia dipping in form, SR became an even greater one horse race. Thats why I think Japan’s league needs to get in the mix. The international flavor of those teams could make for a great spectacle. But surely if we believe that shaving seconds off lost time events in rugby is going to draw fans back, we should be shown some figures that supports this idea before we draw any major conclusions. Where are the stats that shows these changes have made that sort of impact? We’ve measured down to the average no. Of seconds per game. Where the measurement of the impact on the fanbase? Does a rugby “fan” who lost interest because of ball in play time suddenly have a revived interest because we’ve saved or brought back into play a matter of seconds or a few minutes each game? I doubt it. I don’t thinks it’s even a noticeable difference to be impactful. The 20 min red card idea. Agreed. Let’s give it a go. But I think it’s fairer that the player sent off is substituted and plays no further part in the game as a consequence.
1 Go to commentsThose are pretty good draws for the two top Aussie teams. I certainly wouldn't want my Chiefs to have a quarter final in Brisbane. None of the top teams will want the Crusaders.
1 Go to commentsHonestly, I am a bit lost here …. Ireland - RSA was (at least in my opinion) perhaps (from a purely technical / rugby-skills-show point of view) the pinnacle of the RWC2023 - almost flawless playing (putting aside the kicking of RSA which was the difference between the two teams), rugby at it’s very best …. if I were a Bok and after the game some Irish lads came around saying “see you in 5 weeks same place”, I definitely wouldn’t have thought of it as being in any way “arrogant”, rather a sort of jolly “if we both continue to play like this, no one could stop us” - besides, few of us fans would have, at that time, been surprised to see the same teams playing on 23 september and 28 october 2023 ….. well, we all know Ireland chose to hit a slump to keep the QF curse alive …..
135 Go to commentsThere’s value gleaned from having an All Black star running and training with your team. How many games he starts (or even where he plays in the backline) will be decided on a week by week basis based on the needs for that week. But the overall learning and growth for all concerned, I’d think, is massively beneficial. Especially for Irish players.
9 Go to commentsSon, whith just " raw athlete “ , you are able to beat “ better rugby players “ by 74 points…. May be England should recruit in athletics….
1 Go to commentsPffft. It’s not a one-way street bud and Irish teams don’t seem to have had an issue taking kiwi players previously.
9 Go to commentsParticularly great to have captain Scott Barrett back after going off last week for the Crusaders. Codie Taylor a real leader and mighty Tamaiti Williams join Fletcher Newell in the front row. Those 2 will make a big difference. Great bench with the likes of Tom Christie, Jamie Hannah etc who are playing well. Should be a great derby.
1 Go to commentsDoes a blitz defence not have a weekness against a well-placed grubber kick, perhaps angled cleverly. All the defence is up and the full-back can only cover so much ground. Thoughts?
28 Go to commentsWhile Iose is destructive in the Canes set-up, he is not big for an international 8 and could struggle against the top teams. With his speed, he could be developed into a seven but, as Ben points out, he doesn’t show a scavenging game with the Canes or make dominating tackles. Sotutu has shown a step up this year and attitude plus motivation seems to be the big areas of growth. Deserves another AB shot imo.
3 Go to commentsNaholo is my only question mark for this side. He wasn’t the only one who had a forgettable game against the Brumbies but he was passive, defensively poor and generally lacked energy. Needs to get a whole lot busier for me. I would have liked to see Sullivan on that wing with Higgins on the bench (if staying with a 6-2 as BeegMike points out on here!)
3 Go to commentsWell, I am sure that Eben said exactly what he meant to say, exactly how he meant to say it. Does he strike you as a man that doesn't know arrogance when he sees it. He should know it because he has shaken the arrogance out of many foes before.
135 Go to commentsPls get it into your thick arrogant heads that the final was played by two Southern Hemisphere teams. The best against the best and that Argentina was just unlucky otherwise non of the Northetn Hemisphere teams would have seen the light of day.
135 Go to commentsAs long as New Zealand youth are involved in sport they are passionate for, and are well supported, it’s all good. I love league as well as rugby. NRL clubs have long since scouted the First 15 competitions, the NH and Japan scout super rugby and NPC. It’s a miracle there’s any players left for the all blacks to pick from.
4 Go to commentsI'm a Bok fan, so I don't say this lightly, but he is one of my all time favourite players. I am really going to miss watching him play. Thanks for many great memories. You are a true legend of the game.
3 Go to commentsBest way to deal with all of this is to play another game.
135 Go to commentsIt’s 12-15 games Luke. Ringrose has barely played in 2024 and Henshaw and Keenan have also been out for spells in the same time period. There are always injuries and for younger players to play with the likes of Barrett will be great for them. It’s just looking for negatives where there are none.
9 Go to commentsAndy Goode pushing his own agenda with very dubious considerations on refereeing performances. Luke Pearce speaking a bit of French doesn’t make him a good and adequate referee for the Champions Cup final; his latest refereeing performance in particular was not so great.
4 Go to commentsJordie knows that he has to earn the right to put on the jersey, whatever that jersey might be.
9 Go to commentsThe best outside centre in the world at one point. He will be greatly missed.
3 Go to comments