The four All Blacks who impressed Steve Hansen in France win

Sir Steve Hansen has weighed in on the first All Blacks Test of the year, highlighting four players who impressed him and identifying key changes he says Dave Rennie has made in the coach’s brief time with the team so far.

Until last weekend, the opening match of the 2023 Rugby World Cup was the only All Blacks Test Hansen had attended live since stepping away from the team in 2019. With Christchurch finally having its new stadium completed and ready to host international rugby again, Hansen decided a visit was in order.

While his first comment during his guest appearance on the Rugby Unity podcast this week was dedicated to how “special” One New Zealand Stadium is, he then praised France’s depth, discrediting the suggestions that the team that fronted in Christchurch was a second-string outfit.

“They don’t mind dropping the odd Test match to give people the opportunity to grow, so there’s no such thing as a B team,” Hansen said.

When podcast host David Pembroke asked what Hansen noticed as new in Rennie’s first game at the helm, a familiar talking point quickly emerged.

“I think they’re more inclined to use the ball, not kicking as much. I think they only kicked six times in the first half.” Hnsen analysed. “And there’s a real enthusiasm, or optimism, about having to be energetic to get back into the game so they can do that.

“They’ve picked a young five-eighth, who was the form five-eighth in Super Rugby, and I thought (Ruben) Love played particularly well for his first start. He got yellow-carded but bounced back from that really well and directed them around the traps well.

“They created a lot of opportunities. The timing, at times, wasn’t as good as it could have been, but that’s to be expected when it’s the first Test of the year. They just looked like they wanted to play more uptempo.

“But the word I’d use is they had better clarity, I think, about what they wanted to do. They looked like they knew what they wanted to do. Whilst they probably weren’t as clinical as they wanted to be, they certainly knew how they wanted to play.”

Former Australia head coach and podcast panellist Ewen McKenzie was beating a similar drum to Hansen when sharing his thoughts on the performance.

“I was thinking about phase attack, and there was a significant improvement from New Zealand from where they were last year; they were quite static in phase play, and maybe a bit too organised,” McKenzie said.”

“(Sam) Darry carried the ball four times in the first six minutes, so everyone was looking and keen to touch the ball, and everyone was in motion; that was the difference.

“Love organised the game well, and they were actually moving in phase play, whereas I thought they were quite static last year and got caught behind the advantage line a lot. So that was a significant difference.”

Hansen, who recently left his post as Toyota Verblitz head coach, added to his praise of Ruben Love and shared McKenzie’s praise for Sam Darry, while going on to highlight two further players who stood out in the All Blacks’ win.

“They’re going to play with pace. They’re going to force the opposition to go with them, and the more successful they get at that, the harder they’re going to be to combat.

“Love definitely showed that he’s up to the mark. I thought Darry had his best Test match for a wee while and looked more comfortable playing the style of footy that they want to play. (Luke) Jacobson was very good at seven, I thought he did a lot of under-the-radar stuff and he was tough.

“We’ve got some people to come back into the squad. So, next week, it will be interesting to see if they stay with the same selections or if they give some other people a go.

“The young prop (Xavier Numia) that came on, I thought he played well, scrummed ok, but looks really, really comfortable with the ball in hand. All Blacks teams, when they have a tight five that can play some footy, become very, very difficult to beat.”