Steve Tandy: Inward looking Wales to ignore All Blacks aura

Wales boss Steve Tandy wants his team to focus on themselves and not the aura around New Zealand ahead of their Nations Championship clash on Saturday.

The All Blacks have won the last 34 meetings between the two nations and head to the Principality Stadium on the back of a resounding 43-21 victory over Scotland last Saturday.

Tandy steered Wales to an unconvincing 28-21 win over Japan the same day and the head coach wants his players to concentrate on their own performances and not get caught up in the occasion of taking on the three-time world champions.

Tandy told a press conference: “You look at World Cups and everything, the former players they’ve had, there’s always that aura around the All Blacks.

“But I think for our boys, it’s been trying to look in the mirror more at what we can do. We remember the last time we played them, I think the stadium, everything before it, there’s the Haka which is an unbelievable experience for fans.

“For us, it’s got to be about ourselves. I think you can get too sort of drawn to that.

“I thought a lot of last year’s game up until probably 60 minutes we were in the game, we played our game. We attacked the way we wanted to, so that’ll be no different come Saturday.”

Tandy has made four changes for the match, including a start for Taine Basham at number eight in his first Wales appearance since the 2024 Six Nations.

Aaron Wainwright lined-up in the position for last Saturday’s game, but is unavailable due to a minor calf injury.

James Botham starts at blindside flanker, while Adam Beard comes in the second row and Gabriel Hamer-Webb will start on the wing.

The All Blacks have won all of their Nations Championship games so far and Tandy believes they have “gone up a level” since their last meeting in 2025.

“It’s building our game. The All Blacks are an unbelievable team, they’ve got an unbelievable squad, have been together for a long time,” he said.

“They’re superbly coached with Dave (Rennie) and culturally everything about them. I think they’ve gone up a level since we played them last as well.

“For us it’s got to be about getting better and trying to put our game out there. I thought we showed some good intent on the weekend, scored some really good tries, defence improved in particular around that mid-third of the pitch.”