Stuart Barnes' talking points: First and second Test, and the Hurricanes backs
Thursday 3 August 2017 14:25, UK
Stuart Barnes on the first and second Tests, the Hurricanes' backline, and bumping into All Black legends in New Zealand...
1. A good Test match but a bad result for the Lions. The reality is they played their best attacking rugby on the tour to date but were unable to stop New Zealand gathering the required momentum to overrun them in the last 20 minutes of the match.
The breakdown, an area of strength in the warm-up games, was a weakness as the All Blacks and the outstanding Aaron Smith in particular generated a speed of play around the fringes which saw them surge over the gain line.
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When the All Blacks win the gain line they inevitably win the match.
2. The New Zealand press, like the All Blacks management, have been pretty magnanimous in their appraisal of the Lions' effort. That should serve as a warning to the visitors. When the locals praise your style of play it means you are playing too open a game of rugby.
New Zealand loves tempo, whether tight or wide. What it hates is a slow drudge - that is the best way to combat their high class and high skills.
An old-fashioned European arm wrestle can take their individual advantages out of the game. It's just about the only way to beat them. A little less of the beautiful stuff and more attrition is the best hope of winning. It's not a great hope but it's the best one.
3. Don't chase the game; don't play too much rugby in your own half. Keep the box kicks coming, especially as they were so effective on Saturday. Squeeze the width of the pitch into the narrowest confines possible.
Run around the fringes and utilise the centres - Jonathan Davies was outstanding - between the 15-metre lines. The back three are free to counter attack.
A limited dynamism that can trouble even the best, and make no mistake these All Blacks are the best.
4. No more comparisons between this tour and the 2013 equivalent. Chalk and cheese. I reckon this squad, this team, are far superior to the side that were triumphant in Australia. It's just the Wallabies were so rank and New Zealand are so good: 47 straight wins on Kiwi soil.
Judge the Lions on the quality of their performance rather than the result in Wellington on Saturday night.
5. It was quite a comeback from Kieran Read. The All Black captain's highlights included a superb flick pass from the base of the scrum to Aaron Smith, leading to one of Rieko Ioane's two tries and a thunderous hit which rocked Owen Farrell backwards.
Out injured most of the season, no action since breaking a thumb six weeks ago in Bloemfontein, this was a massive match for the All Blacks captain who - injury permitting - will win his 100th cap against the Lions in the third and final Test.
6. I think Sam Warburton might well return on Saturday, the tour captain taking the place of the first-Test captain Peter O'Mahony. Gatland has been promising changes from one Test to the next all tour.
While O'Mahony certainly did not have a bad game - he was a main man in the lineout - it could be that Warburton will be seen as the man to bolster the breakdown where they were badly eclipsed with Sam Cane having a superb match.
7. Courtney Lawes is another who could come into contention for a start (I am taking it as a given that Maro Itoje will start the second Test) with a big performance against the Hurricanes.
The Saint has played with vigour and venom whenever he has been on the field. His lineout is now a given but it is his aggression in the tackle that could see him named in the Test team.
George Kruis had a poor Test, he was shaken up by the physical nature of the confrontation. The abrasive Lawes can make a difference. He will need and is expected to impose himself on the Hurricanes locks.
8. On the subject of the Hurricanes; what a three-quarter line. I won't dwell long on the match because it is over so early in the week but for those of you coming to this column prior to kick-off, let's just say, don't miss it.
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The Lions will want to impose their control up front, otherwise there will be fireworks. There are headline acts aplenty in the Hurricanes backline.
Jordie Barrett, Nehe Milner-Skudder, Ngani Laumape and the forgotten All Black, Julian Savea. The left wing has scored 46 tries in 54 Tests, by some way the greatest strike rate in the history of tier-one Test rugby. But right now he is behind both the 20-year-old Ioane and the Highlanders' Waisake Naholo.
Tommy Seymour has the pleasure of stopping the man known in these parts as 'The Bus'. The same Seymour that marked Naholo in the Highlanders match.
Spare a thought too for Robbie Henshaw who will have come up against both Sonny Bill Williams and the gathering force that is Laumape. Some guys get none of the luck.
9. Rugby, so I am led to believe, is going on outside New Zealand. It was good to read that the Scarlets' young winger, Steff Evans, scored a couple of tries to save Welsh blushes in a narrow squeak of a victory against Samoa in Apia.
There was no such salvation for Scotland in Fiji as Gregor Townsend suffered his first setback as an international manager. This was quite a coup for Fiji, what with Scotland being ranked fourth in the world ahead of the match.
Anyone think the ratings system are something not to be taken too seriously?
10. You can't escape rugby legends here in New Zealand. Last Thursday Brian McKechnie came over in the foyer of our Auckland hotel to introduce himself.
I was a schoolboy watching New Zealand beat Wales back in the 1970s when last I saw him in the flesh. He kicked a late penalty to ensure Wales' losing record against the All Blacks continued on towards and into the next century.
On match day, who else but Richie McCaw walked into the service lifts which takes broadcasters to the commentary position on the fifth floor at Eden Park. The All Black great was happy enough to be watching.
"It's all the training and preparation, I don't miss that," said McCaw.
And finally, out at the fifth floor and I walk slap, bang into my old mate, Frank Bunce... what a centre he was.
There's no escaping All Blacks, let alone rugby here in New Zealand. Still there's a few bars, bookshops, Argentine restaurants to pass the time of night, here on Cuba Street, Wellington.
