One respective injury-enforced change by the All Blacks and England sets the backdrop for a tactical battleground for the Eden Park rematch.
As last week’s one-point margin suggests, nothing separated the All Blacks and England in Dunedin.
With both coaching teams resisting temptations for personnel changes, the question now is: which brains trust can evoke the most improvement in seven days? Who can translate lessons to solutions?
A largely unchanged New Zealand team, with Blues halfback Finlay Christie promoted to replace the injured TJ Perenara and Beauden Barrett retained on the bench, sets clear parameters for the forward pack to lead definitive improvements.
For all the talk of combating England’s rush defence, and designs on exploiting space on the edges through lethal wings Mark Tele’a and Sevu Reece, the All Blacks must first earn the right.
Scott Robertson loves a theme. This week he could tell his men to go forward or go home. The scrum, lineout, maul, carry and clean will determine this outcome.
Test rugby is, as the new All Blacks coaching team discovered in last week’s one-point escape, a vastly different beast to Super Rugby Pacific.
There’s infinitely less time and space. The margins between winning and losing can be as minor as one missed kick, one dropped pass, one poor decision.
Most of all, though, the crunchy bits carry more weight.
Retaining faith in the forward pack that produced a hit and miss performance in Dunedin signals the All Blacks are confident the same eight players – and those injected off the bench – will deliver a more physically imposing, more accurate, display.
While the All Blacks dominated last week’s scrum contest – and will be expected to do so again, with England forced to inject 22-year-old rookie loosehead prop Fin Baxter after vice-captain Joe Marler’s foot injury – their lineout faulted under pressure from Maro Itoje and their breakdown work missed a beat in the clean-out, which allowed England to pounce far too often for turnovers.
Particularly in the second half, when England snatched the lead, the All Blacks’ lack of accuracy and urgency to the breakdown limited their ability to build phases and pressure.
From a physicality perspective, England lock George Martin and damaging blindside Chandler Cunningham-South were standout figures. New Zealand must now match fire with fire.
“England are definitely a physical side,” All Blacks prop Tyrel Lomax noted. “The set piece is an area we want to grow throughout the year so we want to take another step forward around our scrum, lineout and maul.
“They put a lot of pressure on our breakdown so we need to get our cleaners tighter to the ball carrier.”
With Christie handed a rare fifth test start due to Perenara’s enforced absence, the All Blacks must generate consistent go-forward ball. The onus in that department will be on Patrick Tuipulotu, Scott Barrett, Ardie Savea and Samipeni Finau to bend and break the defensive line.
Perenara’s stature allows him to cope with scrappy possession better than most at the base. While Christie is nuggety on defence, his comparatively small frame can be disrupted by counter-rucks and lurking defenders.
Every playmaker is more comfortable pulling the strings while moving forward. Damian McKenzie and Stephen Perofeta are no different. They will hope the All Blacks pack maintains their first-half platform for longer this week which would, as Robertson points out, ramp up expectations for improved attacking execution after failing to convert that dominance into points in Dunedin.
“We need to finish opportunities we created a bit better,” Robertson said. “A bit of game-plan execution. Thinking on our feet but also making sure our game drivers are making the right calls at the right time. We weren’t far away.”
In something of a double-edged sword, Beauden Barrett’s 29-minute cameo off the bench last week proved influential in helping the All Blacks sneak a maiden victory under Robertson.
While the test centurion maintains his impact brief this week, Robertson didn’t rule out Barrett assuming a starting role in the coming weeks.
“There’s 14 tests. Of course we do [see him as a starter], but that experience was the right mix for this test,” Robertson said.
“Stephen was exceptional. He took his opportunity and that gives us a balance of 10 and 15 and experience when we need to bring on Beauden. He sees the game so well and with a couple of early touches, he gave us the field position we needed at that time.”
Those time and space commodities the All Blacks crave will only come through an improved platform.
1. Ethan de Groot, 2. Codie Taylor, 3. Tyrel Lomax , 4. Scott Barrett (c), 5. Patrick Tuipulotu, 6. Samipeni Finau, 7. Dalton Papali’i, 8. Ardie Savea, 9. Finlay Christie, 10. Damian McKenzie, 11. Mark Tele’a, 12. Jordie Barrett, 13. Rieko Ioane, 14. Sevu Reece, 15. Stephen Perofeta
Reserves: 16. Asafo Aumua, 17. Ofa Tu’ungafasi, 18. Fletcher Newell, 19. Tupou Vaa’i, 20. Luke Jacobson, 21. Cortez Ratima (debut), 22. Anton Lienert-Brown, 23. Beauden Barrett
15. George Furbank, 14. Immanuel Feyi-Waboso,13. Henry Slade, 12. Ollie Lawrence, 11. Tommy Freeman, 10. Marcus Smith, 9. Alex Mitchell, 8. Ben Earl, 7. Sam Underhill, 6. Chandler Cunningham-South, 5. George Martin, 4. Maro Itoje, 3. Will Stuart, 2. Jamie George (c), 1. Fin Baxter
Reserves: 16. Theo Dan, 17. Bevan Rodd, 18. Dan Cole, 19. Alex Coles, 20. Tom Curry, 21. Ben Spencer, 22. Fin Smith, 23. Ollie Sleightholme
Liam Napier has been a sports journalist since 2010, and his work has taken him to World Cups in rugby, netball and cricket, boxing world title fights and Commonwealth Games.