After five losses from their last six tests, including three defeats in a row, and with unwanted records mounting, the All Blacks summoned their brilliant best to snap their funk and bring the world champions down to earth. Video / Sky Sport
All Blacks 35 South Africa 23
OPINION:
If this was Ian Foster's last stand as All Blacks coach, it was at least marvellously defiant, supremely resilient and most certainly unexpected.
This was the best performance of the Foster era – one that had a touch of class, a huge amountof bravery to stay in the fight and a relentless desire to compete in the places in which they haven't managed to compete previously.
It's not possible or wise to say the All Blacks are fixed because inconsistency has been the bug this team can't shake, but they are certainly not broken and hope has suddenly sprung from nowhere.
Whether the victory was enough to save Foster's job will become clear in the coming days, but the satisfaction he and his All Blacks can rightly feel at sticking the proverbial finger up to the critics who said this team was dead and buried will be beyond measurable.
This was as good a performance any All Blacks side in history has produced at Ellis Park. It was brave, innovative and dug out from the depth of the rubble.
No one saw this coming. No one except Foster and his players that is, who said all week they felt something special was brewing.
They were right. What we got at Ellis Park was infinitely better than anything produced by the All Blacks so far this season.
What we got was clever rugby – the sort that can win World Cups - which was built on the four pillars of a brilliant lineout, dynamic work at the cleanout, supremely good aerial operations and sharp pass and catch.
Everything the All Blacks couldn't do last week, they did this week. They looked like the real All Blacks – the ones that come out and play hard and fast from the start and find a second wind when they need it.
The big unknown now is where to from here in terms of the coaching set-up? Was this a performance to win a reprieve or did it simply force everyone to ask why it has taken the All Blacks so long this year to produce a performance of this nature?
The transformation wasn't built on anything radical or particularly difficult to replicate.
The story of the test is that the All Blacks finally polished up their core skills and got the foundation parts of their game right for most of the 80 minutes.
It was as if they suddenly remembered that rugby is in fact a simple game, built on nothing more elaborate than strong execution of the basics and a fearsome commitment to the business of set piece and collision warfare.
And it also helped immeasurably that they didn't offer up the first half hour as koha for their hosts as they did in Mbombela – every other test of 2022 in fact – and got stuck in early.
Perhaps most importantly of all, however, there was discernible evidence of research having been done, plans adapted, strategies amended and execution much improved from Mbombela.
This may seem like a table stake sort of expectation, but it didn't happen in the series against Ireland: the All Blacks just banged about hopelessly from one test to the next as if every time they saw Ireland play exactly the same way it was all a giant surprise: like young children stunned every night at bed time that there is an expectation to brush their teeth and wear pyjamas.
Sam Cane scores the opening try of the All Blacks victory over the Springboks at Ellis Park. Photosport
But at Ellis Park, there were signs of growth and clarity. Critically, the backline was prepared to play with greater depth and vary their alignment to force the Springboks to think a little more carefully than just blasting off the line and hammering the midfield with bodies.
Aaron Smith made a subtle but hugely effective adjustment to his usual hands on the ball whip it away approach, by stepping away from the ruck which created an inside channel for prospective receivers and stopped the Boks from sliding wide too early.
Again, the All Blacks have been labouring against rush defences for an age and so while these adjustments were welcome, they were so simple as to make everyone wonder why they hadn't been introduced earlier.
But the biggest difference at Ellis Park was the aerial work. The Boks continued to rely on their box kicking as a means to exert pressure and try to trap the All Blacks in that cycle of pressure from which they couldn't escape last week.
It didn't work though at Ellis Park for the simple reason the All Blacks back three – particularly Jordie Barrett and Will Jordan – were supremely good at getting up in the air early and owning the space.
They mostly caught what was sent down upon them and even more importantly, the All Blacks were often able to counter-attack from the backfield on the back of their aerial accuracy.
