All Blacks: Boks coach kicks off war of words

All Blacks halfback Jimmy Cowan feeds the scrum during the team's indoor training session at Trusts Stadium, Waitakere, yesterday. Photo / Brett Phibbs

Springboks coach Pieter de Villiers believes Graham Henry has a big mouth, but All Blacks assistant coach Steve Hansen has leaped to his colleague's defence.

In keeping with de Villiers' modus operandi, the phoney war between the Springboks and the All Blacks got off to a lively start.

Unhappy that Henry had suggested South Africa played "less rugby" than New Zealand or Australia, he shot back: "I don't understand what they mean by playing less rugby. We all play for 80 minutes. Graham Henry is a good coach, but he's like me, he has a big mouth."

Not so, according to Hansen.

"He's got an upside-down mouth," he joked. "He's one of those unfortunate people that are born with an upside-down smile."

Hansen said the kerfuffle was "just mind games between two very astute coaches", even suggesting the Springboks had earned the right to go down that route.

Before leaving for New Zealand, de Villiers said the challenge of beating the All Blacks on home soil was no longer a source of fear. After two wins in successive years - 32-29 in Hamilton last year and 30-28 in Dunedin in 2008 - he has a point.

"One of the important psychological aspects of the game is that if you are in awe of a team, then you can forget to live your own life," he said.

"We are no longer in awe of the All Blacks. We respect them still, we will still lose some games to them but they will lose against us as well. We fear no one, but we respect everybody."

He's not the first coach to suggest the All Blacks had lost a certain aura, but he is on firmer footing than Wales' Warren Gatland, who is in charge of a team that has not beaten the All Blacks for 57 years.

"Everyone has an opinion based on what they are trying to achieve at the time. The South Africans have got a game plan ... and they're starting to implement some of that," Hansen said.

"Test rugby is a little bit about mind games and he's very good at it. They're 3-0 up over the past 12 months so I suppose they can say anything they want and feel pretty confident."

Another area South Africa can rightly feel confident about is the lineout. The All Black set-piece worked well in the June internationals, but there was nobody in the Irish or Welsh packs that casts a hex quite like Victor Matfield.

"We can't get psyched out by what is a very good defensive lineout," Hansen said. "If we do our role and do it precisely we'll be fine."

All Black No 8 Kieran Read has emerged as key component, doing some jumping at No 2 as well as at the rear of the lineout. He said it could be argued that New Zealand had been too deferential to Matfield.

"In the past maybe we have [worried about him too much]," Read said.

"That's probably his main asset. We regard him as the world's best because he is. He's got that mana about him as well.

"We've really got to turn up and not worry about it, he's just another person."

You can count on de Villiers having something to say about that.