There is no question the All Blacks were a victim of the terrible call to award Bongi Mbonambi a try when he clearly knocked it on short of the line, but they were much greater victims of their own ill-discipline, their propensity to lose their accuracy in key moments, their erratic game management in the last quarter, and ultimately their lack of firepower to cope with the inevitable power surge that came once the Springboks had unleashed their bomb squad.
Test match rugby at this level is a tough old business, and beating the world champions at their spiritual home takes a combination of clever planning, precise execution, set piece proficiency, bravery, brutality, intuition, and ice-cold decision-making.
All of this has to be on point, and it has to be on point for the full 80 minutes.
The All Blacks ticked a lot of the right boxes, but not enough of them and not for long enough. So while there’s ample reason for Robertson and his coaching group to be greatly encouraged by the way the team scrummaged, the innate way they used the ball to exploit space, and the awareness they showed in reading South Africa’s attack, the inability to stay in the fight physically in the last 20 minutes is arguably of such concern as to temper any and all satisfaction about the tries that were scored.
South Africa’s power won them the game. They were able to win counter-ruck and turn over penalties too easily and too often throughout the first half.
They were able to extract too many penalties later in the second half just by lining up their ball carriers again and again to entice the All Blacks into an illegal act to stop the momentum.
Their driving maul got them points and penalties whenever they needed them, and the All Blacks, feeling the pressure, contributed to their own demise by untidy work at kickoff receipts, and some poor kicking options and executions that didn’t win them either territory or possession.
It was a classic case of the All Blacks ultimately getting caught in a vicious cycle where they had to infringe to stay in the fight, and it’s a cycle they have to find a way to break, because it won’t just be the Springboks who lock them into that sort of suffocating pattern, but Ireland, France and England.
And if there is an overriding fear building about this All Blacks team, it’s one built on this growing sense they don’t have enough destructive athletes to call upon to avoid being sucked into grim arm wrestles outside their natural habitat.
There just aren’t enough high-impact ball carriers in the pack, or individuals capable of explosive tackling, and the penalty count that mounted against them was indicative of the lack of dominant tackles made.
Everyone in black defended with all they had, but all the collisions were on South Africa’s terms so they could grind through the phases until eventually New Zealand had to resort to an act of ill-discipline to stop the momentum.
The quest for Robertson now is to find a way to up the power base of the team – to find some explosive hit men who can change the dynamic with the power of one tackle.
And so too does he need to find a way to keep his troops in the fight for the full 80 minutes, and to avoid being tossed in the washing machine the way they were at Ellis Park, unable to break that penalty-maul-penalty-maul pattern that broke them.
Because if they can nullify the Springboks’ power, there is hope for the All Blacks. Real hope they are a team to take seriously and a team with genuine attacking potential.
The All Blacks looked the higher-skilled team – more in tune with the basic idea of using pass and catch and cleverly thought running lines to challenge the defence.
In the art of making space and exploiting it through intuitive timing of the pass, the All Blacks were light years ahead.
The growing hype about the impact of former Highlanders coach Tony Brown has had in liberating and innovating the Springboks’ attack for a more free-wheeling style appeared to be greatly exaggerated, as under pressure, the South Africans didn’t have the same individual skill levels, the same comfort when confronted with split-second opportunities to use soft hands.
The All Blacks looked like they had greater clarity about where and how they wanted to test the South African defence. They used the blindside well, utilising the pace of Damian McKenzie, Rieko Ioane and Will Jordan to get on the outside of the defence.
They were smart in the way they pulled the Springboks into the middle of the field at times, to then generate a width in their attack which was a reward for being willing to align that bit deeper and trust their pass and catch to beat rushing defenders.
Their attack game was smart and clear, and losing Leon MacDonald as an assistant appeared to have only a positive rather than detrimental impact, because there was plenty of good rugby from the All Blacks, just not enough of it.
