KEY POINTS:
It's fitting that this All Black tour should begin in Hong Kong. The former British colony is built largely on reclaimed land, suggesting there is a need to tread carefully, as things can become treacherous underfoot.
There are a few All Blacks on this trip who would do
well to lock in that mindset of steadfast caution and persevere with it right through the UK leg of the journey.
It's not strictly true to say there are some who are in Hong Kong on a last-chance ticket but certainly they need to deposit a good-performance bond.
Some good players have been left at home. Jeremy Thrush was a must-pick for many pundits. The young Wellington lock has all the tools for the modern game. He's come through the age-grade system, so has been indoctrinated into good training habits.
He's been an IRB junior player of the year, shown strong leadership and performed well at Super 14 and provincial level this year. When a player has form, when he has fronted on the field and shown what he's got, it makes it tough to leave him out.
But the selectors made that call, choosing instead to bring Jason Eaton in from the cold.
Eaton was once a hot ticket. At 2.03m, he's a big, big unit. He's mobile, though, and for a brief period, there was serious talk of using him as a blindside. He also had a bit of immunity, as he was a player the selectors took a massive punt on when they picked him for the Grand Slam tour of 2005 when, truthfully, no-one else knew who he was.
All that favoured son status evaporated earlier this year when Eaton just couldn't rekindle the form he had shown before his horrific knee injury in March last year.
He lost confidence in his decision-making, which is why he was ignored by the All Blacks. The athleticism and mobility slowly came back but, too many times, Eaton would take the wrong option and even the responsibility of calling lineouts became too much for him.
Graham Henry went to Napier to watch Eaton play for the Maori to see if he was worthy of a call-up for the second Springbok test when Brad Thorn was suspended and Ali Williams in doubt due to a persistent ankle injury. The judgement then was that Eaton wasn't in the right form to merit a place. Those who watched him for Taranaki are not sure they saw any more in the Air New Zealand Cup to change that initial view.
But Eaton is on this tour and has a chance to repay the faith. He'll most likely get his best chance to do that this week in Edinburgh. The Scots pose the least threat of all the Home Unions and the schedule has conveniently placed them after Australia - the country that poses the greatest threat.
Murrayfield is the place to take selection risks for the All Blacks _ maybe starting with Eaton and Anthony Boric and asking them to prove they deserve to wear the jersey.
Eaton has to show more of that natural presence he wowed everyone with on debut at Lansdowne Road in 2005. If he doesn't, then he's going to have a nervous Super 14 next year, when he will have to match the effort, intensity and contribution of his Hurricanes team-mate Thrush.
Edinburgh is also likely to be, injury permitting, the city where Andy Ellis must decide if he's going to make life difficult for the selectors when Brendon Leonard comes back.
Ellis just hasn't convinced in the three years he has been with the team. He was a surprise call-up for the World Cup squad and didn't really do much to justify his inclusion there ahead of the dropped Piri Weepu. When he started the early tests this year, the talkback lines were running hot with people wanting to vent their dissatisfaction with the halfback's work.
He's barely played since the Tri Nations disaster in Sydney and there was strong support for the inclusion of Alby Mathewson by the end of the Air New Zealand Cup.
Ellis, like Eaton, has been selected with a view to proving what we have seen is not all we are ever going to get. How much longer the selectors can be patient is anyone's guess but Ellis would be best advised to play out of his skin if and when he is let loose.
Leonard is expected back next year, while Mathewson and Taniela Moa are breathing down his neck.
Interestingly, the other two halfbacks in the squad have already repaid the goodwill extended their way. Jimmy Cowan was very nearly out on his ear in July - as in contract terminated - for various drinking offences.
The New Zealand Rugby Union would have been within their rights to have dismissed him and certainly the All Blacks could have cast him adrift. A bold decision was made to support the errant Cowan and he responded in kind with the sort of performances that showed he knew there was some debt to shift on his side of the ledger.
That was also true of Weepu, who suffered an almighty fall from grace last July. It looked odds-on 12 months ago that he would never be seen again in an All Blacks jersey. He huffed and puffed for a while and then slowly found his form again, started to feel better about where he was and what he was doing and earned his recall. When he came back in, there was no petulance or surliness - he was a reformed character and even extended his contract to prove it.
Weepu and Cowan have repaid their debts, Eaton and Ellis haven't and nor has Isaia Toeava.
The Blues utility back is another whose presence in the national side is not universally supported. It's kind of hard to forget his 15-minute cameo at the World Cup quarter-final last year, when his sole contribution was tossing the ball wildly behind him.
His form continued slumping this year, with Toeava even being dropped by the Blues. Somehow, he ended up being called into the All Blacks squad when injury struck Leon MacDonald.
Paul Williams and Cory Jane are better fullbacks - less experienced but better specialists. Toeava, due to the fact he was selected as an unknown 19-year-old who was supposedly going to become a superstar, has always been trying to live up to expectation.
He's never quite managed. If he doesn't come through strongly on this tour, questions have to be asked if he really is anywhere near as good as the All Black selectors keep saying he is.
Maybe it's a consequence of the player drain that has left options thin on the ground. Or maybe this coaching panel are more willing to forgive than they have been in the past.
Whatever the reasons, the door to the All Blacks is not being closed as firmly shut as it once was.
Cowan and Weepu have reaped the benefits of that policy. It is Eaton, Ellis and Toeava that have to do the same over the next few weeks.