All Blacks: Kaino preparing for life at lock

Jerome Kaino has been preparing for his role as an emergency lock. Photo / Getty

All Blacks enforcer Jerome Kaino has been forced to go to some dark places as he worked to adjust his skill set for an expected stint at lock during the World Cup.

Kaino swapped the blindside flanker's shirt for the No4 bib as the All Blacks put the finishing touches on their tournament preparations at a final open training run at Trusts Stadium in Auckland today.

A crowd of several hundred devoted fans, predominantly school children, watched on as Steve Hansen's 31-man squad ran through a light field session and then signed autographs and connected with the public one last time ahead of their flight to England tomorrow night.

A relaxed Kaino said he was only too happy to brush up on his second-row scrummaging and lineout work and believed the mooted positional change could only broaden his horizons.

"I quite enjoyed it. I had a hit-out yesterday with 60 minutes at lock and it wasn't too bad," said Kaino.

"Obviously you have to stick your head in some dark places in the tight five but I thoroughly enjoyed it and it adds a string to my bow so it's good."

Scrum coach Mike Cron had been an invaluable source of information and advice in recent weeks and eased his transition into the tight five.

Running lines and targets needed to be tweaked and changed accordingly, but the All Blacks' thorough understanding of each player's roles meant the 61-test veteran feels at ease about the change.

And while Kaino sees himself slotting in on the tighthead side of the scrum, the 32-year-old admitted he would push and jump wherever he was required.

"They're different [running lines] but we understand the game that we want to play and what we want to achieve so it isn't too hard to adapt," he said.

"Wherever the coaches want me, I'll jump and scrum wherever they want me to.

"There are different areas you need to work on. Obviously, the dark arts of scrummaging, but I've been there [lock] before and I've scrummaged, and Cronno's got some good tips for me so it wasn't too bad. I wouldn't call it hard but different."

Having 14 members of the group that triumphed in the 2011 World Cup ensured this latest edition of All Blacks possessed an inherent knowledge of what's required to get the job done, but looking back won't help them to move forward, stressed Kaino.

"It's good and we'll take a lot of confidence out of that, but I think being world champions, having that title doesn't give us anything.

"We've got to look at it as a new challenge and getting over there, everyone's going to be wanting to knock us off, so we've got to prepare and can't live on the 2011 victory to get us through.

"We've got to start new and look at it as a new challenge."

With a well-publicised culture change proving instrumental in the success of 2011, Kaino felt the All Blacks had their off-field priorities well established. Honing and refining tactics and strategy are the priorities now, ahead of their first-up appointment with Argentina on September 21.

"There's little additions here and there [to the team culture] but not too much. Guys are just really excited and in terms of changes, it will be around our game and how we want to play."