Rugby World Cup 2015: My one concern ahead of All Blacks-France clash

The All Blacks' scrum is the one concern ahead of Sunday's Rugby World Cup quarter-final against France. Photo / Getty

I'm really confident that the All Blacks are going to do well in the quarter-final against France. We have the players and coaches and the form to comfortably win this game. I think we're better equipped and organised and possess fitness levels that no one else has got.

My only real concern, apart from some bad handling errors and anxiety to get the job done too quickly in pool play, has been the scrum.

Really, the only the game that the scrum had dominance was against Namibia. It wasn't great against Argentina, Georgia, or Tonga. if I was the French and looking for a weakness, I would attack the All Black scrum offensively and defensively.

The All Blacks, with a good platform, have a very good scrum attack. They usually launch a lot of key attacks off it. They work moves which bring the No8 off the back and the No9, No12 and wings into play. There is complexity and deception. But we haven't seen a lot of that at the World Cup.

I don't think that has a lot to do with holding stuff back, more the inconsistency of our scrummaging. To launch good scrum moves you need a good platform - a promotion of the side you want to attack. At worst it must be square. Twisted the wrong way, a bad scrum will compromise you.

For example, for a scrum near the left hand touch line, you want that tighthead side up so you take their flankers out of the equation. They are on the back foot and have a lot of ground to make up.

Look at the way Australia are scrummaging. Former Argentina prop Mario Ledesma has made a big difference and they are much more dangerous as a result. One area where we always dominated them was at the scrum, but now they have become a different animal due to their excellence there.

We need to find that too. We need to start bullying teams so we can launch our backs.

It also helps our loose forwards. If you want to launch a quick scrum attack, you're going to lose you No8 a little because he's going to de-power, get down and get on to ball. In that instance you need the other seven forwards working really hard. If you get that and your scrum isn't going back then your flankers are going to get to the breakdown quicker than the opposition and the All Blacks can cause stress off the second phase.

In a nutshell, I think we've got every avenue covered, but if we can solidify that scrum and dominate, then we'll see the All Black machine go to a different level.