Lineouts crucial for Springboks clash

The All Blacks are fortunate they begin the Tri-Nations with two home games against South Africa.

It gives them the opportunity to get off to a good start as they set about trying to defend their title.

But they have to make that draw count and the only way of doing that is winning.

It will be important for the pysche of the team that they win. I don't think any of them will want to experience any World Cup hangover from the public or the media if the unthinkable happens and the All Blacks falter.

So the pressure is immense but that's nothing new. All Blacks teams have been living with that pressure ever since Dave Gallagher led the 1905 Originals to Britain.

Graham Henry, Steve Hansen and Wayne Smith would be reasonably comfortable with where they are at.

They won their warm-up tests without too many difficulties.

The weather made it difficult to get too much out of the Irish test and the comfortable wins over what was a mediocre English team at least gave a clear indication to the areas that need improvement in their game.

The lineout is one area that needs dramatic improvement.

It's crucial ball that you need to be winning and South Africa, in particular, have a very strong competing lineout so Hansen will need to get the tactic sorted and clear in the players' minds before kick off on Saturday.

There seems to have been some confusion during the games as to the lineout calls which made it very hard for the hookers to put the ball in the right place.

One person who has suffered from that is Keven Mealamu.

Critics have had a field day with how poor the lineout has been when he's replaced Andrew Hore but in my experience when you have a hooker who has been a reliable lineout thrower and he loses his confidence, then nine times out of 10 it's the fault of the tactics rather than the individual.

For a hooker to have complete confidence, the jumper needs to be able to get his hands into clear air and the hooker has to know where those hands are going to be and then it's a relatively simple target to find them.

I was alarmed to read Jerome Kaino's comment after the first England test when he told Sunday News the All Blacks "neglected the importance of the lineout" in the lead up to the test because no lineout issues had come out of the previous test against the Irish.

Lineouts are something I found required constant practice and attention, particularly at international level.

With the degree of analysis that goes on, there needs to be subtle variations made as the season progresses to make it more difficult for the opposition to be able to compete.

Another problem area now Richie McCaw is out will be at the breakdown.

While Rodney So'oialo is very strong at getting on the ground and competing for ball, he's only one and he can't be at every breakdown. At best he can be at every second breakdown.

So there has to be another two or three players who are strong in that area and that's something the All Blacks will have to be very mindful of when preparing for the test against the Boks and for the remainder of the Tri-Nations.

The Boks with Schalk Burger, Ryan Kankowski and Luke Watson the likely starters in Wellington would seem to have the edge at the breakdown.

Rodney will have his hands full and it will be interesting to see what other loose forwards are selected.

Obviously they will need to introduce another openside flanker.

Tanerau Latimer proved he was good enough two years ago when he was under Robbie Deans at the Crusaders but I don't know that his recent form warrants selection.

Chris Masoe is an option but what I would be doing is putting Rodney on the openside. He's a hard-working flanker and could do the job better than anyone else in the country while Richie is injured.

And then I would look at Keiran Read at No 6 with Jerome Kaino at No 8. Read, a surprise omission from the squad, is a strong support player and competes very strongly.

The other aspect of McCaw's unavailability is leadership.

Regardless of who the new captain is Rodney has been the vice-captain the onus will be on senior All Blacks like Dan Carter, Mils Muliaina and Ali Williams to step up and make some on-field decisions about tactics.

Another area of forward play that needs work before the test is the accuracy of the All Blacks pick-and-go and driving play.

England, for long periods of the tests, were able to nullify any All Blacks strengths in those facets and forced us into a lateral game where we couldn't get the go-forward upfront.

That needs to change because we need go-forward ball to give the backs the best opportunity to do some damage.

The back play while not consistent against England at times showed touches of class and brilliance and that largely coincided with good quality ball.

They will want to build on that because certainly against South Africa and Australia defences will be very much better than what we saw from Rob Andrew's mob.

The Boks' midfield certainly won't let Ma'a Nonu have free reign.

The All Blacks' selection at centre will be interesting.

Do they go for the experience and solidity of Conrad Smith or do they go for the class and spontaneous brilliance of Richard Kahui?

I guess the selection is going to show us the attitude of New Zealand to this game.

Will they want to attack from all angles (Kahui) or play a percentage game (Smith)?

 

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