THERE’S a lot of shadow boxing going on in this year’s Rugby Championship, with an altogether bigger prize further down the road.

But the first round at the weekends gave us a few clues as to how each team is tracking.

The All Blacks grabbed the early lead on the table with their bonus point win over the Pumas, but more important was the big step up from the game in Apia.

The biggest improvements came at the breakdown, where they were a lot more aggressive, committed more numbers and conceded only one tackle/ruck/maul turnover as against the several in Apia.

Their ball security was infinitely better. There were a few drops from both teams early on as a bit of dew got on the ball, but as the All Blacks settled into a rhythm they were able to keep ball in hand for prolonged periods which enabled them to play at pace and keep the Pumas gasping for air.

They offloaded the ball at will, and kicked far less than they have in recent times. The offloading is a sure pointer to their tactics later in the year, but the lack of kicking might have been a nod to the near perfect conditions….we’ll see plenty of kicking at the World Cup.

The set piece was excellent, with the scrum constantly putting pressure on the much vaunted Pumas pack.

And there was a general lift in individual performances, especially amongst some of the players who’d been singled out for criticism after the Samoa game, most notably Israel Dagg and Sonny-Bill Williams.

Dagg is still short of his 2011 form but performances like that on Friday night will help him get his mojo back. He made a couple of breaks, took some testing high balls and just looked like he was growing in confidence.

A lot of people think Ben Smith should be fullback, but the selectors have made it clear they want Dagg for his all-round skill set and in particular his long kicking game. They are probably only going to pick four back three specialists and the Hawkes Bay man will be one of them.

Sonny-Bill Williams could score three tries, set up three more, make 50 tackles, and not drop a ball all night and some people would still find something to criticize about him, but I thought he had a tremendous game, with four tackle breaks, some unbelievable offloads and some crunching tackles. He and Ma’a Nonu did not allow the Pumas a single break in midfield.

There’ll be some concerns over the two tries conceded from lineout drives, and no doubt coaches elsewhere will have been taking notes.

The first one they tried a marking up system that had Keven Mealamu lifting at the back of the lineout and Jerome Kaino defending the front, but when Kaino was drawn into the maul, it left TJ Perenara on his own defending the pass to Agustin Creevy.

The second one was better defended, and according to the letter of the law, should not have been allowed as the Pumas broke off with two players in front of the ball carrier. It should have been a penalty to the All Blacks, a view confirmed after a discussion Sunday with a senior refereeing official.

Steve Hansen’s views on the rolling maul will get plenty of air and ruffle plenty of feathers, especially amongst those who use it as a key weapon, but I’m sure what he’s really try to do is get this legalised form of obstruction better policed.

They’ll need another improvement this weekend to beat the Springboks, and they’ll have to do it without Dan Carter or SBW but the depth is there.

The Springboks will kicking themselves all the way home after blowing a 13 point lead against the Wallabies.

They lost because they got no value out of their bench and kicked away too much ball - it’s ridiculous that Israel Folau was allowed to carry the ball 23 times, often from “nothing” kicks.

The Wallabies will have taken plenty from the game.

They showed great determination to fight back and win from a “roll the dice” kick for the corner when they might have settled for a draw.

James Horwill showed he should have started after replacing the ineffective Will Skelton, the Boks were winning the breakdown battle until David Pocock came on, and Matt Toomua made a big difference when he took over from Quade Cooper, who had been very erratic.
The Wallaby 15 that finished the match looked a lot better than the 15 that started it.

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Article By: Tony, Johnson