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The All Blacks opened their Rugby Championship campaign with a dominant 47-29 win over the Wallabies at ANZ Stadium. Here are my player ratings:
Wallabies
1. James Slipper – 7. Good performance from Slipper. A couple of charging runs and solid work at the breakdown and set pieces. More of the same should be the minimum going forward.
2. Stephen Moore – 7. Good performance. Accurate at set pieces and plenty of industry in the tight stuff as expected from him.
3. Ben Alexander – 6. Decent performance. Accurate at the set pieces. Not enough mongrel for a tight forward. Lose the beard Benny, you are fooling no one.
4. James Horwill – 5. Average performance from the captain. Did the bare minimum but failed to provide that spark of leadership when the game started slipping away from them.
5. Rob Simmons – 7. Best performance in a Wallaby jersey that I have seen. Did well in the set pieces and the breakdown and carried the ball more than any other forward.
6. Hugh McMeniman – 4. Did not provide the mongrel that was expected from him. Largely anonymous and that is not what you want from your pack enforcer.
7. Michael Hooper – 8. Man of the Match for the Wallabies. Couple of turnovers, support for the ball carrier, and cover defence were the highlights of his game tonight.
8. Ben Mowen – 6. Not much of an impact in attack or defence.
9. Will Genia – 8. The usual good performance from the little master. Did however have a couple of ordinary moments which he will be disappointed about. Scored an outstanding try.
10. Matt Toomua – 6. Solid outing for his debut but did not really test the All Blacks defence enough with any of his kicks, passes or runs.
11. James O’Connor – 4. Poor game apart from an unchallenged run to score a try. Out of position for at least a couple of the All Black tries and selfish with ball in hand.
12. Christian Leali’ifano – 7. Good performance and builds on his solid Lions performances. Did not miss a kick for goal. Will be disappointed to be chargedowned for the Cruden try.
13. Adam Ashley-Cooper – 8. Challenges Hooper for Wallabies player of the game. Ran straight and hard and was the centre of most of the Wallaby attacks.
14. Israel Folau – 5. Hardly touched the ball and was largely anonymous. Will take a while to impose himself on a game when it isn’t going his way.
15. Jesse Mogg – 6. Will not need to watch the replay to know he had a very ordinary game but I think it wasn’t all that bad. Needs to work on his defence quick-smart and realize why the fullback is called the last line of defence
All Blacks
1. Tony Woodcock – 6. Solid performance without standing out.
2. Andrew Hore – 7. Good performance from the old fella. Made a nuisance of himself at the breakdown.
3. Owen Franks – 6. Decent performance but did get folded by Slipper on one occasion. Too many quiet games from the hard man is a little worrying.
4. Sam Whitelock – 6. Decent performance but nowhere near his Super rugby form. Sinbinned at the 75min mark for being stupid.
5. Luke Romano – 6. Replaced after 17 minutes. Solid.
6. Steven Luatua – 8. Super performance from the debutant. Tackled strongly and carried the ball with authority.
7. Richie McCaw – 9. My Man of the Match. Outstanding performance and business as usual from the great one. Stole a few balls including a very important one when the Wallabies were hot on attack and just 10m from the line.
8. Kieren Read – 7. Good game from the number eight but without his usual influence. When your standout moment in the game is a steal from the kick-off, you know you can do a lot better than that.
9. Aaron Smith – 9. Best game in the black jersey from the wee fella. Was always on the ball as any good scrumhalf should be and outplayed Genia which takes some doing. Will be disappointed to miss the tackle on Genia when Genia was 10 metres out from scoring.
10. Aaron Cruden – 8. Made some kick-off errors and hit the posts from a couple of place kicks but other than that a very influential game from Cruden. Stamped himself on the game and scored a great charge-down try.
11. Julian Savea – 6. Limited involvement in the game.
12. Ma’a Nonu – 7. Solid game from Nonu without any highlight moments.
13. Conrad Smith – 8. Great game from a great centre. Rock solid in defence and sharp in attack with quick hands which directly led to a couple of Ben Smith tries.
14. Ben Smith – 9. Spectacular game from Smith. Scored a hat trick of tries and some great moments in attack and defence.
15. Israel Dagg – 7. Good game from Dagg but will look to get more involved in the next game.
Man for man the All Blacks, in my opinion, out-performed the Wallabies and that will be of concern to the Wallaby management.
Genia and Hooper had very good games but even they were outshined by Aaron Smith and McCaw respectively.
Having said that, we all know our beloved game is not about any one player or even fourteen players.
It is about the whole team and there are countless examples where the underdog has beaten the favourite simply because they performed better as a team on the day. This should be the starting point for the Wallabies.
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Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.