The All Blacks, deserved World Cup winners

Somewhere between the All Blacks’ awful performance against Georgia and their strong second half against Tonga, I had a zen-like moment during this World Cup.

If the team was really holding something back, and if they really were training harder than ever during practice, then no amount of anxiety on my part was going to make a difference to their knockout chances.

With that in mind, I went about my business with probably the least apprehension I’ve felt during a World Cup tournament. For three weeks even game day was calm.

What the All Blacks showed during that time was a tremendous self-belief. A belief I didn’t have in them during the pool stages, but one I put my faith in when Hansen, as Duncan Johnstone put it, told an uneasy nation; “Don’t worry, I’ve got this.”

No matter where you turn, Hansen stands as the architect for this World Cup campaign; a campaign that just might be the greatest in All Black World Cup history.

There will always be a romanticism surrounding the 1987 World Cup side and 2011 was a maelstrom of emotions, but by winning the 2015 Cup and breaking so many records along the way, the 2015 side has transformed the All Blacks from World Cup choker to the most successful nation to date.

I thought I’d run the ruler over the team and share a few thoughts about the side.

For a long time there were people clamouring for Ben Smith to switch to fullback due to the form and fitness of Israel Dagg and Smith’s performances there at Super Rugby level.

He started off with a bang against England (who will ever forget his brilliant try saving tackle?), but after a while people began wondering why Smith’s attacking skills had gone missing and whether he as better suited to the wing where he’d been so elusive.

All Black fans are used to attacking fullbacks in the mould of Christian Cullen. Smith’s tidy performances had almost been taken for granted.

In truth, I don’t think Smith was ever going to have another year like his breakout 2013. Once you become a known commodity the tries dry up. The exception to that rule is Julian Savea, but it wouldn’t surprise me, for example, if Nehe Milner-Skudder’s strike rate slows down over the next season or two, as it’s done with Israel Folau and other players.

As the tournament wore on, Smith’s steady skills at the back became increasingly important and the fullback came into his own.

It was surprising that Smith got himself sin binned in the final given his smarts as a rugby player. It put New Zealand under the only real pressure the final had produced, though in fairness to Smith the All Blacks didn’t manage the sin bin period as well as they usually do. They were caught badly on the counter attack when they continued trying to push the tempo with a man down.

That blemish aside, Smith was one of the key components of the 2015 All Blacks. Savea worked his way back into form and had a memorable quarter-final, and Milner-Skudder bewitched oppositions with his feet. He provided a similar spark to the side that Israel Dagg produced in 2011, but Ben Smith was the rock in the way that Conrad Smith had been for so many years.

In fact, as Conrad Smith’s influence waned, Ben Smith’s grew. Conrad Smith didn’t have a disastrous tournament, but his savvy veteran game was built for arm wrestles and outside of the Argentina and South Africa games, he was almost superfluous to needs.

Let me put my hand up right now and say I was one of the people who thought Sonny Bill Williams was lucky to be in the squad and was cynical about his selection. How wrong I was. Williams had an outstanding tournament. He fully embraced his bench role and showed time and time again that he had the core skills to match his offloads.

When Ma’a Nonu regained his fitness and was recalled for the big matches, Hansen showed tremendous tactical acumen in choosing whether to substitute Nonu or Smith for Sonny Bill, and the tactical move in the final paid immediate dividends.

In fact, enabling Nonu and Williams to co-exist in the same side with an almost equal balance to their playing time is arguably one of Hansen’s masterstrokes from the tournament and one area where he clearly exceeded Henry.

Nonu had a slow start to the tournament, perhaps showing the effects of the illness he picked up pre-flight or general wear and tear from the season, but at the crunch end of the tournament he proved yet again one he is one of the great modern day All Blacks.

It may not be as obvious as with Richie McCaw, but few players show as much pride in the All Black jersey and legacy as Ma’a Nonu. He will sorely be missed and was probably the All Black player of the year as the NZ rugby media have noted.

Carter has received enough accolades over the past few days and the stories continue to emerge, such as the fact he was playing with a knee injury that almost ruled him out of the semi. Interestingly, aside from the quarter-final, the cries for Carter to take the ball to the line weren’t as important in the end as his kicking game.

He managed the semi final and final with aplomb even if he couldn’t get his running game going. Perhaps the knee injury hindered him from doing so.

After seeing Carter try so many ugly drop goal attempts since 2007, it was surprising how classy his two finals drop goals were. Perhaps it was Smith’s speed of delivery compared with say the speed of Peri Weepu or Andy Ellis.

Aaron Smith didn’t really live up to his potential as the best player in the world or at least the most influential player at the Cup, but he implemented the game plan well and his overall presence was a boon to the All Blacks in terms of the pace they want to play at. He wasn’t at peak form, but he wasn’t as over-excited as in earlier tests this year.

No mater how much work Kieran Read put in at the coalface during this Cup – and it was a lot – he’ll always be remembered for his high turnover count and the fact he wasn’t combining with Savea on the wing to send the big winner into a gap.

The latter is fortunate in a way as for a while that was the All Blacks’ sole attacking play and would have been easily read if they’d relied on it too much. In an event, Read’s tournament will be deemed a disappointment individually and he’ll continue to come under scrutiny as he takes over the captaincy.

Nothing I could say about Richie McCaw would better his own personal satisfaction about getting the job done, but I argued before the final that he was a better attacking player than David Pocock, and I think he showed that in the final. It’s not so much about running metres as the All Blacks had all the ball, but the attacking instincts that create try assists such as the pass to Milner-Skudder.

One of the big stories of the World Cup from an All Black point of view was the reemergence of Jerome Kaino as a truly world-class player. He timed his run, but when the knockout stages came around he was just as fearsome as in 2010-11 and was a huge reason why the All Black pack had renewed starch after just about every pack had pushed it around.

As the All Black tight five go, so do the All Blacks. That makes sense, but it as telling that when Sam Whitelock, Brodie Retallick and Owen Franks (in particular) upped their workrate that the All Blacks were unbeatable. That has been a common theme over the past four years.

Whitelock has lived a charmed life. He’s 14-0 in World Cup matches and has won back-to-back World Cups. He’s quietly building a career as one of the great All Black locks yet he flies below the radar. Harder players like Brad Thorn or Retallick get the platitudes, but Whitelock isn’t really a star. Retallick is a more physically imposing player, but Whitelock’s lineout work and his workrate around the paddock makes him an equally important clog. When Whitelock’s ruck involvements are high, the All Blacks win; simple as that.

Early in the tournament, I considered Franks a liability, but after Tony Woodcock’s injury he seemed to buckle down as the senior most prop. He upped both his workrate and defence and provided the impact we know he’s capable of at his best. The scrum held up in the knockout stages and wasn’t a factor in two of the games.

Finally, Dane Coles’ biggest role in the tournament was his lineout throwing. It helped that he had so many options in the All Black back row, but that bugaboo of so many past All Black teams became the backbone for the 2015 champions.

As far as the bench went, Beauden Barrett wasn’t quite the super sub of previous years, but he did recover his fitness in time to make a positive contribution. Keven Mealamu played extremely well, I thought, for a player who had been written off by all quarters and become almost synonymous with the frustrations people had with the squad selections or team performances earlier in the year. And Tawera Kerr-Barlow was more than solid in his back-up halfback role despite the fact he had only just returned from injury.

As for where this All Blacks team ranks historically, they’re almost assuredly the best World Cup-winning All Black team of all-time. They didn’t have an all-time great year, but on the other hand they showed that Hansen’s team didn’t peak in 2013 as people like myself claimed prior to the Cup. Taking the 2012-15 period into account, you’d have to say it was the best All Blacks period since 1987-89 even if at times they weren’t as dominant as great All Black sides like the 1996 side or the 2005 one.

The tournament capped a special era that began with the demolition of France on the 2004 EOYT and lasted more than a decade. Not since the 60s has New Zealand rugby been so strong. If you’d told me in the dark moments after those 1998-2002 Bledisloe Cup defeats that this was the silver lining on the horizon I wouldn’t have believed you, but as the World Cup showed, having belief in something takes courage.