Dave Rennie insists that all teams, and not just the All Blacks, are struggling with their kick receipt, claiming that even the Springboks are not dominant.
Since the conclusion of the 2023 Rugby World Cup, there has been a perception that New Zealand are particularly susceptible under the high ball.
Under previous head honcho Scott Robertson, it proved to be a constant issue, and in South Africa under Rennie, they were bested by Rassie Erasmus’ men in the air.
Improvement in Bledisloe Cup
However, they were much better in the first Bledisloe Cup encounter and it played a crucial role in their 50-19 victory over the Wallabies at Eden Park.
Rennie claims that, despite the issues they have faced over the past three Test campaigns, it is not specific to the All Blacks.
“When you look at the high ball stuff, because there are a lot of conversations about it, there’s no side in the world dominating the ball being kicked to them, and not South Africa,” he told reporters.
“It’s the teams that kick the ball who are winning a lot in the air or getting a lot of scraps. I think I mentioned some stats last week, it’s about one in four that are caught clean by the receiving team.
“We kicked a lot of ball last weekend and won a lot of it. I think the ball that they were kicking to us, our tactic has been to rather come forward and get in the air where there’s a competition, we’re trying to track back so we can legally block and win ball there.
“One of tries we got at the weekend involved Will [Jordan] tracking back. We went a couple of phases, won a ball in the air and ended up scoring.
“It’s an important part of the game. Anyone who gets anywhere near blocking runs the risk of being penalised and it’s such a soft penalty.
“That’s a tactic we’ve been working on. It’s no secret, a number of sides in the world are doing the same thing.”
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All Blacks experimentation and the right combination
Robertson continually changed the make-up of the back three in an attempt to find the ideal trio and Rennie has also experimented with different combinations this season.
Part of that is down to injury, however, and that has impacted the All Blacks’ selection for this weekend.
Leroy Carter, who was excellent chasing kicks in last Saturday’s victory, is out with a high ankle sprain which means Josh Moorby takes his place on the left wing.
Moorby was chosen ahead of the experienced Rieko Ioane and Rennie did admit that it was partly based on their ability in the air.
“From a wing perspective, the high ball’s been a big part of our focus, so he’s (Ioane) doing a lot of work in that. What we know is he’s a hell of an athlete so he’s very much in the mix,” the head coach said.
“We did talk about an option to maybe throw him in and start him but we feel the Wallabies will kick a bit of high ball this week, we think it will be a bit shorter and more contestable, so we’ve put the guys out there who we think will be best to deal with that.”