The Bledisloe is back in town

Photo courtesy of Zimbio.com

Last Saturday night the Bledisloe Cup was once again locked away for another year at NZRU headquarters in Wellington with a 27-16 victory over the Wallabies. Sure at times it wasn't pretty or perfect but the All Blacks did enough to continue there dominance over our closest cousins and keep the psychological edge going.

One of the big talking points pre match was the No10 jersey (perhaps it really is cursed) and newbie Tom Taylor stepping into the test match arena for the first time. Much was said about his All Black father Warwick and perhaps the similarities that we could witness on Saturday night.

Showing maturity and a cool, calm and collected demeanor Taylor did a fantastic job first up. Yes he made mistakes, missed a couple of shots at goal but for a test debut essentially against one of our biggest rivals he showed that he perhaps could be a more permanent option in the years to come.

The Wallabies started the game as many predicted, tails between their legs and attacking the All Blacks line. Almost going close and perhaps if it was referred to the TMO the Wallabies would have drawn first blood. But as we have seen throughout so many All Black test matches, the ultimate undoing by many opposition teams is that they just cannot sustain the intensity to disrupt and cause the All Blacks problems throughout the field. 

Ben "The Ghost" Smith continued his form dotting over the white line for a further 2 tries and by this stage we can possibly assume that James O'Connor is having nightmares about the man from the deep south, 4 tries in 2 games is not a pretty statistic. For the second week in a row he was weak on the wing defensively and in particular with Smith's second, he was nowhere to be found. 

With both teams having another week to work on the scrums after the latest installment of laws by the IRB, the Wallabies were as expected demolished but an All Black forward pack, highly superior and almost playing on another level to that of the Aussies. 

A late intercept try to Israel Folau, was barely a consolation for the Wallabies and once again there have been calls for him to move to fullback, someone with his power, explosiveness and unpredictability surely just needs more ball to work off. Mogg had a slightly better game than Sydney but again his defense was found wanting on a couple of crucial occasions. 

Ewen McKenzie post match voiced his gripes with the referring and felt that a couple of All Black infringements deserved further punishment, a spell on the sideline. I must admit, had the Wallabies or any team done what Aaron Smith or Kieran Read did after a Wallaby burst through the midfield, only cm's away from the try line I would probably be calling foul as well. 

However his analysis on the game was directed at Jaco Peyper and his crew of officials, deflecting away from yet another lacklustre performance by his side. Lets face it, even with different tactics and a varying game plan to that of Robbie Deans, Ewen still has the same field of players to select from, something that wont be fixed over night.

On a positive note however, it was the 100th test appearance from Tony Woodcock, a perennial quiet achiever of the team, who didn't even want to lead the team out onto the field as per tradition, another example of a humble man, doing his bit for the team. 

We all have a week off test match rugby so of course the focus will shift back to our All Black breeding ground - the ITM cup. Next it will be to tackle the Argentinean's in Hamilton. Slightly too far away for my liking but I will cope.

What did you think of the game?

All black everything.