@Chris said in All Blacks v France I:
Yeah I watched all the Blues games Barrett did play well for the Blues apart from the odd silly mistake.
I watched most.
Beauden's long range kicking, and especially his exit plays, were terrible. This is one area DMac has it all over him, and he has his poor moments. We will never match the top international teams if we simply cannot get out of our 22 properly.
The Blues did not play better once he got back in the team, quite the contrary -- that is, he's no better than Plummer or Perofeta. In particular, the Blues centres scored almost no tries this year, despite a hard-working forward pack, because BB doesn't set up a back-line very well. It's no coincidence that the All Black back-line becomes similarly dry in tries when he has taken over.
How many times do we have to repeat the end of last year, where we are going OK under McKenzie, only to replace him with Barrett and then get worse? How does our sudden improvement once Beauden was replaced by Mo'unga get ignored?
I get that DMc is not the sort of player that everyone likes. But at least he is good for the other backs to run off, and gives us options other than poor chips, mid-field bombs and cross-kicks.