Reflecting on the All Blacks’ loss to South Africa a fortnight ago, New Zealand assistant coach Jason Holland was quick to highlight some key areas of concern.
After leading at halftime in the Wellington clash, the All Blacks went on to suffer a 43-10 loss; the 33-point margin their worst-ever defeat.
As the side prepare to bounce back against the Wallabies at Eden Park on Saturday night, the key themes in the early week media obligations have been around the stinging review into that loss.
“Obviously it was vitally important that we got to the bottom of some of the things we really weren’t happy with and how South Africa dominated us, especially in the last 20,” Holland said.
“It was important we went really deep on that last week and then we came together on Sunday, our mindset around how we use our ball, what our solutions are and then being able to flip the switch by Monday to focus solely on Aussie.”
Among the areas highlighted by the review, Holland said that how the side were using possession needed to be addressed.
“There’s a couple of things we’re working away at. I touched on our possession and what we’re doing with our ball. There’s times, especially in the South African game and it has happened earlier on, where we give the ball back to the opposition when we don’t need to,” the coach said.
“Whether it’s a kick too often or whether that’s losing the battle in the air, as we know, there are a couple of key things that we feel the pressure is released from the opposition and we feel like that’s where we can really go hard on things.”
The All Blacks return to action this weekend after a week off against a resurgent Wallabies side who lead the Rugby Championship after four rounds.
The Australians have been strong under the coaching of Joe Schmidt and while they haven’t been the best starters, they have finished games well, with both of their wins in the Rugby Championship being comebacks.
It has been the opposite for the New Zealand side, who have again struggled through the final 20 minutes of tests this year. The All Blacks have scored 98 points in their four Rugby Championship tests in 2025, but only 27 in the final quarter of those matches.
“That’s been part of our convos [conversations] on Sunday,” Holland said.
“We’ve gone deep on around what halftime looks like, what our first 10 minutes after halftime looks like, and again, it’ll come back to the same things you keep hearing from me around our ability to apply pressure by having the ball.”
The All Blacks are expected to welcome back a few players for this week’s test, with Cam Roigard, Cortez Ratima, Codie Taylor and Patrick Tuipulotu all cleared to return from injury.
Roigard is yet to feature in the Rugby Championship this season, his most recent outing coming in the second test against France earlier in the year. He did, however, take plenty out of reviewing the side’s loss to the Springboks in Wellington.
“Obviously it was a tough pill to swallow,” Roigard said. “We pride ourselves on performing every week .... We have a lot of pride in what we do and we want to always perform to make New Zealand proud ... ”
“We’ve had some tough conversations yesterday [Monday] and on Sunday, so we’ve done our review and whatnot and we’re just looking forward to putting up a performance that makes ourselves proud and the country proud on Saturday.”
Christopher Reive joined the Herald sports team in 2017, bringing the same versatility to his coverage as he does to his sports viewing habits.
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