Ex-All Blacks back three star Israel Dagg insisted that their aerial game was exposed by France and that moving Rieko Ioane could have impacted it further.
Scott Robertson made the bold call to shift the 28-year-old from centre after his struggles for both the Blues and New Zealand over the past year.
Wing was the position he broke onto the scene in as a teenager but, following the switch into midfield, he has had little experience in that position recently.
‘It’s an art, it’s a skill’
Having played the entirety of the Blues campaign at 13, Ioane was then placed out wide and Dagg felt it enabled Les Bleus to get on top aerially.
“There are positives but there are also a lot of work-ons, and our high balls is one of them. We’ve kind of gone from being the world leaders in retaining our own ball, but at the moment we’re really struggling to catch our own ball and to chase and put pressure on our own kick right now,” he said on Sport Nation’s Scotty & Izzy show.
“One of those could be that we’ve got a guy that’s played centre (Ioane) for the last four or five years who has gone to the wing.
“It’s an art, it’s a skill that is learnt over a very, very, very long time and when I was watching him on the weekend, he just struggled in the high ball.
“He probably lacked confidence and didn’t really have an understanding of what was needed to get up and apply the pressure.”
Dagg also felt that their kicking game did not help matters, with the half-backs not quite accurate enough in putting their opponents under pressure.
“I was listening to Marshy (Justin Marshall) about our kicks as well. Our kicks are going more central, they’re probably going a little too long, which is not allowing our attackers to get there and dominate the space,” he said.
“A lot of focus this week is on where we’re going to do our kicks. At the moment, we’re getting a bit lost and we’re like, ‘oh my god, our only option here is to kick’.
“We’re kicking from the central part of the field which is opening it up. If it goes too long, you’ve got two sides to attack and putting our defence under so much pressure.
“It’s our kick strategy and our ability to catch that high ball. Defensively though the middle, we got exposed a whole lot of times.”
Understrength France show up
It all counted towards what was a rusty first outing from the All Blacks, but Dagg gave credit to a severely understrength French side for their performance.
They were heavily criticised before the match after leaving their stars at home, but Les Bleus showed the depth of quality in the Top 14.
“Eighteen turnovers, not great but for me there are still a lot of positives out there. I’ve never in my time had an easy game against the French,” Dagg said.
“No matter who wears that French jersey, it is one of the most difficult Test matches I will ever have to play because they play with so much emotion.
“They’re so bloody skilful. Watching that French team, C/D team or whatever, they were skilful as hell. They were right up for this game.”