Cruden Blamed, but are the All Blacks so great without Sonny Bill and Carter?

a story by Rusiate Baleilevuka LOLZ - that is exactly what it is Sharkbok, a story with a Rusiate bent/angle! Do you know who Rusiate is? exactly!

The answer is obvious. The abs are simply benefitting from sub standard play fron the wobblies and the Bokke. In the case of the Bokke given the injuries, retirements and new coach its understandable and was predicted by Beeno the realist. However it is not understandable re oz who have a settled side and coach who has been on the job or 5 years.

Hakwa

I do not blame Cruden for the poor play of the All Blacks in the first half - although he was not a house on fire.   He made some mistakes - but those were largely the result of pressure on him.   I think that the All Black forwards wer e not dominant in the first half and that was the main problem in tthis case.   The Argentitnians do not really have depth insofr as forward play is concerned and it shows - when they had to start replacing forwards.   Am not too happy about the All Black forward play in the first half and that needs serious attention.

 Cruden must have ahad a bad game for the whole game apart from the last 15 minutes if this guys is to be believed. Honestly this was a very tough close contest Game, and Argentinia played really well to hold The All Blacks to such a close game until 15 minutes before the end when the floodgates opened. Blaming Cruden for a bad game is totally disrespectfull and does not recognise the Great Argintinian effort. If the Argentinian team were fitter they could maybe have held the game in the last 15 minutes. the only thing that pulled New Zealand through in the end was fitness. 

the pumas got in between the ab and disrupted there pattern of play. to be fair i did not get the feeling the the AB got out of second gear so they might have gone there with the wrong mindset.

one cant play every game great so i think its more a fact of the pumas where up for it. its not easy replacing dan carter. he is one of a kind

I think the conditions at the stadium certainly played into the favour of the Argentinians as the wind and rain evened things up so lets be fair about that. However without showing any disrespect to our Argentinian friends it was clear that they can defend very well but at no time through out the entire match did the Argies look like they had the game in hand or had the ability to  break open the AB defence which for one blemish was just as resolute as the Argies were. It also looked like the AB's were playing within themselves and maybe pacing their game for us this week?

However I think the new or old however you look at it combination of Nonu and Smith coming back did take a while to gel and I think SBW would have made a telling difference running hard and offloading. Nonettheless, next week they will be a force to reckon with and you can bett your bottom dollar that they will run directly at Morne and JDV and pound Kirschner with up and unders. 

But to answer the question is NZ weaker without Carter and SBW of course they are but so is OZ without Pocock and Genia and the Boks without Bissie and Schalk so the argument is moot

spot on radtab

the thing is one cant really replace these types of players without if directly effecting the way the team plays. carter and sbw will be a much bigger loss that schalk i feel. bissie was instrumental in the way the boks forwards battled with the other forwards. nonu will have a field day at jdv and morne. if the AB lose the ball it wont matter because morne and zane will just kick it right back at them to start there enxt wave of attack.

i agree with both radtad1 and clevermike, the All Black forwards in the first half were out played by the fiesty pumas, but just as i expected, the pumas come the 60th minute mark ran our of gas and their aggression at the breakdowns simmerd down, while the All Blacks started to gather momentum

the weather was poor but it was the pumas biggest ally, as it effected the All Blacks fluidity in the backline big time. aaron cruden was quiet, but he wasnt bad considering the conditions and the solid effort from the pumas,especially in the first half.
im expecting the All Blacks to show better fundamentals in dunedin against the Boks, cos the retarctable roof will ensure that its a good running rugby surface, which IMO is bad news for bafan bafana, i mean the Springboks, but if morne should land 50% of the 32 drop goals im expecting, then u never know, the Boks might get their 2nd ever victory in dunedin.