All Blacks v Wallabies
Kick-off: 7:05pm Saturday 28 September NZT
Sky Stadium, Wellington
Live updates on RNZ Sport
All Black coach Scott Robertson has confirmed that the benching of Damian McKenzie was part of their wider plans. He's opted for 131-test veteran Beauden Barrett in the number 10 jersey for this Saturday's second Bledisloe Cup clash against the Wallabies.
"We were always planning to give Beauden a go, you have to," Robertson said at the team's base at the NZCIS today.
"Damian has started every game until now and he's shown some good form but you have to give guys an opportunity to build depth in your team and it's a chance for Beauden to play outside TJ. They've a combination that has played a lot of games together, and they've played a lot of games together at the Cake Tin so it lines up nicely."
TJ Perenara has also been given a start at halfback in what will be his final test on NZ soil, fittingly in his hometown of Wellington.
"He's playing good footy," Robertson said of Perenara's selection.
"When he's started he's been great, when he's come off the bench he's been good as well. You've got a great 9-10 combo."
TJ Perenara of New Zealand leads the haka. Photo: Andrew Cornaga/www.photosport.nz
Perenara said that it was "very cool" that the last test of the year was in Wellington.
"To have my family at the game, to be able to have them at the last game, that will be cool too."
Robertson also addressed the main negative narrative of the season, the All Blacks' inability to score points at the back end of games. He said the main focus of the bench was to "focus on solutions".
"We've looked at the accuracy and the discipline, the experience of the group coming on. You focus on what you need to do, what does it look like and how you action it."
He's named Patrick Tuipulotu, which should help with the experience issue, however discipline is now officially a worry. The All Blacks have conceded six yellow cards this season and five of them have been in the last 20 minutes of test matches, so the evidence is strong that correlation is equalling causation.
"Obviously they are linked. When you give cards away you give away six points on average…that's something that's a little bit of individual and a bit of group and we've got to be better than that. That's what we're focused on."
As for the Wellington curse, that's seen the All Blacks fail to win a test there since 2018, Robertson said it was "really important" that they got a result this weekend.
"It's something we've addressed, someone we're aware of. It's not something we're proud of. But you deal with records with performances."
All Blacks: 1 Ethan de Groot 2 Codie Taylor 3 Tyrel Lomax 4 Scott Barrett (c) 5 Tupou Vaa'i 6 Wallace Sititi 7 Sam Cane 8 Ardie Savea 9 TJ Perenara 10 Beauden Barrett 11 Caleb Clarke 12 Anton Lienert-Brown 13 Rieko Ioane 14 Sevu Reece 15 Will Jordan
Bench: 16 Asafo Aumua 17 Tamaiti Williams 18 Pasilio Tosi 19 Patrick Tuipulotu 20 Luke Jacobson 21 Cortez Ratima 22 David Havili 23 David Havili
Wallabies: 1 Angus Bell, 2 Matt Faessler 3 Taniela Tupou 4 Nick Frost 5 Jeremy Williams 6 Rob Valetini 7 Fraser McReight 8 Harry Wilson (c) 9 Jake Gordon (26 Tests) 10 Noah Lolesio 11 Dylan Pietsch 12 Hunter Paisami 13 Len Ikitau 14 Andrew Kellaway 15 Tom Wright
Bench: 16 Brandon Paenga-Amosa 17 Isaac Kailea 18 Allan Alaalatoa 19 Lukhan Salakaia-Loto 20 Langi Gleeson 21 Tate McDermott 22 Ben Donaldson 23 Josh Flook