All Blacks: Form just one part of puzzle

Despite a blistering season, Jason Rutledge is unlikely to win All Blacks selection. Photo / Getty Images

That Jason Rutledge is unlikely to be on the All Black radar is a sign how little current form counts in the modern age.

The Southlander has been the best hooker in the ITM Cup so far - more accurate, involved and influential than recent All Blacks Corey Flynn and Aled de Malmanche.

Rutledge has played with a maturity and poise the improving Dane Coles hasn't quite matched. In a bygone era the veteran would get an All Black call-up to tour Hong Kong and the UK.

But it won't come. At almost 33, Rutledge is not the future. At 100kg, he's not quite big enough for the increased brutality of test football.

The bigger obstacle to his inclusion is the changed selection template. Earlier this year, All Blacks assistant coach Wayne Smith explained the criteria for selecting players.

Where 10-20 years ago, it was a case of tracking players' form, these days, form is just one component and rarely the most significant. This All Black panel has built detailed dossiers on a group of about 50 players. Each week they receive statistical printouts covering every aspect of a player's game.

They have constant dialogue with Super15 and ITM Cup coaches and are privy to behind-the-scenes details that might explain form slumps or declining confidence in players.

Those who have been All Blacks, spent time in the camp and played test football will already have been assessed in terms of how they respond in training, how they deal with pressure, how they prepare and how they conduct themselves off the field.

This enables the panel to build comprehensive player profiles. It is the reason they were prepared to back the likes of Piri Weepu and Richard Kahui earlier this year when neither had been in particularly convincing form. It's why they will give Andrew Hore every chance to prove his fitness and stake his claim to tour.

A decade or two ago, even experienced, world class players like Hore would not only have to establish their match fitness to regain selection, they would also have to play their way back into form.

Not now. Hore just needs to prove he'll be fit enough to play a full part on the tour. If he can do that - by playing for Taranaki the day before the All Blacks fly to Hong Kong - then he'll go because the selectors are confident he can slot back into test football after such a long layoff.

They will bank on him finding form while on tour and will handle him gently, giving him time off the bench in the first few games with a view to starting him in Dublin or Cardiff.

The patience extended to Hore is an extreme example of the current selection policy. The selectors are being particularly lenient because it has become apparent that Hore and Keven Mealamu are a long way ahead of the other hookers in New Zealand.

Those two are world class and there is a big drop in quality to the tier below.

Flynn backed up Mealamu during the Tri Nations and failed to convince when he played most of the final test in Sydney. De Malmanche continues to be plagued by his lineout throwing.

As well as Rutledge has played, is he really an All Black? The same question should be asked of Coles and Hika Elliot - they have had good campaigns but other than form, how many boxes would they tick on the All Black template?

It's not necessarily Henry's problem, as Hore and Mealamu will both be here next year and who knows what the future holds for the All Black coach beyond 2011?

But New Zealand desperately needs at least one younger hooker to storm through and stake a genuine claim for selection in the next 12 months.