All Blacks: Questions surround Tialata, Eaton

Prop Neemia Tialata's long-term future with the All Blacks is unclear. Photo / Getty Images

Last night's recall for Neemia Tialata confused the picture. As did Jason Eaton's appearance on the bench.

Only a few weeks ago, there was strong intelligence suggesting both men would be left at home for the end of year tour - that their All Black futures were, at best, uncertain.

Then they both appeared in the match-day 22 for the final Tri Nations test. Surely if they were not in the picture to tour, they wouldn't have been selected to play the Wallabies?

With the championship already lost, the rebuilding could start in Wellington and it would have been criminal to waste an opportunity to blood players who are in the frame to tour.

So was it a case of last chance for both Tialata and Eaton? A give-it-all-you-have-got-lads sort of night and prove you have still got it? Or was it a farewell, a chance to give both men a run in front of their home crowd and then tell them later that they are no longer in the mix?

It is hard to know but there are now reasons to believe Tialata and Eaton remain of interest to the All Blacks.

Tialata has never been convincing in prolonged periods. As he revealed on his own Facebook entry, he's been advised by Wellington coach Jamie Joseph to head offshore while his knees still function. Joseph's advice also extended to re-inventing himself as a 20-minute bench man, as Tialata can cover both sides.

When Tialata didn't feature in either Sydney or Hamilton, it merely confirmed the impression the All Blacks were thinking along similar lines to Joseph.

But those close to Tialata say he was told a few weeks back he would be starting last night's test; that the All Black selectors wanted him to play against Taranaki for Wellington before the Springbok test, come back into camp and then wear No 3 against the Wallabies a week later.

Far from being rejected, Tialata has been told by the All Black coaches that he can do something that most props in New Zealand can't - hold a scrum steady.

Expectations have been lowered with Tialata. There is no pressure on him to run for 80 minutes in a test, to carry the ball or power through the tackles.

His job is to scrum and build the platform and right now, the All Blacks are happy with just that. Whether that means Tialata has a longer-term future is hard to know. When Carl Hayman comes back next year, and when Owen Franks matures, the idea of a scrummaging tight-head only will lose its appeal.

Eaton is also believed to have made some progress within the camp and there remains this great hope that he'll pull off the demanding feat of re-inventing himself as a lock-cum-blindside.

He's been told that's his future and presumably six weeks on tour with the All Blacks later this year would be the launchpad to begin the process of re-training him.

That's one possibility with Eaton - the other is he stays at home, follows a tailored programme to help mould his body into the new shape he'll need to be a loose forward and then let him loose with the Hurricanes next year.

Of the four Hurricanes' forwards involved last night, it's probably Rodney So'oialo whose destiny is the easiest to predict. It would be a surprise to see him tour. It would be a surprise to see him win any more All Black caps.

The feeling with So'oialo, like Jerry Collins before him, is that he's hit the wall.

The impact of having given so much in the past 10 years is telling. He's staring at an empty tank and as much as he craves a future that is a replica of his past, it's looking unlikely.