Gregor Paul: All Blacks should be wary of Wallabies true ability

By Gregor Paul in Dunedin

There's a touch of over confidence creeping into the build up for this second Bledisloe Cup encounter.

Not from the All Blacks, but from everyone else it seems. There isn't a pundit to be found who is giving Australia a chance and that included former Wallabies who have been harsh, if not brutal, in their condemnation of the current side.

The TAB have also plunged the odds on the All Blacks to their lowest level for a Bledisloe Cup test and there is this overwhelming sense that fans on both side of the Tasman are in agreement that the clash in Dunedin will deliver another heavy victory for the All Blacks.

Why everyone feels like that is fairly easy to understand. The Wallabies were 54-6 down at one stage last week and they were powerless for more than half an hour to do anything to stop the All Blacks.

There was also the continued bursts of inaccurate skill execution from the Wallabies and this sense, during some periods of the game, that they didn't know what they were trying to do.

For much of the test they didn't look confident. They were hesitant, lacking in commitment to each other and their strategy, and given they were like that for 50 minutes, it's no surprise they have been written off as hopeless.

But that sort of thinking is not so much crazy as unfair and not reflective of the true ability of this Wallabies side.

They can play effectively with the ball. That much was surely noticed by everyone last week? Even when they were leaking badly in the first half, their attacking thrusts were convincing.

They stretched the All Blacks, had them scrambling in that first half. In the second, they broke the All Blacks four times and while some of that was the result of the poor decisions the visitors made, there was still ample evidence that Kurtley Beale has added plenty, Tevita Kuridrani is hungry to make his mark and that Israel Folau is deadly if he's not tackled on the gainline.

On the fast, dry track they will encounter in Dunedin, the Wallabies should be able to do a bit of damage when they have the ball.

The big question is how much improvement can they make on their defence after what was a bit of a horror show in Sydney? And the answer is probably a fair bit.

The All Blacks did expose the structure of the Wallabies defence. They did move the ball so quickly and so effectively that the little uncertainties that are clearly part of the Australian defensive set up as they try to bed in a new pattern, were fully exposed.

But the bigger problem for the Wallabies wasn't their system, it was more their poor one-on-one tackling. That was unusually bad.

Michael Hooper is a world class openside who normally hits hard and yet there he was, missing four tackles he'd expect to make in his sleep. He wasn't the only one and while that was hardly excusable, it is something the Wallabies can confidently expect not to see again this week.

And if they can make better tackles they can do more to slow the speed of the All Blacks' possession at the recycle point and that in turn will give them a better chance of making more tackles when New Zealand look to push wide.

The Wallabies, however it may have looked last Saturday, are not as far behind the All Blacks as the 54-34 game would attest. They will be better in Dunedin, sharper, hungrier more dynamic and more accurate and those who have written them off should be a little wary of regretting that.