KEY POINTS:
If Isaac Newton was right and everything does have an equal and opposite reaction, then the increased kicking under the new rules means there will be increased catching.
In most games now, the ball is kicked more than 80 times. That's a dramatic increase from the old rules
and the result of teams being worried about not being able to recycle possession and conceding free kicks, particularly inside their own territory. So they kick deep.
It is now accepted to boom the ball downfield and exert pressure through the quality of the chase. The Crusaders were expert at it and the All Blacks are increasingly doing it.
That means the All Blacks have had to rethink the type of players they select for the wing.
Under the old rules, the emphasis was on wings with out-and-out speed. If they could beat a man one-on-one, if they could break open the defence and score from just a half chance, then they were in the frame.
Possessing those skills alone now will not guarantee selection. It would be dangerous for the All Blacks to select two out-and-out finishers on the wing.
During parts of 2006 and 2007 the preferred wing pairing was Joe Rokocoko and Sitiveni Sivivatu. They were the two most powerful wings in the squad.
They were the two wings with the most finishing ability, the two who carried the greatest X-factor and the two who were most likely to score tries from nothing.
But now the selectors have to come at things with a more defensive slant. They need at least one of their wings to be capable and confident under the high ball. They need for one wing at least to be in possession of a reliable kicking game.
The reality is that with 80 kicks a game, wingers are going to spend a lot more time catching the ball in defence and then working out what to do with it. Certainly they will be doing that a lot more than they will be sniffing out try-scoring opportunities.
That's why Richard Kahui has been preferred for much of the Tri Nations. Sivivatu, as the most experienced wing in the squad, was always going to play on the left wing.
There were concerns about playing Anthony Tuitavake on the other as he too was a runner, a player whose best work came with the ball in hand.
That combination would have left the All Blacks vulnerable to the avalanche of bombs being rained down upon them.
It would have made them easy to read on the counter-attack as both wings have a natural bent to run out of defence driven by the fact neither can kick particularly well.
Tuitavake's lack of height also made him vulnerable to cross-kicks to Wallaby opposite Lote Tuqiri.
Rudi Wulf was a potential partner to Sivivatu as the North Harbour wing is a defensively solid player. His positional work is good, his tackling strong and his general cleaning and tidying, excellent.
But Wulf was troubled with niggling injuries at the time of the Eden Park test so Kahui was used and he has taken his chance superbly.
Rokocoko has recovered from injury and should he regain his sharpness and commit to staying, then his return will be more dangerous for Sivivatu than for Kahui.
Playing the two Fijian-born wings together doesn't seem like such a good idea any more. Their attacking genius is cancelled by the defensive frailty and that frailty can be all too easily exposed under the new rules.
