Sonny Bill Williams led the way on Friday night. He had two superb passes that were enough to remind everyone why the coaching panel find it hard to resist him. He threw one incredibly dainty pass with his arm at full elevation, just popping the ball gently over the defence to open up plenty of space on the outside.
No one else on the planet could have done the same and it's those micro-moments of outrageous skill that can blow a game wide open.
Offloading is a huge part of his game, always has been. But what the coaches have been drumming into him is the need to use his offloading wisely and judiciously.
It's a brilliant trick to have but not if it's speculative and hopeful. Kieran Read is another who can shatter a defence with his ability to commit two tacklers within the tramlines and free the last runner.
He was backing himself in that facet in Christchurch, as were Ma'a Nonu, Waisake Naholo, Dan Carter, Jerome Kaino and Brodie Retallick. There was one play in the second half when there were three unlikely offloads in short succession which enabled the All Blacks to run 60m when most teams would have been recycling after 10.
"It is a skill-set that we have got in this team," said All Black coach Steve Hansen. "Clearly there is a number of our guys who can do it. It makes it difficult to break us down if we can offload in the contact or thereabouts in the contact. We will keep using it but we have got to get better at it."
What Hansen wants to see is more accuracy and better decision-making around when to pass and when to hold on. That's the key to making it a match-winner: the key to playing rugby that few teams, if any, will be able to stop.
"Did we do it at the right time in the right part of the game? Probably not," said Hansen. "While we have got a good skill-set offloading, we have to learn to adapt to when to do it a little bit better."
The hard, firm ground at Ellis Park will be the ideal place for the All Blacks to refine their offloading. A dry ball will help, too.
Regardless of selections, there is virtually nothing between the Boks and All Blacks. The last few games between these two have been super tight — the separation point typically being a moment of magic.
This will be the story all season, no doubt. The World Cup will inevitably be like that — tight, tense and then something will need to happen to split the respective teams.
The All Blacks want to increase the chances of it being them who breaks the game. They want to be the side with the ability to open any defence and that's why their offloading game is so important.
"It is really tough to defend a side that is offloading well," said Carter. "You have defensive structures obviously but as soon as you offload, you get in behind them and it is tough to defend.
"We have got some guys who are pretty capable. The intent was there and a couple of them did come off. We have got to fine tune that and make sure they are not 50-50s and that there is a bit more certainty to most of them. It will be a huge attacking threat to our game as the season goes on."
It's the potential scale, alluded to in Christchurch, that excites the All Blacks and will have most of the other contenders nervous.
The way the game is set up at the moment, most teams have to build momentum through winning collisions. That's what happens — typically one of the forwards will smash into contact and hope for a quick recycle, before the next one-off runner takes it up.
It's a repeat process until eventually the defence is moving backwards and the ball can be moved wider. But with the All Blacks, it's a bit different because they are looking to offload in those first exchanges.
Romano and Retallick in particular were adept coming on to short passes around the fringes of the breakdown, and then creating the option of offloading out of the contact.
When they were able to do that, the All Blacks were immediately playing with momentum, which created more space for the likes of Williams and Nonu to then run the right angles for them to offload out of the contact.
When done well, as it was a couple of times in Christchurch, the All Blacks were able to play from touchline to touchline and always have a man advantage. The build-up to Charles Piutau's try was the perfect example of what the All Blacks are trying to achieve.
They worked their way down-field through straight running, good timing, exotic and astute offloading and some quick recycling.
"It is about trying to express ourselves," said Israel Dagg. "We can't be silly about it. It has to be a definite offload opportunity. It can't be willy-nilly here and there.
"It is about making a definite opportunity to offload and no doubt we will get to South Africa and have a thorough review where they will tell us what we did well and what we didn't."
No doubt, too, the All Blacks will look to bring Julian Savea and Ben Smith into the backline — two more quality offloaders — and see if they can strike the right balance of when and where to play the ball out of contact.
