All Blacks coach Hansen slams lineout drives

All Blacks coach Steve Hansen appealed Friday for World Rugby to change the laws and allow defending sides to collapse lineout drives. 

His outburst came after the All Blacks had beaten Argentina 39-18 in their Rugby Championship clash in Christchurch, scoring five tries to two and with both Pumas tries coming from what Hansen described as “bloody boring” lineout drives. 

“I think it’s illegal obstruction,” Hansen said, adding he expected South Africa to employ the same tactic when the All Blacks play the Springboks in Johannesburg next weekend. 

The massed forward drive from a lineout has become a potent try-scoring weapon for teams with big packs and Hansen said he did not believe it should be removed from the game, rather he wanted a “fair contest”. 

“The easiest way is to say you can collapse it. There’s never been anyone injured in a collapsed maul yet and there’s thousands of them every week that get penalised,” he said. 

“So make it legal (to collapse a drive) and then it becomes half pie a fair contest. One of the charters of the game is everything’s got to be a fair contest and I don’t believe lineout drives are.”

All Blacks captain Richie McCaw, however, acknowledged that he also enjoyed being on the right side of a lineout drive, and sugggested they would become a common tactic at the World Cup starting in England in September.

“The big boys up front, when we get the chance at it, we rub our hands together and you’ve got to make sure you have a way of stopping it as well,” he said.

“There’s no doubt as we go on this year there’s going to be a fair bit of it I’d suggest.”

McCaw, who scored the All Blacks opening try against Argentina when driving around the front of a lineout, also blamed his own side’s lack of discipline for allowing Argentina to get into a position to score their points.

Along with McCaw, Ma’a Nonu, Charles Piutau, Kieran Read and Codie Taylor scored tries against Argentina with Dan Carter kicking four conversions and two penalties.

Argentina’s points came from Creevy’s double and two penalties and a converesion by Nicolas Sanchez. – Agence France-Presse