\u201cIt\u2019s great being back in Argentina and preparing for a Rugby Championship. We were watching Australia closely in that Lions series, and Argentina knocked off the British and Irish Lions at the Aviva, which is no mean feat. South Africa are world No 1 so the next six weeks are certainly something to look forward to,\u201d Barrett told the Herald. <\/p>\n
\u201cFor the most part of last year\u2019s Rugby Championship we felt we were in a great position for three quarters of those games. There were two tests against South Africa where we didn\u2019t finish the way we wanted when we were up and probably should\u2019ve got home. We had our challenges against Argentina in Wellington and corrected that a week later. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe want to go and win it this year. We didn\u2019t enjoy where we finished last year.\u201d<\/p>\n
Robertson\u2019s first season at the helm marked the largest All Blacks management change in two decades, and the new group had to absorb some harsh lessons in the spotlight, on the job. <\/p>\n
Further upheaval was evident mid-year, too, when assistant coach Leon MacDonald abruptly departed, with Tamati Ellison promoted to join Robertson\u2019s coaching team. <\/p>\n
\u201cLast year had its challenges in this environment with a lot of change,\u201d Barrett said. \u201cWe feel like we\u2019re heading in the right direction now. Each week helps. <\/p>\n
\u201cWhether you like it or not there\u2019s a feeling out period at this level. It\u2019s a tough level to have to go and learn because there are small margins in international rugby with a high calibre of players and coaches all over the world. If you\u2019re a little bit off, you get found out. We weren\u2019t far off last year. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe had a great French series. There\u2019s an expectation to win but then when you win, I feel the NZ public and media then question the how and by how much. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe were fully aware of a great French side with a wealth of Top 14 experience, which is one of the strongest competitions in the world. To close some of those games out, when we were in similar positions in last year\u2019s Rugby Championship, we learnt a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
The next chance to provide definitive proof of that growth arrives against the Pumas. Barrett has experienced the challenges the emotionally charged locals pose on home soil and, alongside other All Blacks senior leaders, he has shared that knowledge with the greener members of the squad \u2013 eight of whom<\/a> play in Argentina for the first time this weekend. <\/p>\n \u201cA lot of the younger guys haven\u2019t had the luxury of travelling over here to play the Jaguares with them being out of Super Rugby, so learning to deal with the travel, trying to upskill and teach them what they\u2019re going to expect on Saturday and what we\u2019re walking into, which is a great international side who are proud with a lot of emotion. <\/p>\n \u201cA lot of the Pumas just want one crack at the All Blacks once in their career. We\u2019ve got to match that level and go up to where they\u2019re going to be. We\u2019re fully aware of that challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n While the Pumas savoured three successes in the past five years against the All Blacks, Robertson\u2019s men seek to maintain their 16-match unbeaten record in Argentina. <\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s not something we\u2019ve drawn on but we\u2019re a side that speaks about performing away from home. That means something to us because it\u2019s challenging. Here in Cordoba we\u2019re in a place none of the squad other than Razor have travelled to so it\u2019s unfamiliar territory but it\u2019s 80 minutes of rugby.\u201d<\/p>\n Barrett\u2019s combination with Proctor is well established at the Hurricanes but after two tests as a starting combination \u2013 since Rieko Ioane\u2019s shift to the wing \u2013 it remains in its infancy for the All Blacks. <\/p>\n The duo has all the makings of a complementary yin and yang pairing, with Barrett injecting the physical edge and Proctor offering silky touches to provide for his outsides, but at this stage they need time to showcase their best on the test scene. <\/p>\n \u201cBilly is an outstanding rugby player. I enjoy every opportunity I get to play alongside him. To truly understand his game the best place to watch from is in the stands. You don\u2019t get to see all the work he does. He covers so much ground. I love the way he plays. <\/p>\n \u201cDefensively he\u2019s tough. He\u2019s got great skills, great athlete. He\u2019s played a handful of games in the black jersey. Hopefully he stays healthy and continues to perform and you\u2019ll see the best rugby ahead of him.\u201d<\/p>\n Liam Napier<\/a> is a Senior Sports Journalist and Rugby Correspondent for the New Zealand Herald. He is a co-host of the Rugby Direct podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cIt\u2019s great being back in Argentina and preparing for a Rugby Championship. We were watching Australia closely in…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71573,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[9490,3265,617,12910,64,63,9661,36042,27046,9658,35819,9663,56112,13057,14014,5587,208,1899,56110,25232,9682,2652,22672,56114,56111,38348,760,9660,9672,85,56115,9673,8293,56113,1547],"class_list":["post-71572","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-after","tag-all","tag-and","tag-argentina","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-barrett","tag-believes","tag-better","tag-blacks","tag-campaign","tag-championship","tag-changes","tag-first","tag-french","tag-from","tag-growth","tag-have","tag-jordie","tag-many","tag-much","tag-on","tag-patchy","tag-placed","tag-reflects","tag-robertsons","tag-rugby","tag-scott","tag-series","tag-sports","tag-suggested","tag-sweep","tag-than","tag-understrength","tag-year"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}