McKenzie landed awkwardly on his ankle after catching a high ball in the fifth minute. He had it strapped and battled on, scoring one try and having another ruled out for losing the ball over the line after regathering a perfectly placed Quinn Tupaea chip kick.<\/p>\n
Damian McKenzie scores a try in the All Blacks’ win over the Sharks. Photo \/ Photosport<\/p>\n
Eventually, though, eight minutes before the break, McKenzie relented and was replaced at fullback by Emoni Narawa. <\/p>\n
Having started three successive Nations Championship<\/a> wins last month, McKenzie was earmarked to continue at fullback for the opening South African test.<\/p>\n All Blacks coach Dave Rennie will, therefore, hope for a swift recovery but he downplayed McKenzie\u2019s injury post match. <\/p>\n \u201cHe was running around, we had it strapped, but it was a little bit ginger. We decided to play it safe. He\u2019s not too bad. We\u2019d expect him to be fine for the first test,\u201c Rennie said, adding the All Blacks would make an announcement on Billy Proctor\u2019s replacement in the coming days after his tour-ending shoulder blade injury. <\/p>\n Torrential rain throughout the day created a sodden, heavy Kings Park pitch. The inclement weather \u2013 and the heavily weakened Sharks team – may have played a part in the underwhelming 14,759 crowd. <\/p>\n The sparsely filled 50,000 capacity venue was certainly a bad look for the tour after a near full first match in Cape Town.<\/p>\n Ma\u2019a Nonu, the 44-year-old, 103-test veteran making his debut for the Sharks off the bench, responded to the All Blacks haka with Kapa o Pango. Nonu then received a rousing reception from the locals when he emerged off the bench for the final quarter. <\/p>\n Otherwise, though, the Sharks barely threatened. <\/p>\n Starting a shadow test team missing first-choice figures Ardie Savea, Codie Taylor, Will Jordan, Tyrel Lomax and Cam Roigard, the All Blacks rectified some areas they struggled with in their opening tour win against the Stormers. <\/p>\n They defended the Sharks maul well and largely dominated the scrums \u2013 albeit against a side missing eight Springboks and without their starting hooker and lock who pulled out with injury 24 hours before the match.<\/p>\n The All Blacks lineout endured some issues, though, and discipline was again a problem early as they conceded the first five penalties.<\/p>\n Conditions made the intent for running rugby initially challenging but the All Blacks employed their kicking game to good effect, with Jordie Barrett finding Fineanganofo with several cross-field kicks.<\/p>\n And by the second half, the All Blacks found their groove with Barrett finishing one sweeping, slick movement.<\/p>\n Ruben Love, other than missing touch from a penalty, delivered a largely assured display in his return to No 10 with one 50\/22 and a classy tip-on pass under pressure to lay on the first of Fehi Fineanganofo\u2019s brace. Love also nailed seven conversions \u2013 four from the sideline \u2013 missing one.<\/p>\n Fineanganofo, in his first start for the All Blacks, was highly involved from the right edge. <\/p>\n After debuting off the bench in the opening test of the year, Fineanganofo has endured a shoulder injury and sickness to remain on ice since early July. In his second crack for the All Blacks, the Hurricanes wing beat defenders with almost every touch. <\/p>\n Kyle Preston was another standout in his first start at halfback to push his case for the deputy role behind Roigard. Wallace Sititi and Semisi Ta\u2019eiloa, the latter on debut off the bench, also impressed.<\/p>\n This eight-try rout was, however, a case of men against boys.<\/p>\n In their last tour match before the first test, against the Bulls in Pretoria this weekend, the All Blacks need more resistance. <\/p>\n All Blacks 54 (Fehi Fineanganofo 2, Damian McKenzie, Caleb Clarke, Jordie Barrett, Kyle Preston, Timoci Tavatavanawai, Sam Darry tries; Ruben Love 7 cons)<\/p>\n Sharks 0<\/p>\n HT: 14-0<\/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 Listen to Elliott Smith\u2019s live commentary on Newstalk ZB Sport and iHeartRadio, or join the Alternative Commentary Collective on iHeartRadio and Radio Hauraki.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"McKenzie landed awkwardly on his ankle after catching a high ball in the fifth minute. He had it…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":566132,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[5263,8136,3013,2741,10709,124,69827,9635,41309,15258,27981,20409,61340,3607,111,139,69,8143,183683,14861,6102,9643,213,6027],"class_list":["post-566131","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-all","tag-blacks","tag-but","tag-claim","tag-concerns","tag-could","tag-damian","tag-dave","tag-dominant","tag-injury","tag-kings","tag-liam","tag-mckenzie","tag-napier","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-park","tag-rennies","tag-sharks","tag-side","tag-spark","tag-sports","tag-win"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/566131","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=566131"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/566131\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/566132"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=566131"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=566131"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=566131"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}} Ma’a Nonu performs a haka in response to the All Blacks in Durban. Photo \/ Smartframe<\/p>\n
Fehi Fineanganofo scored two tries for the All Blacks against the Sharks. Photo \/ Photosport<\/p>\n