All Blacks Look To Start Off Northern Tour With A Win At Murrayfield

The last time we witnessed the All Blacks play this year, they put together a very scrappy 18-18 draw with Australia. Now as they embark into the Northern Hemisphere, Richie McCaw and his men will be looking to not only improve on their well below par performance in Brisbane, but they will be looking to get their Northern Tour underway with a strong win over Scotland at Murrayfield.

What The Scotts Will Bring To The Table:

Scotland will know that they will struggle to match the All Blacks for strength and physicality, so the battle up front won’t be too high on their agenda. The All Blacks are simply too strong at the breakdown, and despite not having the physical presence of Kieran Read and Liam Messam for the opening test, the All Blacks will still target the Scotts in that area and look to continue to produce quick go forward pill for the backline to work with. This means that the Scotts will look to not over commit at the breakdown and have their loose forwards hang off the side of the ruck and look to put constant pressure on Dan Carter and disrupt our back play.

The relatively inexperienced midfield combination of Tamati Ellison and Ben Smith will look to be exploited by the Scottish defence all day, as they are aware that they do not bare the same physical presence of Nonu and Smith the Scotts will look to run heavy traffic their way all day on attack. Scotland has to be confident in their own attacking abilities if they’re to have any chance of putting digits on the board. When they get it right, it can work very well. When they don’t, it’s all over red rover, and its long night on defence for the lads.

5 Who Need Big Games:

Piri Weepu- Again under pressure to perform. What else is new? 

 Ali Williams- Selected on past form. Needs to repay the selectors faith.

Israel Dagg- Expect a somewhat aerial assault early on from the Scotts.

Adam Thompson- Looks to be on the out so needs to show he’s still able to produce something good.

Tawera Kerr-Barlow- On debut and has been talked up. Needs to show that he deserves to be there.

Kick off from Murrayfield is at at 3:25am tomorrow morning live on Sky Sport 1