Can we stop fucking around with mystic interpretations and stats for the backline for a second?
As a start, pick the guys who are best in their positions:
9 White
13 AAC (Adam Ashley-Cooper)
15 Folau
If you argue with that, you are clearly high on something.
These guys are the best, most consistent players in their preferred positions. So save yourself the bullshit theories and start picking the best players around them to complement this. Forget about favouring particular combinations of players from your team, because THESE GAMES ARE NOT ABOUT BEATING FRANCE.
It is about the germination of our World Cup squad, and getting a core of players who are capable of beating those bastard Kiwis in a couple of months to get our cup back.
Eyes on the prize FFS.
As a bastard kiwi I won't presume to tell you who should & shouldn't be wearing yellow this year, but I must say I find this radical idea of picking the best player in each position, that they actually play week-in week-out intriguing. I'll be watching to see if it happens & if so how it pans out.
I would like, however, to point out a coupla errors in your post:
First, the fact that the French have probably never sent frogmen (what else would they be?) into one of your harbours to sink an unarmed vessel going about its lawful business & in the process killing one of said vessels crew, doesn't mean they they wouldn't if their President or PM felt like it. The French should, therefore, be beaten like a Victorian-era waif or late-60's British MP (Moana Pasifika). At every opportunity.
Second, Bledisloe was our guv'ner - there's a Bledisloe St in my old home town, not far from Cobham, Fergusson & Freyberg, GG's of NZ all of 'em - so strictly speaking the times the Cup has spent West of the deetch (FFS, can't you guys even say "Dutch" properly?) count as a holiday not a homecoming. And I don't think Ruchie & his mates are ready to let go just yet - never mind, you've still got bragging rights over the DHL Cup.
