Beauden Barrett: The All Blacks’ biggest strength – and their biggest weakness? Fly-half is the best player in world rugby – but his poor goal kicking record is starting to cost New Zealand

When New Zealand arrive at Twickenham on Saturday they will not be perturbed by the home support of over 80,000, nor the test that England – who not that long ago won 18 matches in a row – can bring when said crowd is roaring them on.

On a collective level, they are All Blacks and rightfully consider themselves among the elite sporting units not just on the international stage, but in history. As individuals, they boast world-class talents such as Kieran Read, Brodie Retallick, Rieko Ioane and, perhaps most talented of all, Beauden Barrett.

Barrett, who has the worst place kicking percentage of all tier one internationals for 2018…

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What makes Barrett so good?

Before we begin to criticise Barrett we need to acknowledge what he brings to New Zealand in open play. If this sounds like a disclaimer in the case he runs in four tries at the weekend… well, it is – he’s extraordinary.

In the eight matches he has worn an All Black jersey this year (including the game against France when he went off injured after 11 minutes following a dangerous tackle), he has scored 95 points, 35 of which came from tries. That is near-unprecedented for a fly-half. He has beaten 18 defenders, made 10 clean breaks and assisted seven tries.

Barrett creates tries for fun, and it is the main reason he has been nominated for World Rugby Player of the Year for the third time in a row, having won it the past two years. He is contested for the honour by Ioane, South Africa’s Faf de Klerk and Malcolm Marx (who may have fluffed it after a howler against England last Saturday) and Ireland’s Johnny Sexton. Should he win, he would be the first player in history to bag a ‘three-peat’, an honour which the only three time winners Richie McCaw and Dan Carter cannot claim.

However, his off days with the kicking tee are becoming more frequent.

Kicking record

Questions have simmered about his record on a low level for years among New Zealand fans, but the complaints began to grow audibly when he missed two from four in the final Test against the British and Irish Lions in 2017, a 15-15 draw which led to a series draw. His performance contrasted horribly with the perfect records of Owen Farrell, with four penalties, and Elliot Daly with one leviathan effort.

This summer, awkward records against France, Australia and especially South Africa led to greater calls for a review of his position as kicker. Against the Springboks in Wellington, Barrett kicked just two from six, hitting the posts twice in a game the All Blacks lost by just two points. Given Barrett’s kicking clearly cost his side in the unlikely defeat, there were calls for his younger brother Jordie or Damian McKenzie to take the tee from him.

His seasonal record at that point also justified the discussion – when the final whistle blew, his hit rate for the year in national colours was 55.2 per cent (16 from 29).

His current rate of 65.9 per cent for the year is, whichever way you cut it, poor for an international fly-half. While his tactical kicking out of hand has been excellent, his dip in form has been rightfully criticised.

Taking a larger sample, since 2016 he’s averaged 73.7 per cent – but that’s still not particularly strong compared to the rest of the field at the top level.

Interestingly, this year he’s been far better for his provincial side, the Hurricanes (in 2017, it was the other way round).

Of the 20 kickers who attempted more than 20 kicks from the tee in Super Rugby last season, Barrett ranked the sixth best with a strike rate of 82.4 per cent (42 from 51). Of those ahead of him only Hayden Parker of the Sunwolves (96 per cent) and Mitchell Hunt of the Crusaders (82.8 per cent) are Kiwis.

Under New Zealand selection criteria, Parker would not be considered due to the fact he plays his rugby in Japan – although they appeared to relax this rule for their recent match against Japan in which Matt Todd was selected despite his summer move to the Panasonic Wild Knights in the Japanese Top League.

Despite the fact that Barrett could argue he remains the strongest kicker in the New Zealand squad, with Richie Mo’unga and McKenzie below him in terms of their Super Rugby percentages, he is obviously worth keeping in the starting lineup for his creative abilities alone. If he’s having a bad day he can always pass the tee to one of his teammates, and a creative fly-half does not necessarily need to kick from the tee to provide value as the Ford/Farrell England axis has shown in recent years.

What does Barrett say?

Barrett is open to this idea of passing over kicking duties to teammates, as he told Newstalk ZB in October: “On occasions when I’m perhaps not feeling particularly good about my kicking I can easily hand over the tee and that’s something I’ve been conscious of.

“It’s not something that will happen every Test going forward, in fact the last two times I’ve done it I’ve been kicking really well. It’s just about figuring out how it works, and with Richie [Mo’unga] coming off the bench, he had fresh legs too, so I enjoy going back to full-back and it’s certainly a different perspective and chance to be a driver of the team from the back.

“From a leadership point of view it was also quite good to be able to help Rieko [Ioane] and Ben Smith in those huddles while Richie was kicking.”

Barrett’s form has improved in recent Tests and he could lay a claim to being one of the hottest kickers in international rugby right now, which is precisely the point assistant coach Ian Foster made in response to a question on the topic earlier this week.

“I think it is more talked about in the media than anything,” Foster said. “I don’t see too many articles saying that he has kicked 11 out of 12 in the last three Tests, but if he kicks two out of six and two at the posts, it is like a national calamity.

“We are pretty happy. If you are going to spend all day grizzling about your goal-kicker then you lose focus about the overall part of the game and that is to make sure we win each minute of an 80-minute battle and the goal-kicking is part of that.”

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This doesn’t explain why Mo’unga has started kicking the goals whenever he is substituted on – Barrett’s percentages earlier in the year do.

That said, Barrett has been improving, and his track record in terms of his career is good – in 2017 he recorded an 81.3 per cent record.

Whether the 2017 or 2018 Barrett turns up to the tee, England still need to be wary – he’s a world class talent with much more than a boot on him.

Nevertheless, it will be interesting to see what happens if New Zealand have a penalty in the final minute needing three points to win the game.

@LouisAlexDore