Firstly whilst Nonu had improved his passing game it seems to have gone backwards again which has hampered NZ. When coupled with the distribution game of Carter, and his decision making, it seems to me that he is no longer a shining example of that style of 12.

By contrast the SA game works exactly because of what you mention, powerful runners. But their breakdown work and harrying is superior to ours, and they have a veyr formidable scrum and the best lineout in the world. With us not competing at all in the scrum, having an average at best lineout and struggling at the breakdown our pack arent given us the front foot ball that would be needed to make use of the power runners in the same way as SA.

I maybe being a tad harsh on Jon Davies, he has slowly been improving his all around skills, but i am not sure he is yet at the standard needed to create tries at international level with regards finding gaps for others or beating players 1vs1 in the same way Hook can.

Does James Hook at 12 limit our crash ball ability? yes, a bit, but not a huge amount. Firtsly he can take contact well these days, not with the power of a crashball specialist but better than most 2nd 5/8ths I can think of aside from Henson.

More importantly, as you pointed out, Shanks and Roberts swapped roles a lot, having Roberts switching in for the crashball works fine, and with Powells tendancy to be in the backline there is always the option of him.

We will wait and see how this plays out, but I am still convinced that Gatland is putting blind faith in players rather than looking at whats in front of him

I agree that Hook’s functioned well a 12 this season (and an outright second five-eight is clearly the preferred option for Australia and, until this week at least, England), but playing him there denies the crash-ball option of which Gatland is clearly fond. A big man with soft hands seems to have worked well enough for South Africa (Jean de Villiers), and even Nonu has improved his distribution, so there seems mileage in the traditional 12 yet. And yes, I know New Zealand have the creative impetus of Dan Carter at 10, but South Africa have done well enough with Butch James/Morne Steyn/Ruan Pienaar at 10 – players closer in quality to our own Stephen Jones. What’s more, although decent players both, I’m not sure that Adie Jacobs or Jacque Fourie (more excellent than decent in Fourie’s case!) can provide the same sort of creativity as O’Driscoll did during the summer from 13.

As a follower of the Blues, I’d further contend that for all his qualities, Shanklin isn’t the player he once was. His history of knee injuries seems to have cost him half a yard, and denied him the sort of pace necessary in a 13 to exploit the outside gap. Much the same thing seems to have happened to O’Driscoll, but perhaps not to the same extent, and largely compensated by the wonders of his all round game. Frankly, when Laulala eventually shows up, Shanklin might find his Blues appearances substantially reduced.

I confess, even if there’s a little more creativity in evidence against Argentina, Jones – Davies – Roberts is never likely to be the most dynamic attacking trio. But I’ll reserve further judgement until we’ve seen if some apparently small changes can reap greater rewards.