Killers can come with the prettiest faces. Dan Carter, New Zealand pin-up boy
and underwear model, is not the sort of man one imagines Martin Johnson
trembling over, though the manager and his England team have every reason to
see the world’s most gilded talent looming, all black, in their nightmares.
Taken on the bare statistics, we can argue that Carter alone has been
overwhelmingly too good for England in the six Tests he has started against
them. New Zealand have won all six encounters, with the fly-half amassing
120 personal points. In contrast, England, through the combined effort of
all 22 players, have stumbled to a derisory 86 points. On average, the
scoreboard reads Carter 20, England 15 since he was first named a starter
against them four years ago.
Nobody should be working harder in the next week than Mike Ford, England’s
defence coach. Carter is a devastating runner from fly-half. He has an
astonishing try count of 25 in 56 internationals (not counting yesterday’s
Test); the man is in a league of his own.
Alas for England, as with his overall point-scoring, he has a predilection for
upping the averages against the men in white. Six games and four tries for
Carter, two tries every three games. And when he is not single-handedly
tearing Ford’s defensive system to pieces, he orchestrates the waves of
attack that crash through flimsy white barriers.
Here’s one more statistic. Six starts for Carter against England and 23 tries
by the All Blacks. The defence that went through the semi-final and final of
the World Cup last year without conceding a try is porous to the tune of
four tries a game against the spells of Carter and his colleagues. There is
only one Dan Carter and, from the perspective of England, thank goodness.
He announced himself to the general British and Irish sporting public in the
second Test of the Lions series in 2005, when he delivered the greatest
performance of fly-half play it has been my privilege to witness in 35
years. Some handy operators have worn the No 10 shirt in that period but
none of them - Bennett, John, Ella, Larkham, Mehrtens, Porta or Wilkinson -
have come close to the majesty of his performance that night in Wellington.
Barely one year into his international career, Carter scaled the heights of
greatness. And still he soars.
There is nothing obvious in this talent other than the met-ronomic accuracy of
the boot nine days out of 10. The hands are not as quick as Mark Ella’s
were, the feet lack the frenzied speed of that Welsh wizard Phil Bennett and
the shoulder is not as firm as Jonny Wilkinson’s was in the tackle. To
capture his bewitching ability is not easy; try to get a hold of what makes
him so good and he oozes away from the easy answer. Ah, that is what he does
better than any of the great 10s, oozes.
When England have tried their damnedest to stop Carter in full flow, the task
has proved as impossible as checking the passage of a stream with pebbles;
you think one avenue is blocked and he diverts into another channel. The
acceleration is all the more devastating for its seamlessness. There is a
channel down which all defences love to see the fly-half run. It is created
by pushing up in an umbrella-shaped line, with the inside-centre rushing to
cut off the pass, thus forcing the fly-half into a corridor where an
aggressive flanker can bear down on him.
Carter loves this channel. It breaks all known laws of fly-half play but he
goes into what is usually an area of certain destruction and comes out the
other end travelling as unruffled as he was when entering the trap.
Pace, balance and tremendously strong hips combine to befuddle the best
England can throw at him. How? The reason for the complete absence of Carter
control by England became horribly apparent when watching him train one day
and England prepare their defence for him the next in New Zealand five
months ago.
Carter rarely takes the ball standing still; he tends to be on the move in a
slightly diagonal direction away from the forwards, moving towards the space
between the 10 and 12. English defenders have not been able to push Carter
where they want him; he sets the agenda for the defence. The initial
movement before he takes the ball makes the change of pace all the greater
and it makes the threat of him, as a runner, all the more obvious.
Players are sucked into his orbit because of his individual threat and that
makes the space for the wider pass or the short ball to the growing presence
of Ma’a Nonu. Playing on the gain line, there is no room for defensive
manoeuvre when he slides the chip behind the onrushing defenders. Time and
again opponents are caught flat-footed by the grubber kick.
And then there is the lofted crossfield kick into the waiting arms of the
wingers. Kicking, running, passing, he is always on the move either in
training or during matches, when he is usually one subtle step ahead of the
English defence.
That is how Carter operates. England, before the second Test in June, trained
with Charlie Hodgson as Carter. The moves Hodgson attempted were those the
All Blacks used but the fly-half stood flat-footed to receive the ball and
England, accordingly, prepared for a fluid force against a static Carter.
The extra two paces make all the difference but Mike Ford’s session seemed
not to allow for that.
Watch out for Carter running diagonally across the field, pulling the entire
England defence with him, then hooking a left-footed kick back in the
direction from which he has run. It works because his individual threat is
so great that, unless you control his movement, he will always take a
defence where he wants you.
Both Australia and South Africa have had success against him because they
employ a more aggressive blitz defence, which can force Carter back on to
his right foot and into the heavy traffic where the forwards await him. He
has been known to emerge from the bottom of a breakdown flustered. But
neither Ford, nor Phil Larder before him, has yet to comprehend the nature
of this particular fly-half.
England’s drifting defensive system plays into Carter’s and New Zealand’s
hands. Maybe Ford thinks one man cannot be allowed to force a complete
change of defensive strategy, but as both a try-scorer and crea-tor, the
record of Carter against England suggests the home team will continue to be
candy for the All Black fly-half until they consider him the unique
attacking talent that he is.
If the England management cannot come up with the flexible thinking to channel
the fluid force of Carter into areas they want him to roam he will, yet
again, beat England on his own on Saturday.
