Smith praises All Black commitment
by Huw Turner
July 23, 2000

In the aftermath of Saturday's Tri-Nations test against South Africa in Christchurch, New Zealand coach Wayne Smith has been talking about the quality of his side's performance.

' I think it was good for us to show as a team we could battle through something as tight as that,' said Smith.' The guys will take quite a bit of confidence from coming out at half time and grinding their way to a win rather than doing it with the flashy stuff.Our defence was really good, especially in the second half.We worked hard on our defence all week and our lineout options and it paid off.'

Very little was seen of the All Blacks' much- respected attacking potential , Christian Cullen's two first half tries the only touch downs of the entire game , but Smith added ,' Everyone knows that we've scored 40-odd tries this year already but we had to show that we could play the possession and territory game as well.Tactically, I think we adapted quite well. Sometimes you have to sacrifice a bit of flair.'

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