The All Blacks ended the year as they began it - irked by opponents using alleged go-slow tactics to nullify their game.

Players and management highlighted the painfully slow nature of the first half, in particular, of Saturday's 34-16 win over Wales, with Kieran Read saying the Dragons seemed to have a reason to delay most play restarts - allowing the hosts to re-gather their breath and take any tempo out of the Test. The same observation was made during England's June tour of New Zealand, and Read suggested after the tight win over South Africa in Wellington that some Springboks players were feigning injury to slow proceedings.

"It is frustrating," Read said. "Every set piece it seems to be happening, but we've had it before this year as well, from a couple of teams. What can you do? You're in the ref's ear as much as you can, but if he's not going to do anything about it, you just carry on."

Steve Hansen noted the law says play should be halted only for injury if it is to a front-rower, yet referee Wayne Barnes stopped the clock for every Welsh ailment on Saturday. Richie McCaw says he queried Barnes about it "fairly regularly", to no avail.

The tactics may explain in part New Zealand's season tally of 433 points from 14 Tests, their lowest for five years, even when boosted by a 74-6 rout of the second-tier United States.

Read said the team had found it harder to put teams away. "If we're not quite on our game or we don't adapt to what teams are giving us, then we get put under pressure."

He says New Zealand at the 2015 Rugby World Cup will most probably experience the rush defence and zealous breakdown work that England, Scotland and Wales produced this month, and they need to plan for it.

"There's a few lessons to be learned from how teams have really tried to get under our skin up here the last couple of weeks," he said.