Unbeaten record 'huge motivation' for All Blacks vs Scotland

Maintaining their unbeaten record against Scotland is huge motivation for New Zealand ahead of Saturday's meeting at Murrayfield, according to assistant coach and former Scotland captain Mike Blair.

The All Blacks have never lost in 121 years of meetings between the two sides, with two draws in 1964 and 1883 the closest Scotland have come to a historic victory.

And Blair, who had his own opportunities to end that run during his playing days, says the All Blacks are desperate to avoid being the first side to slip up against Scotland.

“It's really important," said the former scrum-half on his return to Edinburgh.

"We've got a couple of long-standing records. There's the Eden Park record [where New Zealand are unbeaten in 53 matches from July 1994] and every time we play there there's an extra edge to it because you don't want to be the team that loses that record.

“It's definitely a huge motivation and as I said before we're really proud of that record and we know over the last four matches it's been close so it's going to be a tough contest.

"The records are something you are conscious of because they're such longstanding ones and that motivation about not wanting to be that team to break that record.

“We’re very mindful of it. It puts a little bit of pressure on but these guys seem to enjoy the pressure and raise their game for that.”

Blair joked that he was part of the reason for the All Blacks' long winning run. The scrum-half was involved in a couple of heavy Murrayfield defeats against the All Blacks, notably in 2010 and 2012 when the Scots lost 49-3 and 51-22.

He also recalled a game in 2005 when a teenage fullback made a big impression.

“Well, I contributed to quite a lot to the New Zealand victories in the 2000s and 2010s but it's different now,” smiled the former Edinburgh and Glasgow Warriors man.

“I remember Isaia Toeava played his first game for the All Blacks against us as an 18-year-old in 2005, I think it was. I thought, ‘We're going to pepper him. We're going to make his life a misery.’ It was raining like this but, first ball, he climbs, takes it above everyone else, makes a 20-metre break. So it was ‘right, change of plan!’

“Times have changed from that. We're fully loaded. We're ready to go. We know we need to do our best to beat the Scottish team.

“We're in a good place, I think. We're pleased with what we did against Australia but we're also aware that playing Scotland at Murrayfield is a really big challenge. We talked about it this morning, the tightness of the games. The last four games [against Scotland] all being within eight points, so these games have been really competitive. It's another good opportunity to show the growth in our game.

“We've been together four and a half months. The team under Gregor has been seven or eight years in the making and are very cohesive and know their game well so it's going to be a big challenge for us.”

And Blair is relishing the chance of going up against Gregor Townsend, the man who handed him his first coaching opportunity with Glasgow Warriors and then brought him into the Scotland staff.

"It's good fun," he said when asked about facing Townsend this weekend before revealing their most recent conversations have been more guarded than usual ahead of this weekend's game.

"We've been in touch this week. When I was over after the fourth test [against South Africa] I was over for a couple of weeks and caught up with him and always make a point to do that.

“We have a good conversation about rugby, about everything, what's going on, what direction the game's moving, but we're just a little bit more cagey around certain things, how we believe the game's developing now and what we can do."

Blair is not the only member of the All Blacks staff to have inside information on some of Scotland's stars.

New Zealand head coach Dave Rennie spent two years as Glasgow boss, but Blair played down the significance of their knowledge.

He said: "The balance of how you preview a game and the opposition, I believe, is weighing heavier more towards what you do as a team as opposed to what the opposition do.

“You need to be aware of certain plays the opposition might do or shape, but you've really got to trust what you're trying to do. I certainly feel like that with attack.

"You'll make little tweaks in your detail, depending on what the defence offer, but for me, it’s ‘this is the kind of thing they do but if we get our game right, then we can impose ourselves’.

“There's a bit of inside knowledge, but I don't think it carries a huge amount of weight.”

The All Blacks trained in dreadful conditions on Tuesday morning, and Blair is confident they will be able to cope with whatever conditions are thrown up at Murrayfield.

“We've had a little look at the forecast. It looks like there's a small chance of rain. I think both Scotland and New Zealand would like a dry ball. But the way we're trying to evolve our game, there's obviously game management within it, using our kicking game to create pressure and unstructured defences.

“But we also believe we've got a skill set that can manipulate defence with the ball in hand, even if the weather's not great.”

Damian McKenzie, whose late cameo denied Scotland a famous win last year, and fellow playmaker Beauden Barrett are likely to be crucial to the tourists' chances.

"Our selections have shown the 10 and 15 as players who are able to play-make.

“I think Damian and Beauden have done that really well. They've played a lot of test matches together. They've been in a lot of squads together.

“Their ability to switch in and out of first receiver and play-make from different areas is really key to our attack.”

Blair was the first member of the All Blacks coaching staff to face the media in person following the passing of their security chief Logan Cadwallader, who died suddenly at the team hotel on Sunday.

"It's been a tough couple of days," Blair said.

"Logan was a big part of the All Blacks for 10 years, very close with players and management and it’s obviously a huge shock and it's taken time to deal with."