The All Blacks are still to reap the rewards of the Ian Foster-Joe Schmidt coaching axis, asserts first-five Beauden Barrett.
When he was confirmed as All Blacks head coach through to next year's Rugby World Cup, Foster was also boosted by Schmidt's appointment, who moved from his role as selector to fulltime attack coach.
Schmidt, 56, is best known for transforming Ireland's test fortunes, famously leading them to its first victory over the All Blacks.
Arguably, the All Blacks best attacking performance of the year came in the first test against Ireland at Eden Park, where Schmidt helped the side for a week, while Foster was unavailable with COVID-19.
But in a rocky start to his tenure, Schmidt's progress was overshadowed by disciplinary lapses that saw the All Blacks give away 18 points in penalties, as Argentina took a 25-18 victory.
As an observer at Christchurch, Barrett sat out of the historic loss with a neck injury suffered in training, but says Schmidt's work with the team will pay off, potentially as early as Saturday at Hamilton.
"It's all on building good habits and doing it all the time," Barrett said. "I think Joe's been really good in that space.
"There's no doubt, he and Fozzie [Foster] are finding their feet in how they're going to run things, but I think Joe's been awesome and so has Fozzie. I think we'll see the fruits of that this weekend and in games to come."
But while Schmidt's attacking style with Ireland - and Leinster before that - was built on pragmatism rather than flair, Barrett is also confident the All Blacks can add a dimension under his tutelage.
"We don't want to be like other teams - we want to be the best team we can be.
"There's no doubt, there'll be a little bit of that showing through in weeks to come, but we've still got to be the expressive All Blacks that we know we can be."
Barrett also provides a positive prognosis over the neck injury that ruled him out last week, hopes to return to the side on Saturday.
The neck injury came less than a month after a horrifying incident against South Africa, where he was taken out in the air by Springboks winger Kurt-Lee Arendse and needed to be helped from the field.
But after putting in the effort with the All Blacks physio department, Barrett hopes he can play a role, as his side hunt revenge against Argentina at FMG Stadium.
"I've realised I've got to get a neck like a front rower to handle these knocks," he joked. "I've been working hard on it in the gym with Pete [Gallagher], a few more shoulder-on tackles and I'd say I'm just about ready to go.
"It all adds up, it's another knock. I try and treat everything in isolation, but maybe it did have a compounding effect.
"I'm feeling pretty good this week, just working on each day, rehabbing [and] strengthening."
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