Wales fell to a 26-52 defeat against New Zealand on Saturday, with wing Tom Rogers scoring a historic hattrick.

However, Wales’ performance only lasted 50 minutes as the All Blacks scored five tries in the final half an hour to extend the losing margin to 26 points.

There were a number of good individual performances from the home side, though.

Pre-match show spectacular

With the match played on the 120th anniversary of the first clash between the All Blacks and Wales, the Welsh Rugby Union decided to forgo the usual brass band and male voice choir for the anthem.

With the Welsh football team pioneering singing the anthem without a musical backing, the rugby followed suit, leading to a rousing rendition of Hen Wlad Fy Nhadau.

Add in the stadium plunged into darkness and the All Blacks’ Haka lit only by spotlight, and the pre-match scene rivaled those on the pitch.

Wales are always respectful of the Haka, where other teams like to make a point. One could argue that the home side should respond to the ceremonial dance, but that is an argument for another day.

Rogers makes hattrick history

Scarlets wing Tom Rogers became the first Welsh player in history to score a hattrick against New Zealand and only the fifth ever.

Having been dropped from the squad for the Japan match last week, Rogers showed his finishing and aerial ability throughout the first hour, before being replaced with a slight niggle.

“I’ve always been a fighter and I wanted to prove to Tandy that I deserved a spot in the team,” said the 26-year-old.

“It was class and I’m really chuffed. It hasn’t sunk in because when as a kid it’s your dream to play for Wales against the All Blacks.”

“From the Argentina and Japan games, it was a massive improvement. We attacked well, it’s just the All Blacks were class in the second half. We wanted to put our game on the pitch and I think we did that for an hour.”

Attack fires as half-backs’ influence continues to be felt

Ask any rugby fan who their most important play is and the answer will range from position to position.

For Wales, their half-backs are fast becoming their most important players. Tomos Williams has been the best scrum-half in Wales for a number of years now and his tour of Australia as a British and Irish Lion was testament to that.

However, the emergence of Dan Edwards in the last six months has been equally as important.

The Ospreys playmaker is brilliant with ball in hand, but has been able to show in the last few weeks that he has the extra nous needed for international rugby.

Wales’ game management is still a work in progress, but Edwards’ boot has got them out of a number of holes in recent games.

The Williams-Edwards combination is one that Steve Tandy can rely on for the foreseeable.

Young guns and debutants impress

Wales blooded three new caps against New Zealand, with Harri Deaves impressing in particular.

Dragons hooker Brodie Coghlan and Ospreys back row Morgan Morse were not given the time to show their talent, but Morse’s teammate Deaves was excellent.

The 24-year-old is not the biggest flanker in the world but showed tremendous heart and no little skill. His miss-pass to Louis Rees-Zammit in the second half was a standout moment, as was his clear emotion when belting out the anthem for the first time as a Wales international.

Elsewhere, Dafydd Jenkins – still only 22 – put in his best performance in a Wales shirt so far. The Exeter captain put in 21 tackles, eight carries and was twice directly involved in the build-up to Rogers’ tries.

Tandy must fix Wales’ discipline issues

After the game, the stats made for stark reading: Wales conceded 14 penalties to New Zealand’s four. After 50 minutes, Wales trailed their opponents 21-24, but yellow cards to Gareth Thomas and Taine Plumtree saw the home side fade rapidly.

“Ultimately we have to look at our discipline in this campaign over the last couple of games,” said captain Dewi Lake.

“If you give the team the quality of the All Blacks that many entries into your 22, it’s tough to stop them time after time.

“We did well in a couple of defence sets but when you have to back that up five or six times in a row, it’s hard. The game was in the balance at half-time and discipline got us into tricky areas with two yellow cards.”

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