Which is why Moon will watch Mitchell with special interest. He considers him an exceptional prospect who could cement a place with a big game. "Young Drew: he just goes from strength to strength," Moon says. "To me Drew's not programmed yet, and neither is Rogers. They just run all over the park and find the breaks. To me, we're too stereotyped in what we do."
Moon says this isn't a criticism of anyone, simply a function of age whereby players who have been around a few years tend to become habitual. "Talk to them and they will tell you they run this channel or that channel, or do this or that," he says. "I sometimes think the old youthful exuberance thing really counts. The irrational player is a lot more difficult to defend against - like Drew Mitchell the other night [against South Africa]. He's the type of player who throws conventional defensive patterns into disarray."
There is another, even more important factor contributing to stereotyped back-line play, Moon says: the rules of the game.
"My view is that this is a problem for the International Rugby Board. We've got a game that's almost approaching gridiron in terms of defensive patterns," he says. "It's not even like league. At least the leaguies get a decent run-up against each other - the ref keeps them 20 metres apart. Our poor guys get five metres. We've just got all these big, short, squat men running at each other. Nobody can think outside the square when they're facing that sort of situation
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