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All Blacks rubbish claim they had secret meeting with ref

Footage from the game showed Franks apparently grappling at Australian lock Kane Douglas’s face during a maul early in the niggly game.

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Told the result of the test between the Pumas and Springboks, Hansen said: “It’s going to make our Hamilton game a goodie isn’t it?”

“You’ve got to be really careful until you see all the views”, he said.

“Whoever was running it has obviously seen all the angles and believes there’s nothing to answer for”.

“It’s something we want to be heard on and I think for Australia we’ve got to get ourselves heard on and off the field as much as we can to try and get ourselves more organised”.

Although New Zealand retained the Bledisloe Cup following a 29-9 victory over Australia, their triumph has been overshadowed by the subsequent controversy surrounding Owen Franks.

Hansen has quashed claims he met with game two referee Romain Poite in the lead-up to his side’s Bledisloe Cup clash with the Wallabies but admitted to having a meeting with Peyper, the man in charge for game one in Sydney.

Cheika was “bitterly disappointed” with the refereeing and claimed he was on record with referee’s bos Alain Rolland about the treatment of his captain Steven Moore and his team-mates by Poite and Nigel Owens during the past year.

After viewing the footage, New Zealand coach Steve Hansen said he agreed with the citing commissioner’s decision. “They couldn’t miss it, it was pretty in the open”. [But] we certainly didn’t have one with Romain Poite.

“It’s not true, unless you count saying “G’day” to him in the morning, because he stayed at this hotel”, Hansen said. “So why wouldn’t you sit down and have the meeting? We don’t meet the ref, we haven’t for 18 to 24 months because it’s just a waste of time”.

But Hansen – who noted Cheika didn’t complain about the refereeing in last year’s World Cup quarter-final against Scotland, which was decided by a controversial late penalty – suggested that was their fault.

The ploy worked to an extent, the All Blacks leading only 15-9 at half-time courtesy of two tries by Israel Dagg and a conversion and penalty from Beauden Barrett.

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“On the scoreboard it looks like we’ve done it pretty easy but I don’t think anyone would say it was easy”, he said.

Australian coach Michael Cheika wasn't pleased with the refereeing by Romain Poite