All Blacks v France: In Ruben Love’s selection, Dave Rennie makes his mark over Scott Robertson – Gregor Paul

All Blacks v France, Saturday, 7.05pm

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Optimism appears to be the latest entrant into rugby’s lexicon of misused buzzwords – and Dave Rennie’s first All Blacks selection positively reeks of the stuff.

To borrow and adapt former Prime Minister David Lange’s famous retort at the Oxford Union, it was possible to practically smell the optimism on Rennie’s breath as he unveiled a match-day 23 that had new faces, form players, a high-impact bench and the country’s brightest play-making duo.

It’s the selection of Ruben Love at No 10 that sets the theme and creates a dramatic sense of this being a new era.

Love has been the story so far of 2026. He has clambered out of the cocoon with the Hurricanes, where he has shown a maturity in his decision-making, a calmness in his demeanour, an ability to manage a gameplan. Most importantly, he’s added a sense of adventure and freedom in just the right proportions.

Love looks like the player of the moment – a high-energy, multi-skilled No 10 on the way up and the sort of player the All Blacks could build their attack around for the next 18 months and beyond.

And while it may have seemed obvious that Love had to be endorsed – given the playmaking keys to the kingdom – recent history suggests All Blacks coaches don’t all see things through the same lens and have vastly different assessments about the level of risk posed by picking young, inexperienced players.

Rennie, driven by his optimism mantra, clearly has no qualms about selecting Love for his first test start at No 10 when his form has been so good. And he’s also old enough to know not to look a gift horse in the mouth.

“He was outstanding,” Rennie said of Love’s Super Rugby Pacific form. “I am sure there won’t be too many arguments about that selection.

“He sits amongst Cam [Roigard] and Jordie [Barrett], which will give him a lot of comfort with his combination and communication.

“He has done a fantastic job. He is really confident. Really clear. He’s spent a lot of time with Mike [Blair, assistant New Zealand coach] and [his] ability running things even in meetings has been really impressive.”

Some coaches take their time to stamp their mark and crawl out of the shadow of their predecessor, but with the selection of Love, Rennie has made a definitive statement that this is his team.

For the past two years, the All Blacks have struggled to play as if they know who they are – a problem that may have had its origins in the coaching regime’s lack of conviction about who to endorse as their premier first five-eighths.

The last lot started with Damian McKenzie as their tactical general but lost faith in him. In came the veteran Beauden Barrett, but while he steadied the ship, he was never able to give the All Blacks’ attack the shape and vibrancy it needed to impress as something considered and deliberate.

It wasn’t his fault, as evidenced by the coaching clean-out earlier this year, but as much as it was apparent the All Blacks needed a strategic reset, so too did they need to discover and back a new No 10 who could change the direction of travel.

Love, then, is the face of optimism. And what about this new buzzword? How does it pertain to the All Blacks?

“I think playing with optimism is a mindset of ‘how do you score from here’,” Rennie says. “I want us so that if the opposition spill a ball five metres from our line, we are thinking how do we score from here.

“But optimism is also around your work ethic so if we are optimistic, we will get people into position quickly so you can play. That doesn’t mean we are not going to kick, we are still going to kick a lot, but we want to kick on our terms.

“We have talked a lot about this in our camp, so the boys are well aware of the importance of that mindset and the work ethic that is required to go with it.”

That nod to work ethic extends to acknowledging the realities of test rugby. The French – even this version, which has played with a joie de vivre of old – still believe in the “no-scrum, no-win” mantra, hence the selection of arguably the best scrummaging front row in Ethan de Groot, Codie Taylor and Fletcher Newell.

It’s all well and good being optimistic, but hope can be easily crushed on the back of a retreating set piece, so De Groot and Newell will be asked to scrum their little hearts out before making way for the dynamic, all-court Hurricanes trio of Asafa Aumua, Xavier Numia and Tyrel Lomax.

By that measure, in Josh Lord and Sam Darry there is also an athletic locking duo who have the size, mobility and variety of skillsets to endure long into the future.

Gregor Paul is one of New Zealand’s most respected rugby writers and columnists. He has won multiple awards for journalism and written several books about sport.