Steve Hansen hits back at French accusations: 'All Blacks not dirty players'

All Blacks coach Steve Hansen has hit back at allegations of dirty play from his side in Saturday night's runaway 52-11 victory over France to open their June international series.

France wing Remy Grosso suffered a reported double fracture to his cheekbone after a second-half collision with All Blacks flanker Sam Cane and replacement prop Ofa Tu'unagfasi which visiting coach Jacques Brunel described as "dangerous" and "illegal". Cane was penalised for the incident, but not yellow-carded.

Earlier French lock Paul Gabrillagues had been sent to the sinbin for what looked a far more innocuous high hit on midfielder Ryan Crotty – a call that changed the match with the All Blacks scoring two quick tries while a man up to ignite a second-half scoring blitz.

ANDREW CORNAGA/PHOTOSPORT

All Blacks coach Steve Hansen says rugby is a 'fluid' game and sometimes nasty collisions take place.

Hansen's men ran in seven unanswered tries to win the second half 44-0 after the match had been knotted at 11-11 when Gabrillagues was sent to cool his heels in the 51st minute.

But Hansen on Sunday bit back at those allegations, describing the incident in which Cane appeared to initially collect Grosso high with his arm and then Tu'ungafasi strike him with his shoulder as accidental and part of the 'fluid" nature of the game.

He also shrugged off suggestions the world's No 1 side played the game on the wrong side of the legality line.

"I can understand they'll be a little bit miffed when their guy got yellow-carded, and as I said last night I don't think [he] should have been yellow-carded, and nor do I think Ofa should have been yellow-carded either," said the All Blacks coach.

"Our game is really fluid, there's movement in it, and when you get two guys coming in to make a tackle on one, things can change late. That's what happened."

Hansen had viewed the match twice in the aftermath and explained the incident from his viewpoint.

"Sammy made the tackle and Ofa ended up accidentally hitting him in the face with his shoulder. There's no intention to hurt him. All three got head knocks. Sam got an elbow to the face from the French guy and he might have got Ofa's head as well, so Ofa was causing a bit of carnage.

"When the game is fluid like it is and players change their angle late and you've committed ... it's difficult to get out of the way. So it was accidental."

English referee Luke Pearce agreed with Hansen's assessment at the time, adjudicating that Grosso had dipped into the tackle.

But Hansen felt he should have looked closer at the yellow card to Gabrillagues after replays showed the hit was not as serious as first appearances indicated.

"If you're going to send someone off, and a yellow card is off the field for 10 minutes, I think you've got to take time to check it on video.

"Overall I thought he did a pretty good job. Did he get all the decisions right? No. But we've been here before haven't we, when referees don't always get the decisions right, and you've got to live with that."

The All Blacks coach also shrugged off continued suggestions his side embraces illegal tactics.

"We've been called cheats for 100 years, and if you keep winning people have got to find reasons.  Like Richie McCaw was the biggest 'cheat' ever, but he didn't cheat. He just played to the letter of the law.

"You've just got to roll with that stuff and not take too much notice of it."

Overall the coach was satisfied with his side's first-up effort for the year which extended their winning streak over France to 12 tests.

"We were rusty to start with, but as the game went on we started to work at the things we wanted to work at, and I felt we controlled the pace of the game. The subs made a real difference and injected themselves. It was a good start."

Hansen also confirmed Crusaders loose forward Jordan Taufua was out of the series after scans revealed a tear in his calf (Matt Todd stays on as a rreplacement), while there was better news on midfielder Sonny Bill Williams who had been cleared to resume training this week after his minor knee procedure and could be available for the third test against France.

He confirmed he "probably" would not look to make too many changes for next Saturday's second test in Wellington.