The All Blacks have labelled rugby's new lineout numbers law a mistake.

Last Saturday's 19-8 Tri-Nations defeat of the Springboks in Wellington was the first Test to employ the Experimental Law Variations (ELVs) plus two other rules introduced by the International Rugby Board (IRB), which have both drawn criticism.

The law that allows mauls to be collapsed has raised safety concerns, particularly at lower levels of the game, while All Blacks assistant coach Steve Hansen got stuck into the law that allows defending teams to field any number of players at a lineout.

Hansen believed the rule had been introduced mainly to help referees.

"They (IRB) have possibly made a mistake," Hansen said.

"The contest in the lineout has been flipped over on one side. The defending team's got an advantage."

The All Blacks lost seven of their lineout throws in Wellington, mostly in the second half when the Springboks stacked numbers to compete.

It was also notable that both teams deliberately employed one or two extra forwards off the back of lineouts purely to put pressure on the attacking backline.

Hansen said while his side had failed to adjust, the world class Springboks lineout also struggled to win quality ball.

The laws are set to remain in place this year and Hansen said planning would be crucial ahead of this Saturday's second Test between the teams at Dunedin.

"Rugby's a game where you adapt to the laws and if you can adapt well enough to win your own lineout ball when they're putting more in it then at the end of the season, I may be sitting here saying I love them," Hansen said.

"As we play more games we'll get better at exploiting them, both on attack and defence."

Predictably, British newspapers over the weekend were critical of the impact of the ELVs, with several columnists opining that while the Test was fast and brutal, it had no structure.

All Blacks coach Graham Henry agreed the first half in particular lacked shape but believed the new laws could only benefit his team.

"The guys enjoy playing the ELVs. Just forget about the two new ones," he said.

"If you ask the All Blacks what they enjoy playing most, they'd rather play with the new ELVs in place.

"They enjoy that game, it's more open. It's more athletic and so on.

"For coaches who have coached the game for a long time, we find it less structured and that creates challenges in itself."

Henry said his players were encouraged to play "off the cuff".

He hoped Test rugby would go the same way as the Super 14, where teams eventually adapted to the ELVs.

"At the start of the Super 14, you would have thought `this looks shambolic'.

"But in the last half of the Super 14 as we got closer to the finals there was some hell of a good rugby played."

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