It could be just their familiarity with the tight media posse which follows them around the world. Or even just the fact that these guys get on so well together. Haven’t we heard plenty about the famed ‘culture’ that has fed this team’s success?

Whatever the reason, there can be a playfulness that borders on silliness when the players front up to the press and Damian McKenzie and Jack Goodhue were happy to giggle away like a pair of schoolboys when the latter teased his teammate about his Movember moustache.

“If you get the right light, perhaps you can see yours,” Goodhue laughed.

Add the wispy strands on his upper lip and the boyish smile to a frame that stands no taller than 5’ 8” and what you get with McKenzie is an All Black slight of stature but big on ability and one that has no shortage of fans inside the Kiwi camp and beyond.

His measurements are misleading. A superb tackler who can pluck his fair share of balls out of the skies, McKenzie is also a robust operator. He had featured in 52 games straight for the Chiefs until injury finally benched him for the away tie against the Sharks in May.

“He’s a brave fella,” Keith Earls said this week.

“He’s defied all the odds. When you look at a lot of their backs, they’re all massive, powerful men. He’s a lot smaller but he’s powerful as well. He seems to have everything. Even some of the high ball against England (last week), he’s getting up in the air and he’s winning some of those collisions. He’s an all-round threat, really.”

The question is where to get the best out of him.

McKenzie made his debut for New Zealand as a replacement centre against Argentina in 2016 and contributed a cameo on the wing against Australia this season, but his versatility has been confined mostly to posts at either full-back and out-half.

Seventeen of his 21 caps have been earned at 15, where he has also played the vast majority of his Super Rugby career, but one player’s path can often be dictated by that of another and Aaron Cruden’s move from the Chiefs to Montpellier last year is the perfect example.

With Stephen Donald moving on as well, McKenzie was sized up for the No.10 jersey and ended up playing 12 of his 14 games in the slot with the Hamilton-based franchise this season. Hansen has continued to utilise him at 15 but that switch at club level hasn’t put the All Blacks boss out.

Quite the opposite.

Hansen was actually declaring himself open to the idea of McKenzie switching to scrum-half just last month but his intuition is that the 23-year-old will follow the examples of Beauden Barrett, Dan Carter and Andrew Mehrtens and gravitate in towards ‘first five-eight’.

“Deep down in my heart of hearts I think that’s where he’ll end up playing most of his rugby,” Hansen has said.

It’s easy to see why. McKenzie can run and he can kick and he can pass. He is a livewire of a rugby player blessed with pace who can create magic. For now, his presence at full-back offers the All Blacks the option of a second playmaker to relieve the pressure and focus on Barrett.

“As a 10-15 combination, having two drivers, two playmakers out on the field, it’s working alongside Beaudie and Richie (Mo’unga) and helping out where I can when they are not available,” McKenzie said this week.

“For us it’s about trying to keep teams guessing a bit.”

It’s not as if the current role stifles him in some way. James Lowe and McKenzie provided a devastating counter-attacking threat at the Chiefs before the former left for Leinster and Lowe has described his old teammate as one of the best full-backs in the world.

Lowe himself has had to work hard to get up to scratch on the defensive side of his game in Dublin and McKenzie’s propensity for the high-risk option has landed him and his teams in trouble in the past.

Hansen has compared him to a fly in a bottle but he is learning to live with the constraints that involves and the head coach has backed the player’s flair while stressing the need for him to come up with a better understanding of the line between risk and reward.

“I’m trying to mature as a player around my decision-making and I love attacking rugby and just getting out there and enjoying myself,” McKenzie said.

“Sometimes that can get me in trouble so I guess it’s about having a good balance between doing the right things, making the right decisions.”

Watch him go tonight.

Does size matter?

The All Blacks have long since grasped the fact that bigger isn’t automatically better and they will field four of the smallest men on the field this evening. In all, 10 of the players featuring at the Aviva Stadium will stand, officially, under six-feet tall.

• Aaron Smith, 5’ 6”
• Damian McKenzie, 5’ 8”
• Richie Mo’unga, 5’ 8”
• Ryan Crotty, 5’ 9”
• Luke McGrath, 5’ 9”
• Jordan Larmour, 5’ 10”
• Keith Earls, 5’ 10”
• Kieran Marmion, 5’ 10”
• Sean Cronin, 5’ 11”
• Rory Best 5’ 11”