Peter Jackson: All Blacks great Beauden Barrett is hanging on for his final hurrah

When it comes to elite fly-halves raging against the dying of the light, nobody set the bar as high as Johnny Sexton. For physical and mental endurance, he stands alone.

By taking Dylan Thomas at his word about daring ‘not to go gently into that good night’, the Dubliner kept putting heart and mind through the wringer until he achieved what many considered impossible, one last World Cup in his 39th year.

Where Sexton stood four summers ago, Beauden Barrett stands now, hanging on for a final global hurrah.

The most striking difference between them is to be found in comparing where Sexton stood 15 months out from the last World Cup, still supreme as Ireland‘s prize asset, and where Barrett stands 15 months out from the next one.

Surplus to bench requirements

While one preserved his untouchable status to the very end, the other is fighting to prove he still has a Test future, albeit as a substitute.

Neither Martin Johnson nor Richie McCaw can have been as indispensable to their respective national causes as Sexton was to Ireland’s.

Barrett, for all his glory days as the only back to win consecutive World Rugby Player of the Year awards, has found himself all too disposable in recent weeks.

For the first time, he is neither New Zealand‘s first-choice fly-half nor their first-choice full-back, superseded by Ruben Love and Damian McKenzie respectively.

Worse still, their dual goalkicking abilities have conspired to make the eldest of the Barrett brothers surplus to bench requirements.

Had next Saturday’s Test in Cape Town been a one-off, he would probably have been left at home to watch from afar.

Instead the choice of 44 players to meet the rigours of an eight-match tour has enabled their 144-Test veteran to sample the brand new experience of an ancient ritual.

Still going: Beauden Barrett playing for New Zealand against the Stormers.

Dying of the light

His first performance in an All Black jersey against provincial opposition, at 10 against the Springbok-less Stormers, did nothing to raise any doubt over Love starting the four-Test series as due reward for barely putting a foot wrong during his three Nations Championship matches.

Barrett’s switch to full-back against the Bulls in Pretoria last night served a dual purpose: making way for the uncapped Josh Jacomb’s baptism at fly-half and giving the Golden Oldie a dress rehearsal amid concern over McKenzie who twisted an ankle in midweek.

Irrespective of how that plays out, Barrett now finds his last ambition, a fourth World Cup next year, threatened by yet another obstacle, as if he hadn’t been confronted by enough of them before the tour began.

Who should arrive out of the blue to replace the luckless Billy Proctor but the All Blacks’ No.1 fly-half at the last World Cup, Richie Mo’unga.

At 32, three years younger than Barrett, he will settle for nothing less than to start next year’s jamboree where he finished the last one in Paris before letting three years in Japan take care of his future post-rugby.

Despite having a bit more time at his disposal, Mo’unga will definitely rage against any premature dying of his light.

Rage

His rage will be nothing compared to that of a Wallaby last seen on the Test stage four years ago.

Bernard Foley, back home after six seasons in Japan, has taken the first step on the off-chance of emulating Sexton by making the starting grid for Australia‘s second World Cup at the age of 38.

Rejoining the Waratahs on a one-year deal, Foley is no doubt encouraged by the fact that the Wallabies have gone through almost twice as many fly-halves in the last 10 years as the UK has had prime ministers: 13 against 7.

Another of the 13, the mercurial Quade Cooper, has spoken of a comeback that sounds too fanciful to be taken seriously.

“The thing is, I never retired,” Cooper said earlier this month. “I just had other opportunities (among them coaching in Japan).

“It’s a home World Cup, I know I can still play so, of course, I’m interested.”

Persuading a Super Rugby franchise to give him a shot at 38 will take some doing, never mind convincing a potential employer that he still has a dying light worth the rage.

Finn Russell, the most automatic of Scotland selections, and George Ford, England‘s out-of-favour master craftsman, will have no such problem.

Both will be 34 when the World Cup starts, a year older than Dan Carter when he, like Johnson in Sydney in 2003, retired from the Test arena with the pot of gold in his hands.

The odds are stacking ever higher against Barrett doing likewise in Sydney next year.