Who Should Captain the All Blacks In McCaw's Absence?

So McCaw will be off on holiday for 6 months in 2013, giving his body a break while he travels the world looking for his long lost love.

McCaw should be back for the Rugby Championship but will miss the All Blacks' first three games against France in June, leaving the All Blacks captaincy role vacant for those games.

So who should captain the All Blacks in McCaw's absence if they're not injured? Here are my 5 top likely candidates -

Kieran Read
The favourite it has to be said at this point. Read is already captain of the Crusaders and very much part of the leadership core of the All Blacks. As long as Read's body holds up during another tough Super rugby campaign, Read's consistent form should continue and All Blacks selection in June should be nearly by default as will the captaincy. He would make a fine leader in McCaw's absence.

Keven Mealamu
An outside shot really given Mealamu's age but has captained the All Blacks before so should not be counted. However, Mealamu hasn't shown any signs of slowing down and could possibly play on for another season or two. Mealamu is one of our best ever hookers and a fine leader of the forwards. However, his  rotation with Andrew Hore for the hooker position could also count against him taking McCaw's armband.

Dan Carter
Another outside shot but Carter was set to captain the All Blacks against Canada in the Rugby World Cup last year until Carter's desperate bad luck with injury prior to the game. Would Hansen consider giving him the captaincy for the 3 games as compensation? Perhaps, but quite unlikely I'd think - I still don't necessarily consider Carter as an All Black captain in the traditional sense even if he does lead the backline extremely well. There's also still the chance he may join McCaw on sabbatical next year too as he aims to keep himself fresh and available for 2015.

Conrad Smith
A long outside shot but should be considered given he has experience as Hurricanes captain and is pretty much an ever-present at centre nowadays. Conrad Smith would make a fine captain, and the first centre to be captain of the All Blacks since Frank Bunce.

Andrew Hore
Another long outside shot especially with Mealamu more likely to be the hooker who gets the captaincy but if Mealamu and Read are unavailable for selection, Hore could be the only forward with enough experience and therefore should be considered captain if the coaches would rather have a forward as captain. Hore has captained Taranaki in the past but wasn't really considered as captain at the Hurricanes and Highlanders and with his age it is questionable how long he'll be around for.