NZ Engine

Source: Radio New Zealand

So now what? There’s six months till the All Blacks will play their first test of the year, a not so insignificant showdown with a full strength France in Christchurch. Between now and then, someone needs to be hired to replace Scott Robertson after his tenure was sensationally cut short on Thursday.

It’s worth remembering that both Robertson and Ian Foster had to contend with serious disruption to their staff, so it’s likely some serious scrutiny will be taken around who the successful candidate will be bringing with them into the coaching box.

Some names immediately jump out, but given how dramatic the last six years have been for All Black coaches, it’s fair to say that nothing can be taken for granted.

Probables

Jamie Joseph is the obvious one, as he was linked to the job as soon as cracks started to appear in the Razor Regime. Joseph is a former All Black himself and has an extensive coaching career across the last two decades, the majority of it with the Highlanders at Super Rugby level and the Japanese national team.

Tony Brown is probably the key part of a Joseph-led coaching axis, as he has fashioned himself into one of the leading attacking minds in test rugby. Brown is currently with the Springboks, with the main question now being why he would want to leave a system where head coach Rassie Erasmus has almost complete control over every aspect of the national set up.

Talk is that Dave Rennie will be involved too, which will be yet another remarkable chapter in one of the most interesting coaching careers we’ve seen. Rennie was making strides with the Wallabies before being abruptly dumped for Eddie Jones in 2023, a move that is now highly regretted by Rugby Australia. He’s been in Japan since, presumably biding his time for an opportunity like this.

While he probably won’t be a full member of the staff, expect Sir Wayne Smith to be a big part of whatever happens next.

Possibles

On paper, Vern Cotter seems like an ideal candidate. He not only turned a struggling Blues team into champions in one season, but converted them into an direct power side with a style that would be highly effective against the like of the England, France and the Springboks. Cotter already has relationships with key All Blacks, international experience and gets on well with the media.

Joe Schmidt has the advantage of having already been in the All Blacks and also coming out of the Foster era relatively unscathed, reputation-wise. He’s also off-contract with the Wallabies, although that situation seems to change every time it gets brought up.

Clayton McMillan likely has All Black aspirations and consistent form at domestic level, however, is only in his first season with Irish province Munster. He went there to further his coaching acumen and develop different styles of play, which is something that NZ Rugby will be taking a keen interest in when it comes to selection time.

Outsiders

Pat Lam’s name has been bandied about by Northern Hemisphere scribes, but it’s unlikely the Bristol Bears coach will have the sort of connections back here to make a decent case.

Warren Gatland is currently available, but his recent record makes his chances exceptionally remote.

NZR chairman David Kirk could not definitively say whether the board would consider a foreign-born coach, which makes that seem like a no, but if they change their mind it would be quite interesting to see who puts their hand up. Ronan O’Gara is the most obvious choice as he’s had a season with the Crusaders.

– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand

Source: Radio New Zealand

A former All Blacks captain says New Zealand Rugby was left with no option but to sack Scott Robertson.

The coach’s reign came to an end after just two years in the top job following a less than favourable internal review.

NZR’s chair David Kirk said they took on a wide range of opinions before making the decision.

Former New Zealand skipper Taine Randell said Robertson’s removal comes after significant changes made by the board – and they’re changes that couldn’t have happened sooner.

“I was very shocked … but it’s not unprecedented to sack All Black coaches, he told Morning Report.

“I was playing in 2001 when Wayne Smith had his tenure cut very short, but I think … if you look at what’s been happening at the New Zealand union over the last 12 months, it hasn’t really been talked about.

“I think Razor’s removal is just the latest in a number of massive changes that have occurred at New Zealand Rugby that signal that actually, ‘hey look, the New Zealand Rugby Union that we have today is a very different beast to the one we had 12 months ago’ and to be perfectly honest, it couldn’t have happened soon enough.”

Randell said NZR had been in a funk over the past seven years, and all indicators suggested there was disillusionment with the game in New Zealand.

He said there had been a lot of issues between NZR and the provinces.

“As a result of that, we’ve ended up in February with a new chairman. They say a fish rots from the head,” Randell said.

“Well, with Dame Patsy Reddy, my personal thing, she did quite a bit of damage to New Zealand Rugby and then she fell out with a lot of our stakeholders, as did the rugby union.

“In result, David Kirk was the new chairman. Now, since then, we were looking for a new CEO because the CEO has essentially been removed. That’s a big call.

“Last week, head of high performance has basically gone … those things don’t happen in a vacuum. But as a result, I believe that the changes that we’ve had at the top and the most recent change that we’ve got, we’ve got to have a new coach.”

Randell said while Robertson’s win record as All Blacks coach was 74 percent, the performances weren’t good enough.

He said the internal review pointed to a culture problem in the All Blacks set up, which led to record-breaking defeats.

“If you have a good culture of the team, you do not have two of your leading assistant coaches leave,” Randell said.

“If the culture of the team is going well, actually, irrespective of win, lose or draw, which the All Blacks you should win, at least the performance of the team should give you some encouragement that they’re on the right track and if you’ve got a good culture of the team, you don’t have colossal losses to the Springboks.”

Randell said losses to nations like Ireland and Argentina had become commonplace, which also pointed to a “terrible” culture.

He said it was easy to determine if things were going well, and Kirk had put it right by sacking Robertson.

Randell also refuted ideas that players had too much influence, and said you didn’t need degree in psychology to see that things weren’t going well.

“One of the things I really liked, irrespective of the decision, is that when it came to making the decision on the coaches, actually the chairman and one of the directors, Keven Mealamu, were directly involved in the review.

“They didn’t farm out that process to some consultants or a board of other people. They did it themselves. That’s what they were elected to do and they did it themselves.”

He said whether supporters agreed with the decision or not, the board had made a strong call and that was a good sign of leadership from NZR.

They’ve got institutional knowledge that’s been missing from the New Zealand Rugby board for a long time, he said.

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– Published by EveningReport.nz and AsiaPacificReport.nz, see: MIL OSI in partnership with Radio New Zealand