Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?
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@Steven-Harris My criticism comes after there were far inferior players getting picked after he was playing the house down from 2017-2018 for both Auckland and the Blues yet people continued to knock him for no reason or as @Nepia says, shift the goalposts and find other reasons to criticise him. Yes he was in awful shape in the Mitre 10 Cup and was in a bad place and faded in last years Super Rugby but it wasn't helped with him getting played into the ground by the Blues with a lack of competition at the time.
Now he's just found his form from previous seasons but I'm sure there will be some reason as to why he'll get overlooked for higher honours.
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@African-Monkey said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
@Steven-Harris My criticism comes after there were far inferior players getting picked after he was playing the house down from 2017-2018 for both Auckland and the Blues yet people continued to knock him for no reason or as @Nepia says, shift the goalposts and find other reasons to criticise him. Yes he was in awful shape in the Mitre 10 Cup and was in a bad place and faded in last years Super Rugby but it wasn't helped with him getting played into the ground by the Blues with a lack of competition at the time.
Now he's just found his form from previous seasons but I'm sure there will be some reason as to why he'll get overlooked for higher honours.
In the 2017-2018 period he absolutely should have been selected, especially ahead of some of the players that did make it.
The impact of the very unusual public criticisms from Hansen lead to the drop off in form, and he has talked about the difficulty he faced handling that.
Must have been hard to take being labelled lazy when you play 80mins in every game and lead the team stats for tackles and attack for forwards. Was usually our last line of defence too.
But anyway, new coaches for the Blues and ABs and he's back to his 2018 form, maybe even better. He's a great player, would love to see what he'd bring to Test rugby. Those hits he put in yesterday were bone crunching.
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@African-Monkey said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
@Steven-Harris My criticism comes after there were far inferior players getting picked after he was playing the house down from 2017-2018 for both Auckland and the Blues yet people continued to knock him for no reason or as @Nepia says, shift the goalposts and find other reasons to criticise him. Yes he was in awful shape in the Mitre 10 Cup and was in a bad place and faded in last years Super Rugby but it wasn't helped with him getting played into the ground by the Blues with a lack of competition at the time.
Now he's just found his form from previous seasons but I'm sure there will be some reason as to why he'll get overlooked for higher honours.
- It's entirely possible for both positions to be true:
- Hansen et al may have noticed an element of his game missing.
- He may not have been given the opportunity within the Blues structures to demonstrate what the AB coaches wanted to see.
- Being physically exhausted may well have impacted his mental health
A rest and the Blues current form may have been the panacea to his current form.
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@KiwiMurph said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Hansen's selection policy of loose forwards in the 2016-2019 4 year period certainly deserves some scrutiny.
Seemingly tried everyone under the sun (with a couple of notable exceptions) and never landed on a settled combination.
He knew his 7 and 8. Any diversion from them was due to injury.
6 was a problem because anyone that raised their hand then didn’t raise it again when given a shot. We were just in a slump with 6s. Some good ones coming through but not quick enough.
If you wanted a consistent loose trio who was going to be your 6? -
@Crucial said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
@KiwiMurph said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Hansen's selection policy of loose forwards in the 2016-2019 4 year period certainly deserves some scrutiny.
Seemingly tried everyone under the sun (with a couple of notable exceptions) and never landed on a settled combination.
He knew his 7 and 8. Any diversion from them was due to injury.
6 was a problem because anyone that raised their hand then didn’t raise it again when given a shot. We were just in a slump with 6s. Some good ones coming through but not quick enough.
If you wanted a consistent loose trio who was going to be your 6?What's Liam Squire up to ?
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@MN5 said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
@Crucial said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
@KiwiMurph said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Hansen's selection policy of loose forwards in the 2016-2019 4 year period certainly deserves some scrutiny.
Seemingly tried everyone under the sun (with a couple of notable exceptions) and never landed on a settled combination.
He knew his 7 and 8. Any diversion from them was due to injury.
6 was a problem because anyone that raised their hand then didn’t raise it again when given a shot. We were just in a slump with 6s. Some good ones coming through but not quick enough.
If you wanted a consistent loose trio who was going to be your 6?What's Liam Squire up to ?
True. He was really the first choice for a while except he kept breaking. The other side of that was that others had to get game time to understudy.
It was his choice to remove himself from contention. -
@KiwiMurph said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Squire was highly overrated. He was made to look good against the slumping Wallabies/Boks in 16/17 but when the going got tough he went missing. Flat track bully.
playing the Aussies 3 times a year wasn't great for getting a real measure of players
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Squire put in numerous shoddy defensive shifts for the ABs too. The loss in Brisbane comes to mind. Ludicrously overrated player. Played some real shockers against the Crusaders in playoffs, where he was more interested in lining up late shoulder charges than tackling forwards.
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@akan004 said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Hansen selected Fifita regularly and had the nerve to call Akira lazy. Wish Shag had retired/resigned in 2017 as originally planned.
Duluth needs to let us like posts more than once. That sums up the issue perfectly.
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@mariner4life said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
@KiwiMurph said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Squire was highly overrated. He was made to look good against the slumping Wallabies/Boks in 16/17 but when the going got tough he went missing. Flat track bully.
playing the Aussies 3 times a year wasn't great for getting a real measure of players
particularly forwards
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@KiwiMurph said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
Squire was highly overrated. He was made to look good against the slumping Wallabies/Boks in 16/17 but when the going got tough he went missing. Flat track bully.
Don't forget that his selection was a part in how we lost Luatua.
https://www.allblacks.com/news/all-blacks-squad-named-for-2016-steinlager-series/
https://www.allblacks.com/news/all-blacks-squad-named-for-2016-investec-rugby-championship
https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/opinion/82673550/five-unlucky-all-black-omissions
When you look at how those selections turned out, you really realize what at a fucking mess they created by imposing non-selections on key players. What the fuck did they expect from him after he signed for two years in 2015? I'm still fucking fuming about it.
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@Stargazer said in Are Akira Ioane and Jackson Hemopo the answer?:
LOL, is this the new Akira bandwagon thread?
Do you disagree with @sparky? I mean, it's not like any of the other 6's did anything meaningful. Akira had to cop some, but Hansen doesn't escape the online blame we're dishing out