When should Foster go?
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@Donsteppa said in When should Foster go?:
Well, John Hart is backing Foster.
Former ABs coach reveals team 'issues': Why players are to blame, not Foster
All Blacks legend points the finger at the players rather than under-fire Ian Foster.
Oh well I'm sold
Does fozzie look good in a turtle neck?
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@hydro11 I also think you have to factor in context and how rubbish The Rugby Championship was from 2016-17.
Boks had a coach so far out his depth it wasn't funny those 2 years and Wallabies were decimated with retirements/exodus after 2015 World Cup + it became clear Cheika was a good short term coach but not built for the long haul (he even admitted he didn't believe in analysing opponent!). Argentina also regressed after 2015 RWC and canned their coach in 2018.
The difference between the 2017 Lions series and the 2016-17 The Rugby Championship was enormous in terms of a change of intensity - it was like tier one vs tier two stuff.
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One of those wins v England was a bee's dick from being a loss
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@mariner4life same with Pretoria 2018 v Rassie's Boks. Were down 30-13 in the second half and down 30-18 after 75 minutes.
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@taniwharugby said in When should Foster go?:
@Crazy-Horse think the difference is DC was able to adapt and react a bit quicker than most mortals
DC had a decent left boot that he could use to turn the opposition around and get their forward going backwards when his forward pack couldn't do that for him. He was also very robust, so that when he struggled with ball in hand he was still able to have an impact on D. He was also a leader capable of influencing a match in less obvious ways. Let's be honest here, he hardly got an armchair ride in the 2015 semi, yet he managed come up with crucial plays when the opportunity presented itself. Same as in the 2015 final, when Oz were getting close and had all the momentum, he had the ability to kick a 45m drop goal off the cuff and completely wrestle momentum back off them. No doubt he was a special player, but these aren't examples of freakish play that only he could do. It's about having the initiative and game sense to execute a basic skill - a punt or drop kick - that is going to have significant impact. RM just doesn't appear to have that. He seems to only be able to do the sublime or nothing at all.
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@taniwharugby said in When should Foster go?:
@broughie possibly, although it isnt like it was a secret Hansen was leaving either and the job would be up post RWC.
I guess for Rennie, he knew he wouldnt be the only candidate from outside the cool kids club, so maybe he had looked at who he might be up against, plus the history of internal succession, and though safe option was to take the Aus job on offer instead of waiting for the AB job to come up, that he mightnt get (similarly Joseph, Schmidt was always an outside shot given he had said he wasnt applying)
Wasnt it also only 6 months earlier Robertson had said he wasnt sure he was ready for it (or was that 2018?)
Timing was very important too. The NZRU's decision to delay the appointment process until after the RWC, was probably a bit misguided (even if it did make some sense to delay the actual appointment until that time). All this did was give all of our major rivals a jump start on our best candidates and, seemingly, forced the hands of guys like Rennie and Joseph to take the offers in hand (and who could blame them).
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@mariner4life said in When should Foster go?:
Of course, this thinking ignored the two years of rugby that came before it, but hey, organisations used to success have blindspots.
I suspect this is the real issue - when the trophy cabinet is full and you're making money, saying "yes, more of the same is easy".
The reality was that the world was catching up to the All Blacks, the NZRFU assumed everyone would want to apply for the AB's role even when they were publicly withdrawing and there were major issues within SANZAAR pre-COVID-19.
The NZRFU have arguably handled the SANZAAR negotiations poorly - while I don't think they could have stopped South Africa taking the path they have, the 2020 Tri Nations being played in Australia appeared to be the NZRFU failing to agree with the NZ government before handing the tournament to Australia and now the 2021 Super Rugby competition is 5 NZ teams vs 5 Australian teams, again what appears to be a victory for Australian rugby although it will depend on final revenue sharing to tell for certain.
For comparison, it's interesting reading about some of the struggles Eddie Jones has had with the RFU - creating a strong team in a weak or flawed organisation is hard.
None of this is intended to support Foster remaining as head coach, just that there are larger issues to solve if NZ rugby wants to continue to be successful.
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@mariner4life said in When should Foster go?:
Oh well I'm sold
Does fozzie look good in a turtle neck?
So histories repeating? And we will be knocked out in RWC by France in the semi's and Foster will be replaced by Xavier Rush/Aaron Mauger?
Or maybe I need a new crystal ball. This one appears to be cracked...
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@PecoTrain said in When should Foster go?:
@mariner4life said in When should Foster go?:
Oh well I'm sold
Does fozzie look good in a turtle neck?
So histories repeating? And we will be knocked out in RWC by France in the semi's and Foster will be replaced by Xavier Rush/Aaron Mauger?
Or maybe I need a new crystal ball. This one appears to be cracked...
Razor and Rangi, you heard it here first.
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Other than Fozzie resigning I think the NZR have to let him see out his contract. They already showed limited confidence in him giving him a 2year contract, but if you fire him after 2 losses (hopefully only 2) what kind of message are you sending to the next coaches. If it makes people feel any better Rassie was looking down the barrel of a gun and about to resign after 2 straight losses but then beat ABs in NZ and started to turn the ship around.
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Oh yeah, so our "soak" defence. Seems to be a lot tied into scenarios we actively try to avoid on attack also.
It appears what they're trying to do is isolate players, usually in behind the advantage line where it takes that split second longer for the attack to get there and secure ball and gives anyone "cycling around" in behind the D line a chance to get in and disrupt. The problem with it being that our defence accuracy just isn't good enough to be working that structure well enough and when it's off, as it has been most of the time for us, it is disastrous and leads to a lot of scramble and therefore a defence easily worked around and easily tired. I noticed in the weekend there looked to be a lot of 2nd man tacklers coming in late on a tackle too, which combined with the poor accuracy then leads to gaps 1 or 2 out that are easily exploited off quick ruck ball and/or offloads. We are being saved a lot of blushes by our scrambling defence which is phenomenal.
So on that note - our attack constantly trying to run into tackles and take as many defenders with them as possible, seems to be aimed to save us from the situation above which leads to isolated attacking players (and also tiring out defenders to create space for our Moungas/Clarkes/ALBs/BBs) - it is kind of working, but again a lack of accuracy and venom is leading to us turning it over and/or choosing really poor options due to being on the back foot.
That's my take anyway. I can see what I think they're trying to do, but it's just not sticking with the players and perhaps they are losing faith and shape. If it comes right, then we could see that "evolution" that we're all asking for, but it's a long way from being right and surely we have to be able to change gears.
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@DMX said in When should Foster go?:
what kind of message are you sending to the next coaches.
That they need to win matches? That being selected to be head coach should be based on merit, and retained based on performance?
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@DMX said in When should Foster go?:
Other than Fozzie resigning I think the NZR have to let him see out his contract. They already showed limited confidence in him giving him a 2year contract, but if you fire him after 2 losses (hopefully only 2) what kind of message are you sending to the next coaches. If it makes people feel any better Rassie was looking down the barrel of a gun and about to resign after 2 straight losses but then beat ABs in NZ and started to turn the ship around.
I am not familiar enough with NZ rugby to comment on who should be coaching the AB's and whether Foster can get it back on track or whether it would be better to cut ties early.
But I can give some perspective on the bolded bit about Rassie:
At the time Rassie took over, the Boks had already slumped to 6th or 7th in the world.
They had managed (convincingly) to lose to Italy.
Fans were quite literally burning their Bok jerseys on the braais around the country.
The Bok players were in a very dark, demotivated place.And yes, history will tell us that it didn't start particularly well for Rassie and yet inside 18 months he had taken the Springboks to the top of the rugby world. So yes, a coach can, even after a seemingly poor start, turn the ship around.
In deciding on Foster, the question I guess you kiwis are better placed to answer is: are you worse now than you were 12 months ago, or is the AB team simply experiencing a temporary personnel cycle challenge that would be stretching any coach?
As I said - I'm not qualified to answer any of that.
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@Bones said in When should Foster go?:
Oh yeah, so our "soak" defence. Seems to be a lot tied into scenarios we actively try to avoid on attack also.
It's not the "soak" defence part of it that seems to be the main issue - it's our inability to build phases/pressure and develop a platform to attack from. We seem to hit the rush defence with no real impact and when we have runners to offload to, they drop the ball or don't even realise they might get a pass.
Unless the "soak" defence is leaving us weary and sore? I'm not so sure about this because it seems to happen throughout the first half.
We also appear to have stopped building slowly into games.
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@PecoTrain yep, the accuracy is missing big time on both sides of the ball. Maybe it's a change of style/plan that's just bedding in really badly, but it seems they're going at it do or die, thrown the baby out with the bathwater and forgetting we can't afford to lose.
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@akan004 said in When should Foster go?:
@taniwharugby said in When should Foster go?:
think the point is he was kicking for the 5m lineout, that is the difficult part, but given how far out he was kicking from, he shouldnt have been going for that lower % play...irony is, if he had gone for say 10-15m out, he woulda put it into the 5m....
I know he has said that he is happy to take the risk and go for extra metres and if it doesn't come off then he can live with it. That's fine if we are in the lead or at least are in the game, however this was a crucial time in the game where we were well behind and needed to score. It was definitely not the time to take a risk. This team lacks rugby IQ and Mounga displayed that perfectly with that kick.
The point about rugby IQ is well made. There were things which were working, and some which weren't (including the bitch slapping) and the situation was crying out for a wise head to say, 'This is what they're/we're doing and this is what we need to do about it'.
At the moment doesn't seem to be Cane. Certainly in the backs Smith might be expected to have a say. My hunch is that ALB could be quite good, too.
Someone (Cane?) needed to be saying, 'Colesy/other pull your head in'.
On dealing with the rush defence, a VERY important point is that any response will involve mistakes. The rush is designed to deliver knock ons and penalties as the boundries are pushed to pierce it.
Most important is not to try and beat the rush within 40m of own line. The risk reward just isn't worth it. So, unless there is a huge hole, if we're 25m out from our own line we need to be looking to kick into oppo half. When there we CAN try some razzle dazzle.
One thing which seems important in unlocking the rush is some footwork. Running straight at teams like Pumas isn't productive and can be the opposite. But a bit of footwork and doubt sets in and some space results. For me, in Puma 2 ALB has to be at 12. And him being next to 10 might help with play selection, too.
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@canefan Cane SHOULD have plenty of support in Coles (I know, I know) Whitelock, Tuipulotu, Ardie, Smith, BB, ALB, Goodhue, Moody, even TJP (I know again) so there is no excuse there.
Fozzie has been criticized for his conservative approach and I do wonder if this has been a ploy that he thought would see him through to 2021 when he can start afresh with his new ideas/plans etc, this has obviously backfired.
With limited games, limited opposition, he has kinda followed through with Hansens stuff (as it is obvious he has) and no noticable difference in things from Hansen...so th eoptimist in me thinks this is how he has played his hand in 2020.
How he responds now though will be interesting, change it up for the final match, or stick with the same old and then start 2021 with a new approach (asummptions being made of course he has new ideas)
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@Hooroo said in When should Foster go?:
@Machpants said in When should Foster go?:
@Victor-Meldrew said in When should Foster go?:
He may have inherited a whole load of problems but he knew they were there when he took on the job. Key question for me is if he's the man to sort out the problems.
Give him until the end of the season to show if he's up to it.
Cool, one more game and he's gone
Even though we all know he needs to go, we should also probably know that he won't be sacked or stand down as Covid will be bandied about as an excuse in unsettled times and all that.
Before any tests were played, and as the test calendar started to take shape for the year. I thought to myself, this will be Fozzie 's best year. Will get off to a covid assisted good start that will paper over the cracks.
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@canefan said in When should Foster go?:
@pakman after the failure of 2007, it was decided that McCaw did not have enough supporting help and they developed their senior player group didn't they? Don't see Cane with much support out there
BB is notably doing a lot of talking out on the field, so there is one.
