Foster, Robertson etc
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@stodders said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@junior said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@PecoTrain said in Foster must go:
If we have little to no confidence in Foster developing the team, why leave him in-place to leave a mess for his successor when the chances of RWC are largely independent of the current coaching team? At worst we start to move forward again...
Genuine question. If Foster is replaced - and I think he should be - and the new coach drops more than one game in the TRC and/or loses a game on the EOYT (more than possible the way England, Wales & Scotland are playing at the moment), he will have done no better, or possibly worse, than Foster in 2021.
What do we do then? Do we sack the new coach and look for another to turn things around in time for Sept 2023?
Obviously not. The new coach’s mandate should be to come in and arrest the current slide and try get this current crop of players to the stage where they don’t embarrass themselves at the World Cup next year. Whoever comes in will have I imagine quite a bit of goodwill for volunteering to take on the difficult task of turning around this shitshow, and probably because he will have shown some coaching ability in the past so people will immediately believe he can actually turn things around (and hopefully so do the players). The damage to this team may be irreparable and impossible to turn around, but we may as well try, right?
So if it turns out the new bloke's not a great success and doesn't do any better than Foster? What do we do then?
Don't think it's viable to just accept that level of performance, keep the new bloke in place, blame it all on Foster and effectively shrug our shoulders and say "at least we tried". Need a bit more planning than that surely.
Human sacrifices?
Well, pitch-forks and flaming torches are (rightly) all the rage right now....
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Anybody wonder if Foster doubts himself or does he really believe he is capable of turning things around?
Must be very hard to coach effectively if you think everyone thinks you are an idiot.
I imagine he must be low on self confidence and it must be a very hard headspace to be in which surely does not help things.
When things go wrong people start pointing fingers and you wonder what the locker room chat is among players, coaches etc re Foster.
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@PecoTrain said in Foster must go:
If we have little to no confidence in Foster developing the team, why leave him in-place to leave a mess for his successor when the chances of RWC are largely independent of the current coaching team? At worst we start to move forward again...
Genuine question. If Foster is replaced - and I think he should be - and the new coach drops more than one game in the TRC and/or loses a game on the EOYT (more than possible the way England, Wales & Scotland are playing at the moment), he will have done no better, or possibly worse, than Foster in 2021.
What do we do then? Do we sack the new coach and look for another to turn things around in time for Sept 2023?
I’d accept keeping the bledisloe and not losing to wales or Scotland on end of year tour. Oh and going 2-0 vs Argentina. Can’t expect a guy to come in at short notice and not potentially lose to SA in SA.
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@ploughboy said in Foster must go:
foster to stay to be joined by gatland and schmidt
Schmidt and Gatland like water and oil.
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@pakman said in Foster must go:
@ploughboy said in Foster must go:
foster to stay to be joined by gatland and schmidt
Schmidt and Gatland like water and oil.
Both focus on defence, prefer to play to set patterns (which some argue the ABs need right now). It might work 😁
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@Billy-Tell said in Foster must go:
I’d accept keeping the bledisloe and not losing to wales or Scotland on end of year tour. Oh and going 2-0 vs Argentina. Can’t expect a guy to come in at short notice and not potentially lose to SA in SA.
Not good enough. We'd be treading water or going backwards compared to Foster with no guarantee things are really on the up.
Enough mediocrity - put success measures in place and have an action plan if they aren't met.
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@chimoaus said in Foster must go:
Anybody wonder if Foster doubts himself or does he really believe he is capable of turning things around?
Must be very hard to coach effectively if you think everyone thinks you are an idiot.
I imagine he must be low on self confidence and it must be a very hard headspace to be in which surely does not help things.
When things go wrong people start pointing fingers and you wonder what the locker room chat is among players, coaches etc re Foster.
On a personal level, you'd have to have a heart of stone not to feel for the guy. He's had a load of stuff hit him which is out of his control and I don't doubt he's doing his best.
But he's paid to do a job and if he can't do it then he should consider his position. At the very least you'd hope NZR are giving him the support he needs no matter what he and they decide to do.
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@Billy-Tell said in Foster must go:
I’d accept keeping the bledisloe and not losing to wales or Scotland on end of year tour. Oh and going 2-0 vs Argentina. Can’t expect a guy to come in at short notice and not potentially lose to SA in SA.
Not good enough. We'd be treading water or going backwards compared to Foster with no guarantee things are really on the up.
Enough mediocrity - put success measures in place and have an action plan if they aren't met.
Do t think so. I have only hope and not expectation when the ABs play these days.
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The Blues wound up in this situation. So have the Warriors.
What doesn't work :
-- pretending it was not a problem and nothing needed fixing.
-- staying with poor coaches, hoping they'd get better.
-- picking nice guys to coach with mana rather than those with winning records because the other guys were kind of prickly and irritating and were going to ruffle some feathers.
-- endless rants about "lack of development" and how the whole organisation was dysfunctional and needed a hard reboot.. This was a Fern speciality. Still is, apparently. (The Waikato RU is as dysfunctional as any on the planet. They can still have winning seasons.)
-- spending money on players.
What did work :
-- trying new things until one stuck.
-- a good coach.
It turns out that that pretty much everything hung on the coaching. Everything else was fine when he was good.
Rennie showed that Foster was the problem at the Chiefs, although in his case it was also the useless WRU -- but cronyism with Foster was part of that.
My predictions:
-- doing nothing will be a disaster.
-- eventually the problems will be sorted by the right coach.
-- nothing else matters. Back room chair organising will not fix poor coaching.
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@Chester-Draws said in Foster must go:
What did work :
-- trying new things until one stuck.
-- a good coach.
It turns out that that pretty much everything hung on the coaching. Everything else was fine when he was good.
-- nothing else matters. Back room chair organising will not fix poor coaching.Agree, very few teams have won trophies with a poor coach.
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@Chester-Draws I respectfully disagree.
Good coaches in poor environments will struggle. Bad coaches in good environments will look better than they are.
The Blues renaissance came with a new board. Everything good flowed from there; a good coach, better player selection and retention, a competent back room staff, stakeholders/owners that weren't at war with each other. The coach can't fix those issues.
It's like a good 10 in a bad team. They'll be dragged down.
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@Chester-Draws said in Foster must go:
Rennie showed that Foster was the problem at the Chiefs, although in his case it was also the useless WRU -- but cronyism with Foster was part of that.
Especially this. Though somehow ten years on he's now coaching the All Blacks...
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@Chester-Draws said in Foster must go:
It turns out that that pretty much everything hung on the coaching. Everything else was fine when he was good.
Sorry, but I think that's way too simplistic and assumes quality of cattle, player development, quality of opposition, the quality of the people choosing and supporting the coach and the processes around managing the game have no impact on the results.
Sure, a good coach is essential and can get the best out of what he's been given, but he can't fix the structural issues in his union.
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@nzzp said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew progress for the new coach won't just be winning, but clarity around selections, game plans and direction. There may be short term losses, but there has to be hope for the future.
He has clarity and has managed to sell that 'vision' to his employers about three times now.
Trouble is that it either doesn't work, the players can't apply it and/or it simply isn't right for the situation we face against structured low error teams.
The public also can see zero evidence of positive change and the few public statements about what needs to change seem at odds to what is happening.
'We need more power in the forwards', OK now I'm going to bench or leave out our most powerful hooker -
Given that it is only 3 weeks until we go to SA what is the practical solution here if Foster goes?
A transition to Schmidt whereby he can make gradual changes to the systems in place?
It's either Schmidt commits to the RWC or he acts as a caretaker bringing in new systems and players in consultation with Razor, who then takes over for EOYT after getting his house in order.
One of the next problems then is assistants (who I truly believe are Fosters biggest mistake). Razor has his great team but can they move across to the ABs without derailing the Saders own succession plans? Is Schmidt initially saddled with the same muppets Foster put in place?
Our scrum is OK if not dominant (and dominant scrums mean little against these big teams - the refs still let them get the ball out while moving backwards). Therefore maybe Feek can stay.
The option of Schmidt and Razor working together worries me that it could be another Grizz/Hart -
When the current coaching group got Covid and Schmidt took the coaching reigns, that led to the only win.
Perhaps an interim change is enough to get through the Rugby Championship, and the board doesn't need to rush to get a long term replacement (or maybe Schmidt is the guy, who knows).
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@Crucial well McLeod should be on the block, regardless, our defence has been woeful for years now.
The disconnect is there for all to see, we don't move as one, staggered, passive and slow, that try posted in the game thread highlighted how poor we were when we twist thier scrum away from the zone they are attacking, its slow ball and yet they still go that way and still make it over the gain line with a simple passing move.
When you watch the Irish line come up quickly, together, structured.
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Tbh I don't think a massive amount is required to get them back on track. The players are there and when they have nothing to lose, start playing direct and let rip you can see the other teams start getting sqeaky bum time. But that's usually after an inept, bumbling and headless first 40 that's already put them 20 odd points behind. Tactically the ABs have been a mess since even 2016. It's simply arrogance and hubris that can't be papered over by individual brilliance anymore. Same thing with teams tiring. They simply don't hit wall like they used to. If anything we hit the wall after the necessary early 2nd half fightback required to arrest a 20 point deficit. I see all the major teams at least looking like they have a plan and at least playing with some kind of depth and enterprise. I don't know wtf the ABs are doing and I'm not sure the players do either. Just get in someone, anyone who is prepared to fůcking evolve and acknowledge it isn't farking 2015 anymore.
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@nzzp said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew progress for the new coach won't just be winning, but clarity around selections, game plans and direction. There may be short term losses, but there has to be hope for the future.
You raise a really good point though, the issue is deeper than just the coach. But the coach has appeared to be a significant part of the issue.
My point is if/when we dump Foster we have to expect much more than just visibility of new game plan and getting more information at pressers on selection thinking.
Sure, I'll give a loss or two if that means progress, but I'd want some pretty rapid progress after 2-3 games if I were NZR and have some contingency plans on re-appointment in place if it doesn't happen. Hope is all well and good, but let's not have another Foster-like fiasco.
I don’t think that will be an expectation nor should it be.
If (and I still think it is a massive if) a new coach and assistants are installed then NZR will have to say there is a massive problem to justify such a step. Massive problems aren’t turned around in 2-3 games.
From a playing perspective it will take time for philosophy buy in and the changes to manifest. From a PR perspective we will be in that similar position to the post Connolly and MacKenzie Wallabies of managing expectations and sending out messages of what’s working in camp etc.
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I saw a brief interview with RTS pre game and when asked how he found things he talked about having huge amounts of study to do with systems etc but then added that Fozzie said 'we don't want robots out there, the systems are just a framework'.
It's a simplification off one newcomers comment but I have to wonder if that is part of the issue here. Either give clear direction and plans whereby players get to express themselves only at 'pull the trigger' moments or don't bother. They seem not to understand when to stick to the plan at the moment.
A good case was on the weekend, we got a small roll on making Ireland defend, got down in their 22 and to me it was time to keep heaping on pressure until a crack appeared but instead we went for what was presumably a phase one glory move off the lineout,. Execution was out and we let the foot off the gas.
Were was the ruthlessness? Players don't seem to understand the need to keep applying pressure in an organised way. Even a very good defence will show cracks after 10 plus phases as long as those phases draw them out of structure. Then you can show off your instinctive brilliance.
