Foster, Robertson etc
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@canefan said in Foster must go:
He has little to no lead in time before heading to the Republic. I think some leeway is called for.
Oh, I'm not expecting instant success & 50-point wins, just progress. And I can's see why that can't be visible reasonably quickly.
Foster won 11 of his first 14 games with one draw and surely we should expect something at least as good with a decent coach.
Travelling away for a few weeks would probably help when trying to change things. The downside is having to play the old enemy. I can't remember who Fozz's team played in those 11 wins. But games vs SA and Oz, (Argie will be tough if we play them away), and the EOYT is a pretty tough intro. I would not expect Fozz to win many of those games, so I will extend that to the new man. But I want to see a change in the way we play on the field, and if we win too that will be great
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@canefan said in Foster must go:
He has little to no lead in time before heading to the Republic. I think some leeway is called for.
Oh, I'm not expecting instant success & 50-point wins, just progress. And I can's see why that can't be visible reasonably quickly.
Foster won 11 of his first 14 games with one draw and surely we should expect something at least as good with a decent coach.
Eh? Foster was involved for how many years before that? And inherited a team that wasn't in the doldrums.
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@Bones said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@canefan said in Foster must go:
He has little to no lead in time before heading to the Republic. I think some leeway is called for.
Oh, I'm not expecting instant success & 50-point wins, just progress. And I can's see why that can't be visible reasonably quickly.
Foster won 11 of his first 14 games with one draw and surely we should expect something at least as good with a decent coach.
Eh? Foster was involved for how many years before that? And inherited a team that wasn't
in the doldrumsa rabbleFixed
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@canefan said in Foster must go:
@Bones said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@canefan said in Foster must go:
He has little to no lead in time before heading to the Republic. I think some leeway is called for.
Oh, I'm not expecting instant success & 50-point wins, just progress. And I can's see why that can't be visible reasonably quickly.
Foster won 11 of his first 14 games with one draw and surely we should expect something at least as good with a decent coach.
Eh? Foster was involved for how many years before that? And inherited a team that wasn't
in the doldrumsa rabbleFixed
Thanks. I don't even know where the dd's are anyway
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@Bones said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@canefan said in Foster must go:
He has little to no lead in time before heading to the Republic. I think some leeway is called for.
Oh, I'm not expecting instant success & 50-point wins, just progress. And I can's see why that can't be visible reasonably quickly.
Foster won 11 of his first 14 games with one draw and surely we should expect something at least as good with a decent coach.
Eh? Foster was involved for how many years before that?
The argument at the time, IIRC, was we needed someone fresh and with a track record of success - unlike Foster. So if we get that, we should expect an improvement surely.
And inherited a team that wasn't in the doldrums.
It was on a downward slope though and the pattern of winning great, then playing crap the next game along with being out-coached and players running around like headless chooks, was obvious. The new bloke needs to show he can turn that around
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@Bones said in Foster must go:
Eh? Foster was involved for how many years before that? And inherited a team that wasn't
in the doldrumsa rabbleThanks. I don't even know where the dd's are anyway
where the unemployed percussionists live?
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@voodoo said in Foster must go:
@nostrildamus said in Foster must go:
@voodoo said in Foster must go:
@mariner4life said in Foster must go:
@Crucial said in Foster must go:
@Tim said in Foster must go:
Newshub claimed that they've been informed by "sources" that sacking Foster would cost $3M to $4M.
Depends how you add it up. Maybe 18 months payout for Foster (NZRs fault) and 18 months for the new guy.
If Schmidt he’s already on a contract so the increase won’t be a full salary. Then there’s the assistants to pay out.yeah fair point
It's semi-fair. The cost of the replacement guys shouldn't be counted as an additional cost, just any incremental cost above what the current guys are getting. Meaningless number if we count both in any assessment of what to do from here.
But surely the real cost, is, how well will the brand do over the next two years the way we are going?
The brand is everything!
The brand is the new aura
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@Bones said in Foster must go:
@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@canefan said in Foster must go:
He has little to no lead in time before heading to the Republic. I think some leeway is called for.
Oh, I'm not expecting instant success & 50-point wins, just progress. And I can's see why that can't be visible reasonably quickly.
Foster won 11 of his first 14 games with one draw and surely we should expect something at least as good with a decent coach.
Eh? Foster was involved for how many years before that?
The argument at the time, IIRC, was we needed someone fresh and with a track record of success - unlike Foster. So if we get that, we should expect an improvement surely.
And inherited a team that wasn't in the doldrums.
It was on a downward slope though and the pattern of winning great, then playing crap the next game along with being out-coached and players running around like headless chooks was obvious.
I'm not really arguing with you, I just don't think we have the time, product, board discernment or even 'aura' at the moment to be in a strong bargaining position...
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@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster must go:
@junior 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:
@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.
Whatever we do, we run the risk of tings getting worse. But that in itself is not a reason to do nothing to try to turn around the currently dire situation.
Of course not.
We will all have to accept that with a change in coach, things may just get worse before they get better. We may also get a dead cat bounce where things get immediately worse, but then revert to what we currently have.
Nine Tests (to the end of '22) is more than enough for a decent coach to cement progress. And we'd need to listening for alarm bells if there isn't significant improvement by the end of the RC.
All this will tell us is that things are in fact worse than perhaps we had realised and that things would have gotten worse under Foster.
That's just a ready-made get-out-of-jail for non-improvement. People with far more knowledge of the game than me are saying we have superior players and skills and there are coaches out there with a game plan, able to build confidence and with a winning track record to turn things around.
We need improvement, not a coach telling us it would have been worse under the other guy - not even Foster used that as an excuse.
I would rather we accept these risks and be proactive about trying to avoid them by appointing a new coach with a proven track record of success - whether that's Razor, Schmidt or someone else like Gatland - than continue on with the current team of coaches who have little to no success in their own right.
Totally agree. But let's stop the excuses and acceptance of mediocrity. We have the players and we put in a coach with a track recording of winning. He either get a better track record than Foster got in '21 or considers his position and NZR has a contingency plan in place.
I think we may be a little at cross purposes here - I don't disagree with anything you have written above, I suppose I am being realistic in saying that a new coach may not be able to arrest all of the malaise. Just because this coach may not be the solution does not however mean that Foster is not part of the problem and therefore needs to go.
For what it's worth, I do think Razor or Schmidt - or even Gats for 16 months or so - could improve the team. What that means in terms of results, I don't know - but with anyone of those three, you can be confident that there might be some kind of plan in place and it might even be discernible.
I guess the point I'm making is, if it is just Foster that's the main problem, I don't see why it would take long to see improvement with a new coach, and 9 Tests seems long enough for me to see if the new bloke is up to it.
Any more than 3 losses would be way worse than Foster's win average and I'd be asking some serious questions at that stage. And there has to be a contingency plan in place if that happens.
Everyone almost to a man here can see that the problem is not just Foster - there are systemic "NZ Rugby problems" and there are "All Black problems", some of which are downstream of the "NZ Rugby problems". Sacking Foster is obviously not going to resolve the "NZ Rugby problems", I don't believe anyone has said they would and, if they have, that person (or persons) is obviously a moron.
However, there are specific "All Black problems" that could be resolved by a change in the overall coaching group, including the head coach. These include things like game plans / strategies, opposition analysis, etc. all of which can and should generally result in better infield performances. This is the most easily identifiable and resolvable of the "All Black problems" at the moment. It won't resolve all of the "All Black problems" - for example, we have the best available talent in the squad - and it certainly won't resolve all of the "NZ Rugby problems".
But, in all likelihood, it will resolve the key "All Black problem" of not getting the most out of the talent we have available.
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@TheMojoman said in Foster must go:
Foster by the numbers - https://i.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all-blacks/300639756/the-charts-that-put-ian-fosters-all-blacks-coaching-record-in-sharp-perspective
Looking at those stats, you have to feel a bit sorry for the flak that Vodanovich is getting on here. 40% of his tests were against a very good Lions side I think.
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@Catogrande said in Foster must go:
@TheMojoman said in Foster must go:
Foster by the numbers - https://i.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all-blacks/300639756/the-charts-that-put-ian-fosters-all-blacks-coaching-record-in-sharp-perspective
Looking at those stats, you have to feel a bit sorry for the flak that Vodanovich is getting on here. 40% of his tests were against a very good Lions side I think.
Heretic 🔱
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@Catogrande said in Foster must go:
@TheMojoman said in Foster must go:
Foster by the numbers - https://i.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/all-blacks/300639756/the-charts-that-put-ian-fosters-all-blacks-coaching-record-in-sharp-perspective
Looking at those stats, you have to feel a bit sorry for the flak that Vodanovich is getting on here. 40% of his tests were against a very good Lions side I think.
He wasn't rated by the players from what I've read. According to them, his idea of coaching was to simply train the team to exhaustion and hope for the best tactics-wise on the day. Zero innovation.
There was a huge exodus of experienced players from the AB's after the 1970 tour and some have given him as the reason. IIRC Chris Laidlaw was particularly scathing.
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@MN5 said in Foster must go:
@antipodean said in Foster must go:
@Crucial said in Foster must go:
@antipodean said in Foster must go:
“That statement from the CEO really annoys me,” Kirwan said.
“Why doesn’t Mark Robinson come out and say we’ve got faith [in Ian Foster]? The CEO needs to come out and go ‘we’ve done a review six months ago, we’re confident of turning it around, [it’s] only three test matches.’
“He’s throwing his coach under the bus, people!”
Well, he'd know all about that.
Situation maybe feeling a bit to familiar to him perhaps?Well it might be, but I'm not very sympathetic to it. Quite frankly I'm sick of seeing "mental health" used as a synonym for "don't critique me" for poor performances in professional settings. These aren't amateurs who stepped up to the plate because no one else would do it.
There will be MASSIVE pressure on Foster as there should be and you’re right. He could have said no to the job and he’s been paid a huge salary. On face value it is very easy to put the boot in.
……but the more empathetic side of me does feel for him a bit and how stressed, unhappy and unhealthy he looks when he fronts the media.
He just looks utterly resigned to a shit situation and bereft of ideas of how to sort it.
Except the obvious idea - resign with grace and dignity.
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@Billy-Tell said in Foster must go:
@Daffy-Jaffy said in Foster must go:
But I don't understand. Rennie is a brilliant coach...
I'm pretty sure he could do at least as good a job with England as Eddie. Compare what he has to work with to Foster.
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@Bones said in Foster must go:
@Billy-Tell said in Foster must go:
@Daffy-Jaffy said in Foster must go:
But I don't understand. Rennie is a brilliant coach...
I'm pretty sure he could do at least as good a job with England as Eddie. Compare what he has to work with to Foster.
I understand he has less talent but a 40% win rate is still pretty poor. He has few fanboys from his chiefs days but as I lived in the NH I followed glasgow a bit when he was in charge. He’s a good coach but he’s not a brilliant coach imho.
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@junior 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:
@junior said in Foster must go:
@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.
Whatever we do, we run the risk of tings getting worse. But that in itself is not a reason to do nothing to try to turn around the currently dire situation.
Of course not.
We will all have to accept that with a change in coach, things may just get worse before they get better. We may also get a dead cat bounce where things get immediately worse, but then revert to what we currently have.
Nine Tests (to the end of '22) is more than enough for a decent coach to cement progress. And we'd need to listening for alarm bells if there isn't significant improvement by the end of the RC.
All this will tell us is that things are in fact worse than perhaps we had realised and that things would have gotten worse under Foster.
That's just a ready-made get-out-of-jail for non-improvement. People with far more knowledge of the game than me are saying we have superior players and skills and there are coaches out there with a game plan, able to build confidence and with a winning track record to turn things around.
We need improvement, not a coach telling us it would have been worse under the other guy - not even Foster used that as an excuse.
I would rather we accept these risks and be proactive about trying to avoid them by appointing a new coach with a proven track record of success - whether that's Razor, Schmidt or someone else like Gatland - than continue on with the current team of coaches who have little to no success in their own right.
Totally agree. But let's stop the excuses and acceptance of mediocrity. We have the players and we put in a coach with a track recording of winning. He either get a better track record than Foster got in '21 or considers his position and NZR has a contingency plan in place.
I think we may be a little at cross purposes here - I don't disagree with anything you have written above, I suppose I am being realistic in saying that a new coach may not be able to arrest all of the malaise. Just because this coach may not be the solution does not however mean that Foster is not part of the problem and therefore needs to go.
For what it's worth, I do think Razor or Schmidt - or even Gats for 16 months or so - could improve the team. What that means in terms of results, I don't know - but with anyone of those three, you can be confident that there might be some kind of plan in place and it might even be discernible.
I guess the point I'm making is, if it is just Foster that's the main problem, I don't see why it would take long to see improvement with a new coach, and 9 Tests seems long enough for me to see if the new bloke is up to it.
Any more than 3 losses would be way worse than Foster's win average and I'd be asking some serious questions at that stage. And there has to be a contingency plan in place if that happens.
Everyone almost to a man here can see that the problem is not just Foster - there are systemic "NZ Rugby problems" and there are "All Black problems", some of which are downstream of the "NZ Rugby problems". Sacking Foster is obviously not going to resolve the "NZ Rugby problems", I don't believe anyone has said they would and, if they have, that person (or persons) is obviously a moron.
Obviously. I've been saying exactly that for quite some time and I'm only talking about fixing the problems that changing the coaching staff will fix.
But, in all likelihood, it will resolve the key "All Black problem" of not getting the most out of the talent we have available.
I just don't think we can work any more on the basis of "all likelihood". Either we and NZR believe a new coach is needed and will improve things or we don't. If we do (and we should), then put a stake in the ground and have the confidence to test the success of that change and tweak as necessary. Anything else is cop-out and a repeat of the last 2 years
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@Victor-Meldrew It's a high performance role, and the standards should be high. if they're not met, changes should happen. That requires a significant change from the NZRU, who gave us a debacle of a selection process then appointed a coach without successful head coaching experience, then extended his contract far further that they should have based on nothing.
To go from that to dropping someone in the deep end taking over a rabble with bugger-all prep before SA in SA and then judging them on that would be fish-tailing. There should be a sensible middle ground, with clear goals, and a little leeway for the short notice.
Regardless the current coaches have to go. Not only is there no visible improvement, they are going backwards. -
If they know a change has to happen then do it immediately. I would rather we go to SA without A head coach in place than go there to give Fozzie more time to get it right. Surely, the penny has dropped that what is required is beyond his skill level?
The answers to the coaching problem are all NZR employees. Schmidt and Robertson. Schmidt may not want the head coach role due to personal circumstances but he can be part of Robertson team.
It’s not like they have to headhunt new people from outside our organisation or buy out expensive contracts and wait for notice periods.
I saw in the herald today that the cost of paying contracts out was about $2m. That is not a lot of money and shouldn’t be a blocker for a newly cashed up organisation.
They did a major review 6 months ago. They don’t need another review 3 games later.
There was a lot of talk last year (and rightly so) about players being in A covid bubble for months after a long tour (11 away tests) but now at home and fresh we have gone backwards from last year and even from those losses last year.
We are in crisis mode and the one thing that the NZR cannot afford is the All Blacks losing and being exposed as a poor team.
Be decisive, act now, get the right guys in place and give them more than they ask for.
I think 3 weeks together in SA is an ideal time for a new coaching group and squad to come together quickly and get them on the right path. (They may lose but essentially they have nothing to lose at this point).
(Not all of that was replying to you Bov but I got up a head of steam as I was writing! 😉)
