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Now that Graham Henry has named his first All Black team of the year, it is impossible not to wish the players and all those who still support this team all the best.
As divided as my own loyalties are while Henry remains at the helm, you have to fight off the lingering post-World Cup bitterness and try to find some reasonable ground. It's not easy, or really possible unfortunately.
The fabulous Richie McCaw and his Crusaders mates have done the country proud again, and this All Black side is littered with players who have picked themselves up from the World Cup disappointment and got on with the game and life, a fairly easy task once the initial hangover of defeat has worn off. After all, it's only a game.
And then there are the newcomers like Anthony Boric, Rudy Wulf, Anthony Tuitavake and that woolly mammoth from the south Adam Thomson, whose dreams are being realised.
While the player cupboard isn't exactly bare, the All Blacks are having to try out a few unopened jars that have been lurking around in far corners. As a result, we have the Maybe Blacks.
The really interesting character is Thomson, whose 112kg frame represents an encouraging upsizing of the No 6 position. Thomson is raw, with folk-hero potential written all over him.
In Wulf's case, he has surged back from a horrendous injury which would have knocked the stuffing out of most of us while Tuitavake plays with a verve giving hope that rugby will not die on the altar of method coaching. Boric - like Wulf - is a straight out bolter, save for the fact we get a peep at the test squad through the wider training group.
The trouble is, this squad is playing for a coach I can't stomach and under an administration which I loathe, not only for having allowed Henry's one-trick excuse act to find a receptive audience, but also its determination to run the game like a secret society that almost encourages a state of fear.
Appropriate to mention here then that a Herald reporter who contacted a relative of a new All Black was told yesterday that she couldn't talk to the press because the player was now under the All Black umbrella. Golly.
Maybe a misunderstanding was involved, but it indicates the depressing, crassly reverential environment in which the game operates.
Reverence for this All Black regime is in drastically short supply.
Every All Black triumph now represents an opening through which Henry and co. can falsely claim or imply they were on the mark in 2007, that the World Cup campaign was cut short by an errant referee.
Henry made so many errors, from selections to preparation. The New Zealand Rugby Union should have had the balls to acknowledge they got things wrong and the natural order of sport demanded Henry be sacked.
My antipathy towards Henry certainly wasn't eased when he gave Jerry Collins a bon voyage card last week that looked like a flea in his ear.
Having studiously avoided taking any wholehearted blame for the World Cup failure, this man who refused to fall on his sword appeared more than happy to stab Jerry in the back with it.
Henry remains empowered to act like royalty, issuing decrees from upon high. The imperious schoolmaster was at it again - you concluded - making up the rules to suit himself in a playground in which no one can answer back. Maybe Jerry should have demanded a six month inquiry into his performance conducted by a lawyer and former tiddlywinks star.
Instead of that, he got a heave-ho that should have been used on Henry.
The net result of the World Cup fallout is that I'll never cheer for a team coached by Henry. No team in black will ever represent my sporting fervour while he is in charge. There will never be a time soon enough for Henry's departure.
A South African friend of mine talked of a similar - and far more significant - dilemma as an ardent supporter of the Springboks. He wanted the best for players and fans but loathed what he regarded as narrow minded and racist coaches.
He concluded the only way to deal with this conundrum was to hope the Springboks failed in minor battles but won the big wars.
I have yet to meet one outright supporter of Henry's retention, even though polls claimed the country is full of them.
In 38 years of following the All Blacks, this dilemma has never arisen before. For better or worse, including rugby's infuriatingly arrogant assumption that the entire country is always behind them, the feelings have ranged from being fanatically supportive through to indifferent. But never opposed.
What hurts most is that rugby's safety net, an ability to rely on widespread support built up through more honest if not always perfect times, enabled a blatantly prejudiced decision which handed these smug failures an outrageous grab at redemption. The NZRU preyed on history rather than honoured it.
The rugby union obviously doesn't believe it has to fight for the supporters' loyalty, that the All Blacks are now open to personal crusades and the adoring masses will just have to cop it. It stinks and we're stuck with it.
Yet when that fresh looking squad was named yesterday, you wanted to cheer them on. It's going to be a difficult season.
