Last orders called on bingeing

All Black manager Darren Shand said we need to find the middle ground when it comes to drinking. Picture / Fotopress

Senior All Blacks have been tasked with driving through a cultural shift to end binge drinking.

Coach Graham Henry felt time-honoured institutions such as court sessions needed to be scrapped in order to hammer home the message that binge drinking would not be tolerated.

Most NPC and Super 12 teams have environments where players abstain during the week, only to drink heavily after a match.

This was also largely the culture within the All Blacks prior to Henry's appointment in December 2003 but he wanted to create an environment to reflect the higher demands of test football - and the higher quality performance that can be gained under a moderate drinking regime.

In a frank meeting last August management made it clear that players had to adopt more responsible drinking and preparation habits.

All Black manager Darren Shand said the onus was put on the senior players to make a quantum shift in culture that would put an end to heavy nights on the booze as a reward for good performance.

Shand said: "We wanted to create a culture where saving up all week to binge drink on the Saturday night was not going to be tolerated or accepted by the team. We work at the extremes - we either binge or we don't drink - whereas in Europe they seem to have found that middle ground. That is what we want.

"We still want people to enjoy themselves and feel like they deserve a drink. But the players need to manage that. Things like court sessions, that was something we decided we were not going to tolerate in our environment any more.

"We wanted guys to feel comfortable when we went out socially during the week. We wanted to make that middle ground be the norm, rather than have it how it has been in the past."

Some hardened All Blacks of yesteryear may frown at the scrapping of court sessions and point to them as vital bonding sessions that have traditionally been used to bring the team closer together.

But these rituals and the culture of heavy drinking became institutionalised in the amateur era, where the Corinthian spirit rode much closer to the surface.

In the more ruthless and demanding world of professional rugby, research has proven unequivocally that a big night on the sauce immediately after a game can reduce recovery times and subsequent athletic performance.

Shand said: "In professional rugby, the first 24 hours are the most critical in terms of getting your body in a state to train again and go through the whole process of a training week.

"We have got data that shows us how moderate to significant amounts of consumption impacts on your recovery. We are looking at that more closely and have been able to chart that and say to players this is how you did last week when you didn't drink and this is how you did when you had a few drinks. Pretty quickly, people realise how important it is to take care of yourself.

"We have got a player responsible who is the role model for the group. He talks post-game about what is coming up, how we need to behave tonight. What he thinks would be acceptable for the evening.

"It's an internal mechanism driven by the players, putting pressure on themselves about how they have to perform."

- HERALD ON SUNDAY