48 Hours: Adding value to All Black variety

A mate opined this week: "I can't believe all this nonsense about Graham Henry and his rotation policy having cheapened the All Black jersey.

"I've been looking everywhere and I can't find one for under $150."

This was a man who could take no further shocks. Since he already felt mauled by the jersey manufacturers and their licensing deal with the rugby authorities, I felt obligated to give him warning that he might be fleeced again, that his quip was headed for a column.

Many a true word is spoken in jest and rugby fans - or consumers as they are undoubtedly regarded in a corporate rugby world where the game is called a product - might be asking a few questions about ticket prices for next year's two-test tour by France, if it survives.

Having observed a cavalry in the form of Canterbury and Waikato arriving in the nick of time to invigorate the Air New Zealand Cup on Friday night, it was back to reality over the weekend as news emerged that France intend sending a squad minus 30 top players here next year.

You might say that the All Blacks' rotation policy has come full circle.

France C, as their test team will be under coach Bernard Laporte's plan, would be worth about $10 a ticket and you'd be within your rights to expect a cup of tea in the price.

No doubt the tour will get the usual PR advertising treatment however, about brave young Frenchmen looking to uphold the spirit and genius of the victorious 1994 tourists, or the Bastille Day storming of Eden Park in 1979. There's never a dull moment in observing the sports marketeers' will or skill in prising open the punters' wallets.

Events that in the old money were full-blooded test series have become testing grounds in the new currency. What is the point, you sigh, before trying to muster interest.

New Zealand has only a toehold, and certainly not a leg to stand on, in complaining should Laporte send an empty vessel this way.

It is an oddly timed tour anyway. It's hard to see the benefit for France in sending a top squad to face the No 1 ranked side on the other side of the world, less then three months before they kick off the World Cup at the Stade de France on the Paris fringes.

Apart from risking major injuries and wearing players out, it would offer the All Blacks a royal chance to gain a sizeable psychological advantage. Better indeed to launch a passionate surprise attack on European soil during the tournament - there is a chance the teams will meet in a quarter-final in Cardiff.

New Zealand rugby is reaping what it has sown, although it is not the only country tampering with the test formula. While Henry's All Blacks are never C-grade, they have contributed greatly to the lowering of test rugby.

It's not so much Henry's policy of testing and resting which has been so bewildering, because it is a sound and necessary tactic in the professional era of long seasons. It is the extent to which he has taken it that has helped rip at the foundations of test rugby.

Henry and co have managed to turn half of this country's core Super 14 players into All Blacks and when you see an inside back carthorse like David Hill get a free ride into the test arena, who then promptly rides off into a pot-of-gold sunset, you can only wonder if the selectors have somehow lost all their senses.

The World Cup has added lustre to world rugby, yet we have also lost so much in between. In fairness though, it is not just the four-year tournament which has played its hand here. The rise of professional rugby, and it's fuelling requirements especially in Europe, mean that time was already up on many traditional contests.

It is a shame, a great shame, but that's the way it is. C'est la vie, as Laporte might be musing.

There is a way the IRB might restore more significance to tests, and that would be to hold the World Cup say every eight years. This would leave four or five years in which World Cup thinking played very little part, and might get the game closer to test rugby of old, where you hurled everything including the kitchen sink at each other.

Get real. The chances of the World Cup being downplayed, or of hearing of this suggestion again, rank alongside those of France C.

But at least elements of rugby heart and soul live on, as in Hamilton on Friday night.

It did not matter that four of Canterbury's key All Blacks were missing. There were enough big names in the Canterbury lineup for this to pass as the real deal.

The atmosphere was superb, the crowd engrossed, the ebb and flow fantastic. After 10 minutes you would have picked a Canterbury canter, but by fulltime they had been bludgeoned out of the points.

Mooloo coach Warren Gatland's up-and-at-em defence, the rousing approach as a whole, is a joy to behold. It gives players the chance to express their aggression, the licence to act as individuals within a plan. The crowds love it, and there has always been a particular frustration with patient defences because our instincts remain to go for the kill. It was this relentless pressure that allowed Waikato to survive a horrendous lineout performance.

They are now well positioned to claim one of the first three places when the Top Six part of the competition starts, which carries the advantage of an extra home game.

It was not just a smash-and-grab raid from Waikato. The gems included a try engineered by the pack and halfback Brendon Leonard and finished in his floating best by the brilliant Sitiveni Sivivatu, a move which outwitted the vaunted blindside defence of Reuben Thorne.

Apart from Auckland's continued and commendable faith in finding success through attacking sparkle, the Waikato-Canterbury clash has been the Air New Zealand Cup highlight so far.

High

The stirring provincial rugby clash in Hamilton, and Auckland's revelry in tough conditions at New Plymouth.

Low

The arrival of thundersticks at Mt Smart Stadium. This is fast becoming a national tragedy.