KEY POINTS:
Breathless, assured or vindictive - how will reactions play out tomorrow as the nation waits for the release of the World Cup inquiry?
The report was commissioned three days before Graham Henry and his coaching crew were reappointed in December and the results are to be released at
the NZRU headquarters in Wellington.
Auckland lawyer Mike Heron and Sparc executive Don Tricker were asked to scrutinise all aspects of the campaign, to detail its impact on the rest of the New Zealand rugby scene and to point to lessons for the future. It is almost six years since Sir Thomas Eichelbaum's report into the loss of sub-hosting rights to the 2003 World Cup was unveiled. There was a sense of blood in the water that day, a mood which played out when chief executive David Rutherford and chairman Murray McCaw resigned.
Today, many simply want to know what explanations persuaded the NZRU they should stick with the national coaching incumbents.
Chief executive Steve Tew and chairman Jock Hobbs will front to field questions about the report but it's not clear whether any coaching staff would be present.
Last November the IRB website carried their 76-page analysis into how South Africa won the World Cup and analysis and summaries on every side in the tournament. It acknowledged that the All Blacks were favourites before the event but that there was a risk that their 15-man distribution style increased the risk of losing possession.
The critical question was whether an expansive approach would stand up under the pressure of a winner-take-all, knockout competition.
A year before the All Blacks had slaughtered France scoring seven tries in their 47-3 victory when they created 43 rucks and kicked 29 times.
That formula disappeared in the quarter-final when they created 165 rucks which was about 50 per cent more than the next highest at the tournament and believed to be the greatest in any international. An expansive approach was replaced by forward attrititon.
"The successful formula of recent years had been abandoned for some reason and New Zealand found themselves out of the competition," the IRB report concluded.
Explanations about many All Black strategies will be sought in tomorrow's report. Hopefully there will be a synopsis of the meltdown in Cardiff because, after all, the Webb Ellis Cup was the undiluted focus of 2007.
