Rugby: Selection grinds Gears once again

Gear brothers Hosea (left) and Rico both failed to make World Cup squads. Photo / Getty Images

The Gear brothers, Rico and Hosea, must wonder if they wronged the All Black selectors in a former life.

For misery to turn up again, as it did four years ago, seems unusually cruel. To have not one but two members of the same family miss World Cup selection, dumped by the same panel, is a double that will bring no joy.

What will make it even harder to accept is that Rico was easily the hardest done by player in the country four years ago and Hosea is the one player not in the 2011 squad that most, nearly all the nation wishes was.

This panel has taken some persuading that the Gear boys are All Black material.

Rico was never able to hold a regular place between 2004 and 2007. In 2005 he scored a hat-trick against Wales on the first leg of the Grand Slam tour. Two of his tries were so beautiful they could have made a grown man weep but, when the selectors came to pick their strongest XV to play England, it was Sitiveni Sivivatu and Doug Howlett who got the nod.

A massive hint was dropped that he was in a head-to-head chase for the third World Cup wing spot with Howlett after Sivivatu and Rokocoko were both named in the 22-man re-conditioning group.

Gear played in the 2007 Tri Nations but when the axe fell, it was his neck underneath. He headed overseas at the end of the year and speaking to New Zealand Rugby World magazine last year, he said of his dropping: "I'm happy that I became an All Black, but there is that disappointment about missing out on a World Cup, even though they didn't have a great tournament. But not having the opportunity to go to that tournament was a bigger disappointment for me.

"When they named the conditioning group and picked Joe and Siti, it was pretty obvious that they were going and it was down to me or Dougie [Howlett]. That was a bit of a disappointment too, knowing that I was already on the outer and it was me or the other guy that was going to go."

Everyone remembers that Ma'a Nonu and Piri Weepu didn't make the 2007 World Cup squad but neither of them played well in 2007. Gear did and still missed out.

His younger brother didn't make a compelling case in either of his two Tri Nations tests this year, but many felt he secured his place with an outstanding end of year tour in 2010. Most of the season Gear appeared to be worthy of a place in the team.

But it was only after playing for the Maori, where the whole crowd chanted 'Hosea, Hosea' to a watching Graham Henry that the national coach began to relent. It got to the stage where even Henry's mother was asking him why he wasn't picking Gear. Once he was in the team, Gear repaid the faith with strong, accurate and brave performances, which he wasn't quite able to reproduce this year.

He was coming back from a hamstring strain when he played at Eden Park and there was an argument to be made that he was heading towards his best form. He's a big athlete and maybe it takes him a bit more time to get his match fitness and confidence than some of his peers. The selectors say he was squeezed out by Israel Dagg; that they had never factored in the Hawke's Bay man being able to recover in time from his groin injury.

But, really, he actually lost out to Zac Guildford as four of the back three are fullbacks, picked for their abilities under the high ball - sure to be a chosen tactic of many teams in the knock-out rounds of the World Cup.

That left just one place for a specialist wing - with Guildford, Gear and Sivivatu the hopefuls. Guildford ticked every box the selectors asked him to and therefore won the place. Gear didn't do anything wrong, he just didn't do as much as Guildford, according to the selectors.

So, just like Rico four years earlier, Hosea had to hear that he was perilously close but ultimately deemed surplus to requirements.

To their eternal credit, both men took their rejection with a quiet dignity that reflected well on the depth of their character. Hosea fronted a media gathering the day after he got home. There was no hint of bitterness or anger - he accepted his fate as hard as it was.

Now he must decide whether he should follow his brother's footsteps again and head offshore as Rico did in 2007. The one thing he can be sure of is that while the All Blacks might not want him, many other teams around the world will pay good money for his presence.