2019 Rugby World Cup: Phil Gifford - The All Blacks' uncertain future after semifinal defeat to England

Ardie Savea and Sevu Reece after the All Blacks' defeat to England. Photo / Photosport

COMMENT:

A few World Cup realities, and a fascinating theory from a double World Cup winning All Black.

Despite every effort by local people, and bravura performances by Japan's Brave Blossoms, this hasn't been one of the great Cups.

Some problems were bigger than the game, and unavoidable. The harsh reality of a national tragedy like Typhoon Hagibis, with almost 100 people dead or missing, shakes the fragile, artificial construct that the theatre of sport will always be.

But other difficulties were self inflicted by the game itself. The near hysteria of the opening rounds over high tackles, with referees being hung out to dry by their own masters, was damaging enough, but worse still was the lack of policing of offside lines, so too often a team with smothering defence could kill entertaining play. As a friend involved in the game at high levels in New Zealand said after the Wales-South Africa semifinal, "If you were trying to sell the game to the world, would you want that crap to be your calling card?"

On a more parochial note, while every All Black supporter I've talked to in Japan is disappointed, there's not the visceral despair that followed our worst night at a World Cup, the 2007 loss to France in the quarter-final in Cardiff.

There may not even be the uproar over coaching selection that followed '07. Then there was an almost universal mood to immediately dump Graham Henry and his coaching team. On NewstalkZB Murray Deaker called the team chokers and demanded Henry resign. Laurie Mains, coach of the 1995 World Cup All Blacks, said "I am still amazed that Graham Henry has not resigned. It's quite unbelievable." Undefeated All Black captain Buck Shelford said, "Ego is starting to control the affairs of Graham Henry. The World Cup was a disaster. It's time to move on. We need a change." The NZRU stood by Henry, and four years later that decision paid off with the 2011 Cup victory.

Which way the call on a new All Black coach will go is desperately hard to judge. The public mood leans heavily to Scott Robertson, but if New Zealand Rugby sticks with Ian Foster, the backlash may not be as deep and bitter (albeit relatively brief when the All Blacks started winning) as it was when Henry was reappointed ahead of Robbie Deans.

Ardie Savea and Sevu Reece after the All Blacks' defeat to England. Photo / Photosport

We now know for sure that getting to the top is actually easier than staying there. There's still only been one back-to-back World Cup winning country. And that has nothing to do with the haka, the All Black tradition, or coming from a country where rugby is the national sport.

No, the reason Australia, South Africa, and England haven't won a repeat title is simple. It's bloody hard to do. Win successive titles? Try just getting to the final after you've won it. In the first eight Cups the only defending champions to then even make the next final have been the All Blacks in 2011 and 2014, and England in 2003 and 2007. (The All Blacks won in '15, and England lost in '07).

Are the All Blacks broken, their aura shattered, and is all the rugby power now in the northern hemisphere?

Perhaps if we'd lost to Ireland as well as to England. But one really bad day at the office doesn't negate 23 years of the professional era in which the All Blacks have basically been to rugby what Brazil is to football, often leaders in not only success, but also style.

Having said that, will the foundation members of the World Cup squad for 2023 be based on the players who lost in Yokohama against England? Will they have stored up the pain, and be ready to unleash it all on opponents in France in four years' time?

Maybe not. Of the squad of 23 from the 2007 quarter-final debacle in Cardiff just two, Richie McCaw and Dan Carter, were in the game day squad for the triumphant 2011 World Cup final. The retention rate from the players who lost to England last week in Yokohama may be smaller than you might expect.

Whether it's Foster or Robertson at the helm, there's now some massive rebuilding to be done with the All Blacks. Kieran Read, Ben Smith, Sonny Bill Williams, and Ryan Crotty are gone for sure. Every effort is being made to steer Sam Whitelock and Brodie Retallick through, but in 2023 Whitelock will be 35, and Retallick will be 32, with a shoulder that may feel much older. The natural attrition rate of a game as physical as rugby will eliminate some more of the current crop, so a 2023 squad could be as different as the 2011 group was from the 2007 team.

Ian Foster. Photo / Photosport

Does the loss of the world title put the game as whole in New Zealand in peril? It certainly doesn't make things any easier for NZR. On the one hand sponsorship and media contracts, like the one just signed with Sky, are in place. On the other, playing numbers are fragile, and new CEO, Mark Robinson, and NZR face a year by year battle to win the hearts and minds, and, in the case of young men and women, the bodies of Kiwis.

I've thought for years that administrators of rugby, as strong as the sport's base is in New Zealand, need a mindset bordering on desperation if rugby is to survive and prosper. Common sense says that if you invented rugby now, a sport where to fully enjoy it you have to train hard, in all weathers, and injuries are an almost inevitable result of playing with any level of intensity, the game probably wouldn't catch on.

There are hopeful signs of recognition of the perils of complacency in moves to make rugby less physically and mentally demanding for younger kids, to find measures, as people like Sir Graham Henry have suggested, to allow people who are not giants to play in limited weight grades where they won't be left like roadkill on the field, and genuinely encouraging women's involvement in the game, after years and years when women were too often seen, in the words of a 1990s national administrator, as "a bloody demanding nuisance".

Finally, when Simon Barnett and I talked with Conrad Smith on NewstalkZB during the week, Smith, always a thoughtful, intelligent analyst, dissected the difficulty, which I think not many of us had considered, of how to follow up a stunning performance.

He had, he said, been "pretty nervous all week" after the All Blacks' stunning 46-14 quarter-final win over Ireland, an emotion he discovered was shared by Richie McCaw and Dan Carter when they chatted before the semi with England.

"After having such an amazing performance against the Irish", said Smith, "honestly, the biggest challenge in all team sport, is to then back it up and come out again with the same intensity, and level of precision. It's a very difficult thing to do. In 2011, the semifinal against Australia was one of the best games I was ever involved in as an All Black. Then the final was a squeaky one. In 2015 it was exactly the same thing (after the All Blacks whipped France 62-13 in the quarter-final, they beat South Africa in the semi by just two points, 20-18). It's almost impossible to play your best game two or three times in a row. You somehow have to learn how to win ugly, even when it's not all going right."