The Big Read: History destined to repeat

A certain quarter-final is going to cause comparisons throughout the World Cup. Photo / Getty

It's the quarter-final thing that keeps dragging this World Cup back to 2007 for the All Blacks.

They aren't going to be able to escape the comparisons because now, as then, they are destined to play in Cardiff and now, as then, their likely opponent is France or Ireland.

Everyone forgets, or maybe never even knew, but a week out from the 2007 World Cup, the expectation was that Ireland would finish second in their pool and be sent to Cardiff to face the All Blacks.

Argentina changed everything when they beat France in the opening game and then polished off an Irish side who forgot to turn up. Eight years on and any combination of Ireland, France, New Zealand and Argentina are destined to meet in Cardiff again.

So all roads lead to memory lane and a trip down there ends, as everyone knows, in disaster.

The unbeatable All Blacks hit the iceberg no one believed could be there and they sank, horribly exposed for not having fixed all the problems that had surfaced in 2003. Exposed for being nowhere near the team they thought they were - that their record since the last tournament said they were.

World Cups are like that. They put abnormal stress on the system and cracks and faults can suddenly appear having given no indication they were ever there.

There's no guarantee 2015 will have a different ending, but there is at least a credible argument to be made that they are a different team to the one that travelled to France in 2007 - different in almost every facet.

The big one, of course, is the ability to play and win under pressure. The mental strength of the All Blacks now is infinitely higher than it was eight years ago.

In 2007, the All Blacks were working in an abstract way, believing that increasing leadership responsibilities off the field would transfer. They didn't. It was too oblique, as they painfully discovered.

This All Blacks squad is the most experienced in history. There will most likely be around 1000 caps on the field at any given time. There will most likely be at least nine men on the field at any one time who have experience of winning a World Cup.

What that gives the All Blacks is composure and certainty across the field. Experience in itself is not the difference, though. This All Blacks team have actively worked on their mental strength.

It's part and parcel of being an All Black now that due attention and preparation time is devoted to decision-making, mindset and coping with pressure. Simply racking up test caps isn't enough to be certain players are learning and developing their mental capacity.

Leadership is worked on and studied and the improvements that have been made are obvious. How many times in the last four years have the All Blacks thought then fought their way out of trouble? In Cardiff eight years ago, they had 13 minutes to conjure three points against a French side that wasn't interested in having the ball. All that time, all that possession and they couldn't land the killer blow.

The current team have escaped from much tougher places. Against Ireland in 2012, they worked a play to drop a goal at the death. Again, against Ireland the following year, they scored their miracle try long after the final whistle. They did the same, just about, against England and the Wallabies last year and their most consistent feature is their ability to stay on-task until the final whistle. This lot have been put under plenty of stress and not shown any signs of cracking.

No matter what the World Cup throws at them, they are likely to cope this time. That's not to say they will win or escape if they need to, but they will at least pursue the right strategies and give themselves a chance the way the 2007 side never did.

What provides overwhelming confidence on that front is the stature of Richie McCaw. He was in only his second year as skipper in 2007 - a relative novice who, by his own admission, underestimated many aspects of the job, believing that everything would take care of itself if he continued to prove he was the best player.

Nor did he have the support back then that he does now. In 2007, there wasn't an obvious deputy or core group of strong and natural leaders to strengthen the collective decision-making. McCaw was on his own - unlike now.

Kieran Read has already proven himself as an All Blacks captain. Conrad Smith is a strong and vocal guiding light in the backs, as is Carter, while Ben Smith and Jerome Kaino captain their Super Rugby sides.

The 2015 team might not win, but they won't crumble, freeze or stand back and let a referee knock them out.

Nor will this coaching panel repeat the selection mistakes of 2007. From late 2006 to the World Cup squad being picked in August 2007, Graham Henry endlessly worked his options. The team changed significantly at times from test to test.

Steve Hansen hasn't been wildly different. He, too, has cast the net relatively wide since November last year. The difference between the two regimes, though, is that Hansen won't continue with this philosophy through the pool rounds of the World Cup.

He knows now the combinations he wants and there will be consistency of selection throughout the tournament. In 2007, Henry didn't commit to a top team and went into the quarter-final without knowing his best midfield and, after endless rotation sparked by a mission statement that the All Blacks would never again play a fullback at centre in a crucial World Cup game, they played a centre at fullback in a crucial World Cup game.

The All Blacks have a weak pool, but they should still have established a rhythm and flow by the knockout rounds and be in good form even if they haven't been seriously tested.

And underpinning the entire approach to this World Cup is the conviction Hansen and other senior players have that their attitude wasn't right in 2007. The All Blacks turned up expecting to win and, coming into the quarter-final, they admit they didn't have the urgency and potential finality of the situation clear in their heads. They failed to acknowledge that they had to throw everything into the quarter-final and not have a single thought beyond it.

This time around, Hansen has made it clear the All Blacks aren't defending a trophy as it is not theirs to defend. He's been equally vocal about making sure everyone understands that the All Blacks haven't thought beyond the pool stages. The mindset of one game at a time was epitomised when he was asked on arrival who he saw as the biggest threat to the All Blacks.

"I am not going to sit here today and say who the threats are because that is not being respectful," he said. "We have not earned the right to sit here and say who is going to play in the semfinals and final and quarter-finals. If we earn the right and get through to there, whoever it is on the other side of the white line will be the team that is the biggest threat."