Incoming All Blacks coach Scott Robertson. Photo / Photosport
Incoming All Blacks coach Scott Robertson. Photo / Photosport
Gregor Paul in Lyon
The truth didn’t find itself entirely dissociated from the story that broke last week about incoming coach Scott Robertson being banned from attending All Blacks World Cup games, but it was only clinging on by a thread.
Quite the veritable storm brewedin the teacup when former All Black Justin Marshall, working for South Africa’s Super Sport, suggested on air that Robertson, who had been in France during the early pool rounds and who will take over as All Blacks coach later this year, had been asked by incumbent Ian Foster to stay away from the team in France.
“Can I tell you something really interesting,” Marshall said. “Scott Robertson has been here in France. You would have seen him. He’s been floating around.
“He’s not allowed to be at All Blacks games. They feel he’s too big a distraction to the current players.
“All of a sudden they might want to chat to him or might want to impress him, so Ian Foster said to him...he’s not being allowed at All Blacks games.”
The bit that is categorically nottrue is that Robertson, universally known as Razor, was told by Foster or by New Zealand Rugby to not attend games involving the All Blacks.
What is true, says Foster, is that he asked his employer when it was announced that Razor would be taking over after the World Cup, to establish clear ground rules about what level of contact and exposure the incoming coach would be allowed to have with current players and management staff.
He sought clarity on that subject after NZR chief executive Mark Robinson was asked at a press conference in April whether Robertson would, as the coach-elect, be going to the World Cup in an observational or even advisory capacity.
Scott Robertson speaking to the media after being announced as the All Blacks coach from 2024. Photo / Mark Mitchell
Robinson gave a non-committal answer, and a few weeks later Foster was told that Robertson would be heading to France with NZR in a personal development capacity, while also carrying out commercial work for All Blacks sponsors.
At that juncture, Foster pro-actively sought to make it clear to his employer that he felt there would need to be boundaries to avoid players being in France with effectively two All Blacks coaches on the ground.
He thought it could turn messy: confusing and distracting for the players to have the next coach talking with them while the current one was in charge.
The All Blacks won’t play their first test under Robertson until July next year, enabling Foster to argue that was ample time for the new coach, once he’s installed in the job, to plan and prepare for next season.
Razor, as is his high-performance right, is making sweeping changes to the coaching and management team, with forwards supremo Jason Ryan and conditioning guru Nick Gill being the only two of the incumbent team so far having announced they will be staying.
With such a major cleanout coming, there would be an understandably strained dynamic between departing staff and the incoming coach were he to be hanging around the team in France.
Agreement was, therefore, reached between Foster, NZR and Robertson about the rules of engagement during the World Cup and it was agreed that the latter was free to be a spectator at All Blacks games, but that the players and coaching staff were to be, respectfully, off-limits.
Foster told the Herald in Lyon that he felt his request was entirely reasonable and that it had the full backing of his employer.
He was clear that his stance was not driven by pettiness, paranoia or a sense of being under threat, but because: “It is the right thing for the team to have our focus exclusively on the now and this World Cup and not next year.”
NZR, despite signing off on the agreement to keep distance between the next coach and the current team, has said nothing publicly to clarify the situation.
