The Silver Fern

@Mattasaurus said in All Blacks vs Wallabies Bledisloe I:

The fact we are still tossing Rieko's name around "cos of his defense" .. sums up the issues we have in midfield for me.

Ikitau and Suaalii are far better and more complete midfielders and create so many opportunities for the outsides... we simply have no center's standing up and demanding to be picked at least not any with a complete game on both defense and offense.

They are.... because they've been training under Schmidt for 18 months - those guys were not exactly setting the world alight in Super Rugby - B.Sullivan, Q.Tupaea, ALB, Tawawanavai, Umaga-Jenson, Proctor, were statistically the best performers in Super Rugby this year.

We just have poor technical coaches like our 'midfield specialist' Holland who has overseen the midfield functionality going from world-class under Schmidt in 2023 to steadily going backwards in 2024 and 2025 under Holland.

Not a single midfielder has improved under Holland's watch, they have regressed in every aspect - defense, offense, positional play - Ioane, Barrett, ALB, all performed significantly better under Schmidt.

Stop blaming the players and wake up.

@reprobate said in All Blacks vs Springboks II:

@canefan said in All Blacks vs Springboks II:

@Canes4life said in All Blacks vs Springboks II:

@Mauss said in All Blacks vs Springboks II:

@Canes4life said in All Blacks vs Springboks II:

Can you get those stats? It would be also interesting to see how many times Proctor passed for the Canes compared to the ABs. Just totally different gameplans which isn't helping him progress and get comfortable in one of the hardest positions within the team.

RugbyPass these days has player profile pages where you can look at specific stats for each competition (TRC, SRP, NPC, and so on). This is Proctor's page, for example:

Billy Proctor Rugby Bio | News, Stats, Age, Height & Team | RugbyPass

Get Billy Proctor stats, ratings, news, & video on the world's largest rugby player & team database. Click here to get the latest news on Billy Proctor

If you want to know how often he passed for the Hurricanes, you can take his total number of passes during this year's Canes season (73), divide it by his total playing minutes (517) and then multiply by 80 to get a match average.

So he'd get to a number of 11.3 passes per 80 minutes, which is considerably more than what he averages for the ABs during the TRC (5.1 passes per 80 minutes).

Thanks for pulling this data out, just paints a picture that because of the way the ABs have decided to play, Proctor is getting barely any chance to make a proper impact.

Same probably went for Reiko

I'm not anti-Rieko, and would have no problem with him being selected based on his defence - but he has hardly carved it up or shown a great passing game for the Blues over the past 2 seasons - which may of course be a reflection of how they have played too.
The last time I think he was really good was the WC.

Maybe that speaks to what Joe Schmidt was able to extract from him? The current AB coaches definitely aren't getting the best out of him.

@stodders said in All Blacks 2025:

@Canes4life said in All Blacks 2025:

@nzzp said in All Blacks 2025:

@Canes4life said in All Blacks 2025:

I've felt Holland has been out of his depth ever since he automatically got the head coaching gig at the Canes, was even more baffled when Razor wanted him on his team.

Holland was assistant coach to Canterbury at the same time as Razor. Razor seems to be a relationship guy - he trusts people he has known for some time. It's great, but only if they are actually really good coaches.

Which Holland has proven he’s not.

Holland is the strike play coach, no? Out of all the coaches this year, he’s been earning his corn off first phase. Not a great deal he can do if the team can’t win good first phase ball. They did in the first test against Boks and they carved them open for 2 tries. That suggests some degree of good coaching, no?

Bryn Evans has been responsible for most of the All Blacks tries off set-piece this year, there was a recent article that detailed the difference Evans has made to the strike plays, which were a real weaknesses for us last year & Razor bringing in Evans is the best thing he's done all tenure - that wrap around try off the back of the scrum in Wellington was a play Evans used previously at the Hurricanes.

@Chris said in All Blacks 2025:

@restofit said in All Blacks 2025:

@stodders said in All Blacks 2025:

@Canes4life said in All Blacks 2025:

@nzzp said in All Blacks 2025:

@Canes4life said in All Blacks 2025:

I've felt Holland has been out of his depth ever since he automatically got the head coaching gig at the Canes, was even more baffled when Razor wanted him on his team.

Holland was assistant coach to Canterbury at the same time as Razor. Razor seems to be a relationship guy - he trusts people he has known for some time. It's great, but only if they are actually really good coaches.

Which Holland has proven he’s not.

Holland is the strike play coach, no? Out of all the coaches this year, he’s been earning his corn off first phase. Not a great deal he can do if the team can’t win good first phase ball. They did in the first test against Boks and they carved them open for 2 tries. That suggests some degree of good coaching, no?

Bryn Evans has been responsible for most of the All Blacks tries off set-piece this year, there was a recent article that detailed the difference Evans has made to the strike plays, which were a real weaknesses for us last year & Razor bringing in Evans is the best thing he's done all tenure - that wrap around try off the back of the scrum in Wellington was a play Evans used previously at the Hurricanes.

I am not sure about that Evans is in charge of the line outs and they have not been great.
Holland was also involved in that strike move as it was from a line out involving the backs..
And that is really the only strike move I have seen that has come off in the last 4 tests.

Are you sure about that?

It’s a try Roigard has scored before for the Hurricanes, which blindside flanker Tupou Vaa’i noted after the match when he credited Evans as the mastermind behind the move.

“We honestly stole that from the Hurricanes eh,” Vaa’i said. “We saw it early on, actually here [in Wellington], against the Highlanders. They did that trick play around the front.

“Bryn is such a creative guy and we’ve been saying for years we need a lineout coach and he’s definitely bringing a different flavour to the lineouts and it’s obviously paying off.”

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/360755611/all-blacks-v-france-lineout-move-bamboozled-france-and-genius-behind-it

@Bovidae said in All Blacks 2025:

@stodders said in All Blacks 2025:

@Bovidae said in All Blacks 2025:

Who is the AB skills coach now? Hansen, Holland and Ellison don't inspire confidence.

There isn't a specific skills coach I believe, and hasn't been since Mick Byrne.

they must be relying on one of the assistants I mentioned as a backs skills coach.

Yes, you're right.

All the training photos & video clips show Jason Holland is the back's skills coach, you can see him managing the high-ball sessions and waving pool noodles in the player's faces.

Why there isn't being more criticism directed Holland's way by Canes supporters on here (@Canes4life @canefan, etc.) given the years of mediocrity they endured under his watch beats me.