The Silver Fern

Well how good!

A tremendous day for NZ Cricket, a wonderful day for New Zealand.

For me personally there's a couple of reasons why I watch sport, of course there's the love of the game and the enjoyment of watching skilled people do something really well . But there's also a part of it which is just enjoying the triumph of the human spirit.

I watch sport for those moments of enjoyment when perhaps people/teams aren't as talented, or aren't as good but the people who just work a little bit harder, give a little bit more and succeed.

After the true heartbreak of the ODI final I wouldn't have blamed any of them for not being able to get out of bed or succumb to the thinking that "were just not meant to win one". I'm so glad that so many of those people that were there in 2019 on and off the field were there today share and enjoy the moment. Because it's a great story, it's a great moment of a team overcoming adversity and bad luck, of picking themselves up off the floor and succeeding.

It is a true story of the triumph of the human spirit.

I'm immensely proud of this team and the manner in which they won and the values of hard graft, humility and the simply dogged determination to keeping grinding out a result no matter how grim it is. It's just really nice to see the "good guys" win.

Admittedly I'm a new poster and must forewarn that future posts certainly wont be as poetic as this but dammit!! Today is a special day!!

This is quite an odd topic for me as I came from very humble beginnings and at a very ealry age (early 40's) I'd realsied that id achieved or over achieved everything in life I'd ever wanted to get.

So one would think hapines off the scale, sit with your feet back and clap yourself on the back for a job well done and it's all happy days from here on in.

Unfortunately this wasn't my reality, there was a line that hautned me "you will sit their in your comfort and your lesuire and it will drag you down into your grave and kill you". It sounds severe and odd but I understood exactly what it meant.

I'd become demotivated, bored, real lazy, overwieght and barely doing anything at all outside of my own enjoyment. If you looked at my behaviour youd say I was depressed, I mean I didn't feel depressed as I was happy and content but in reality I probably was.

Also though this time I underwnet two courses of conselling, 1 to help me overcome my childhood trauma (an odd way to bond with your sister when you share your experiences, both come to the exact same conlusions and then reach out for help). The second was to help me get through all the poor coping mechanism's I'd developed to deal with that trauma.

It's been a hard road realizing you've been hurt, then realizing that some of your responses to that hurt has been to hurt others, then going back into your past and apologising to try and make things right. Especially hard when you relaise that the poeple you've hurt the most have generraly been the ones that have tried to love and care for you.

Anyway this year I've been making my peace, joined the gym, got a fitness program and started as head coach of my old rugby team.

It's odd because doing all of that takes a lot of energy, but it fills me with so much more enrgy and motivation than sitting at home and taking it easy ever did. I'm helping out a heap more around the house and with the kids as I'm getting enjoyment from setting simpel goals, completing simple tasks and just being active.

I guess there's that odd line about happiness is that it doesn't come to you if you just search for happiness, you find it in people that fill their lives with purpose. Happiness then comes as a by product.

A couple of points which seems to be an overall trend of the AB's rather than game specific comments.

1. Our attack is ok, we're scoring more than enough points to win games, I'm getting increasingly annoyed at the commentary that "We had chances to put away the game (i.e. score more points), but didn't take them". We shipped 38 against the Argies, and 31 against SA. If the thought is that if we just simply score 50 points a game and we will win, well goodness me - that's not smart or realistic thinking in the slightest. Which leads us into...

2. Our defence and disclipline has cost us badly, our poor disclipline has lead to us playing a lot of the game in the crunch moments in our own half. Our goal-line defence off the pick and go close to the line in particular has been awful, what makes this worse is that bashing the ball in close to the line is a low risk attacking method. We aren't asking teams to take chances or use high-risk plays to score points because they can bash through us playing low risk rugby This has to be fixed immediately or we will continue to lose games.

3. Our bench as a whole, quite simply has been dreadful. The quibble isn't even the fact that they're coming on and having no impact but the fact that they're making things CONSIDERABLY WORSE when they get onto the field. It's very odd because if you look at the players they are all "impact" players.
   Whether it's because they can't fit into the systems (player issue), or know the systems so they can fit in (coaching issue) or simpy dion't have the skills or temprement to fit into the game plan and execute (player and coaching issue) I really don't know. What I do know however is that when it comes to the use of the bench we are being outsmarted tatcially and executionally and ultimately that falls on the coachs.

So it's defence and the last 20 minutes of the game that are costing us dearly and we won't start a winning trend until we fix these.

I was robbed by 6 dwarves today, not happy.

@antipodean said in All Blacks vs Argentina I:

I kind of expected this tbh when you look at Razor's assistants. Did anyone look at Holland and McDonald and think to themselves this is a star studded team?

Even more concerning how their respective franchises improved out of sight after they left...

Well it's a fustrating year so far, overall a highly conservative selection process that has very timidly put forward any new blood into the international ranks. I don't understand in a year where you would get a free pass for rebuilding the team that we would seek to roll out as many old war horses as possible instead of training new ones.

This team can't seem to play for a full 80 minutes, Arg & SA 1 it was our defense and when we get our defence better in SA2 our attack goes missing.

The fact an assistant coach is gone already show's there's definate alignment problems there.

Whilst inidivdual players have stepped up and performed the team as a whole has not, exits and disclipine are still poor and our impact off the bench is getting worse and worse.

Yes we were close against SA and could have won both if only rugby was a 60 minute game. The last 20 minutes really cost us and it was the same in the loss to Arg.

It's a real case of one step forward and one step backwards and the team appears to be going around in circles.

I'm hoping they click and it all comes together soon, but there doesn't seem to be any real improvement.

We can't compare ourselves to SA here.

SA saw an economic oppertunity to shift from SANZAR to the north that fitted with their already exisitng TV audience and could fill the coffers even more, while allowing the flexibility to pick players from overseas (the vast majority of which are playing in the same competition already). It was a win/win scenario for them.

Given NZ teams will not be in the northern hemisphere competion, or our union reaping the financial rewards of being in that competiton all we have set to gain is the loss of our players overseas.

It's not a like for like, or apt comparision.

@KiwiMurph said in RWC: France v All Blacks:

Finlay - such a Fozzie decision.

To be fair it's not like Roigard did much when he came on against SA. Maybe if he'd scored a brilliant individual try completely against the run of play in which he beat several defenders he might have done his chances some good?

But no - he didn't, we need the "slow but steady" Finlay to close out the game with his laborious passing from ruck to ruck.

Well a dog of a game really.

Some of the post match comments from the media have been plain silly - especially the talking about how we created oppertunites but didn't capitalise. Yeah there's a vain of truth there but FFS - shouldn't the record number of points ever conceded to Argentina be more the issue?

You are not going to win games against any tier 1 nation if you concede 38 points.

I must say it took me by surprise as I thought our defense had been fairly solid but my goodness, Argentina just looked dangerous everytime they had the ball, either in close our out wide. It was hard to pin down what was wrong with our defensive pattern as it appeared that everything was wrong with it.

Seeing Dmac standing one off the ruck as the pillar defender when the Argies were hammering our line for the go-ahead try really took the cake. A complete lack of urgency from our forwards to get around the corner and defend when it really mattered.

I'd love to see the missed tackle stats as I'm sure certain players really let themselves down here.

Our "strong" bench was hoplessly mismanged and in reality cost us the game. Instead of adding impact they added errors, subbing on players only made things worse. I feel the majority of the subs were put on too late. Savea at 8, Blackadder at 7 and Sititi at 6 to close out a game is amazing levels of stupidity - lets put on the most inexperienced, out of position and slow loose forward trio we can!!

A really dissapoiting loss, defensively weak and mentally weak when the pressure came on. We effectively gifted the ball to the Argies for the last 20 minutes and to give them credit they didn't need to be asked twice and easily closed out the match.

I told my daughter to go get me a newspaper.

She laughed at me and said, "Dad! You're so old!! Just use my phone".

So I slammed her phone against the wall to kill a spider.

The "All Wokes" is still open as an option, with a logo of a volvo driving soccer mum and a mascot named Karen.

@Dodge mate my sincere condolences to you, that must be tough to go through and by the sounds of it you’re doing a great job keeping it together for the family.

I haven't been through what you have, and I can only speak from my own personal experience so I can only hope I can share my story and that some of it resonates with you, and if it doesn't that's fine also - you've got to do what works for you.

A few years ago, I got counselling for childhood trauma, I've always been the type to grit my teeth and just get on with life and keep pushing forward but it's amazing the number of emotions that sit just under the surface if we bottle it up.

I unwisely took one of my counselling calls at work (was online as it was during covid times) and the counsellor looked at me quizzically and asked if maybe we could reschedule till i was at home. I bravely insisted that we go on and I'd be fine, and he double checked and asked me again if I was in a safe and private space and if I was ok to talk. Again, I bravely insisted I was.

Que about 5 minutes into the session and I'm sitting there having locked the door to the meeting room behind me, back to the windows, weeping uncontrollably into my computer monitor and sleeves of my jacket as real men don’t carry handkerchiefs, and ever so thankful the meeting room had tinted glass so no-one could see me. Probably cried for about 45 minutes straight, then had to take a period of time afterwards composing myself at the end of the session before walking back out into our open plan office without looking like a train had hit me.

While I think that talking to friends and family and complete strangers on the internet helps while their advice is very well intentioned the vast majority of people won’t have the skills and training to do much more than listen and even less so to be able to take that grief and hurt and begin to direct it in a way that can heal you and help you fix yourself.

So my only advice would be to find someone professional to talk to, I'm sure there's specialist grief counsellors that have guided many people through this exact same situation. Sometimes it's just really good to have a safe space you can go to there you can be completely honest, where it's confidential so nothing you say can come back to haunt you later on (which unfortunately can be quite a risk if you're opening up to friends and family and I’ll also be honest that there were things I said to my counsellor that I’d never want my friends, or family, or wife, or kids to ever know and that those words should just stay there) and a place where you can be vulnerable and have a bit of a cry and then pull yourself together so you can go back out into the real world and be the Father, Husband, and workmate you need to be.

And would like to reiterate the advice before, keep moving forward, you will get through this.

Well I'm glad to see that Johnny is being the bigger man and not stooping to Reiko's level and instead of keeping his gripes man to man and leaving them on the field has published them in a book so he can whinge and moan to the absolute maximum amount of people he possibly can.

Such class...

@No-Quarter said in All Blacks vs Springboks - Twickenham:

@Windows97 the only other loosie with strong ball carrying ability is Akira. I'm so disappointed that we have not managed to harness his talent (for whatever reason). As much as I like Jacobson, he's not a test 6. He didn't play badly per se, but is not able to match the physicality of the big teams so we're always going to be under the pump.

Ironically Finau showed some promise in the 1 opportunity he had but of course he stayed at home so we could take an extra winger to "practice with".

Of course the fact that you need go-forward ball first before it's of any use to pass the ball to your wingers otherwise they simply stand as useless lumps on the sides of the field watching the horror unfold in front of them unable to do anything to stop seems to have escaped Foster and Co, as we saw on the weekend.

Still they'll be egg on my face when the AB's unleash attacking moves the likes of which we've never seen before throughout the knock out stages of this RWC thanks to all that additional practice they've been able to have.

Ioane - to Telea!!! Backpass to Barret, triple scissors with Clarke!! They're in again!! Unbelievable - I've never seen play like this from the All Blacks!! That's the final sewn up in an attacking display of rugby that will leave the world speechless for many years to come!!

Oh yes - I'll look back on this post and chuckle to myself - you got one over me Foster, you cunning genius of a man!! Silly me to ever doubt you.

Feel a little sad tbh, she was a great lady the epitome of someone who simply did their duty - often at times under the most intense scrutiny one could face. A throwback to the days where people would simply do what was needed to be done without fuss or complaint.

She was grace and class and hard working, right to the end, a remarkable woman.

Trying for a different take on all of this I don't particularly think that the current mess were in is all Fosters fault but we are simply watching a dynasty in decline.

It's kind of like arguing that Romulus Augustulus was the worst emperor of Rome as he was the one there when Rome finally fell apart - this would provide endless and circular debate for months.

However I do think it's fair to say that the dynasty from Henry to Hansen to Foster was simply one link too far.

Dynasty's ultimately fall apart due to their own hubris, a lack of new idea's, risk aversion due to not wanting to change what's worked in the past, inability to self critique and ultimately sitting on their own laurels till everyone else catch's up and then passes them by.

I think this is what were seeing unfold in front of us, it's not Fosters "fault" but he's certainly not the right coach to take us forward.

Simply put we've done the same thing for too long and now not only have the rest of the pack caught up - they're passing us by.

So to get rid of Foster isn't an incorrect school of thought - we desperately need someone with new ideas, a new way of doing things, the All Blacks need to be given a clean sweep and to start again with something new and Foster isn't new - he's part of the furniture.

And I guess that's the appeal with Robertson - he's seen as someone who will bring new ideas and new ways of doing things.

@kev said in All Blacks v France I:

@Windows97 said in All Blacks Vs France, Test One, Dunedin:

Surised to see Barrett at 10, the golden sun continues to shine out of his *ss. Looking forward to 20m touch finders and pointless chip kicks.

I have heard some commentators say that BB has had a better season than Damien. What it I remember from the season is a completely disfunctional Blues backline and repeated throwaway comments about the variation in his kicking game. All I see is a guy that kicks - a lot, leading an underperforming backline.

Damien had a shocker against Waratahs ( I think ) but was generally great during the year. Chiefs backline was awesome. Came finals time he didn’t play badly but didn’t dominate. Missed 2 kicks in final.

So in the end they prefer someone that is less mercurial - less up and down. Still think this is Damien’s position to win if he gets the chance. If he can play like he did against Ireland and not have too many brain explosions.

In the meantime we are left with BB and his kicking game.

Honestly mate I don't get it, at least DMac with his boot can get us into the right areas of the field.

All BB's kicking game does is keep us trapped in our own half, having Jordan at the back isn't going to help the kicking game either.

It seems as soon as DMac misses a couple of kicks he's put on the reserve bench for a guy who's kicking accuray is no better off the tee and can kick the ball down the field half the distance.

@gt12 said in All Blacks 2024 - looking forward:

@Windows97

Not really, we have five players available who have been capped and play first five, including three of the top four from recent AB squads.

One of those should be nowhere near an AB team, but the others are all reasonable choices. Dmac should be easily the first choice. We are fine.

Add in Plummer, Love, and even Burke (if available for this year) and we aren’t in bad shape.

I can't say I share your optimisim.

It was to be Perofeta's year to cement himself as an AB 10 and he's let it slip through his fingers, the Hurricane's own fans don't even rate Cameron, Love has spent the entire season at fullback, Ioane is a disaster. Plummer is the only one in decent form (at 1st 5) and he's more of a utility than a straight up first 5.

BB's best years at 1st 5 are well behind him, we're kinda left with the option of praying that DMac doesn't get injured.

I was really hoping that someone would come through but TBH the contenders appear to be getting worse not getting better.

Well the trend so far this year for the AB's has been good, terrible, good, terrible.

And given they were good against Wales and then terrible last week against Scotland the only logical conclusion one can draw is that they'll be good this weekend against England.

There's really no more need for comprehensive analysis than that, a sparkling win to finish the season I assure all of you.

Nonu/Smith for me as the best combination - maybe slightly influenced by the 2 WC's they managed to be a part of.

Nonu was big and physical but added more skill and nuance to his game as he progressed, just got better and better with age really.

Smith certainly not athletically the best AB you'd see (no disrespect) but one of the finest rugby brains I've seen. Seemed to go game after game without making a poor decision or being caught out of position.

It really was the ultimate combination of brawn, brains, skill and nuance.