Foster's Firsts.

@akan004 There's something in that - winners and losers - but, it doesn't always hold true. 2007 a case in point. Beaver in 2011.

I don't think Fozzie and Cane were fated to lose that final. We had an awful lot of people in our team who are proven winners. If you take Jordie, for instance - he potentially had the winning of the game in his hands. He didn't make the kick - but, a couple of weeks earlier, it's him who saves the day by holding up the Irishman (and maybe he did it earlier in this game as well? Him or Beaudy).

I certainly don't think we had the luck on the day - starting with the weather.

But, maybe with a different coach and captain we storm to the title. I think we had at least as much talent in our team as we had in 2011 - especially once Danny Boy went down.

It will certainly be interesting to see whether Razor's stardust ends up making Fozzie look like Toddy Blackadder.

And let’s not forget that most of those Foster firsts as coach were also Cane firsts as an AB captain…

First All Blacks coach to lose a World Cup Final by a single point.

@taniwharugby said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Chris-B I think the final was probably a summary of the team under him in the past 4 years.

Poor discipline, lack of composure, poor decision making mixed with some excellent rugby, doing enough to win the game, but not quite finishing what was started.

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

@junior said in Foster's Firsts.:

@taniwharugby said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Chris-B I think the final was probably a summary of the team under him in the past 4 years.

Poor discipline, lack of composure, poor decision making mixed with some excellent rugby, doing enough to win the game, but not quite finishing what was started.

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

Did we have the cattle? Or did the coach get a performance out of them greater than the sum of the parts?

@booboo said in Foster's Firsts.:

@junior said in Foster's Firsts.:

@taniwharugby said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Chris-B I think the final was probably a summary of the team under him in the past 4 years.

Poor discipline, lack of composure, poor decision making mixed with some excellent rugby, doing enough to win the game, but not quite finishing what was started.

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

Did we have the cattle? Or did the coach get a performance out of them greater than the sum of the parts?

You most definitely had and have the cattle

@booboo said in Foster's Firsts.:

@junior said in Foster's Firsts.:

@taniwharugby said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Chris-B I think the final was probably a summary of the team under him in the past 4 years.

Poor discipline, lack of composure, poor decision making mixed with some excellent rugby, doing enough to win the game, but not quite finishing what was started.

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

Did we have the cattle? Or did the coach get a performance out of them greater than the sum of the parts?

LOL

@booboo said in Foster's Firsts.:

@junior said in Foster's Firsts.:

@taniwharugby said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Chris-B I think the final was probably a summary of the team under him in the past 4 years.

Poor discipline, lack of composure, poor decision making mixed with some excellent rugby, doing enough to win the game, but not quite finishing what was started.

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

Did we have the cattle? Or did the coach get a performance out of them greater than the sum of the parts?

The cards suggest our discipline could have been better.

@nostrildamus

Agreed. Quite often lack of discipline is down to muddled thinking and that is usually down to a poor game plan. Guys not knowing what page they are on.

@booboo definitely the first one. And there still were even better cattle that weren’t managed properly over the last 4 years.

@junior said in Foster's Firsts.:

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

If that's true (I'm not convinced it is - other countries seem to have have better player development) - then surely we should look forward to pre-Foster 40-50+ points shellackings of the Boks and France on a regular basis and comfortably win RWC 2027?

If we do have the cattle, then anything less would indicate the coaching hasn't much improved since 2019.

@Victor-Meldrew

Yeah but other teams also have the cattle. Boks, France, Ireland have many very good players too. Boks and Ireland are also very well coached, albeit in different styles.

France are, well, France.

@Victor-Meldrew you have made your bed and are sticking to it, fair enough.

I know your 40 point comment was tongue in cheek but as we know at the elite level it is the little things that can turn a 1 point loss into a 1 point win, and this is where we have fallen over so often the past 4 years or more even.

I have banged the opposite drum to you, that we did have the cattle but Fozzie just wasnt pushing the right buttons with his players.

We have long joked about the powder dry thing, but it would appear Fozzie had been building to the RWC.

There were subtle changes this year and for periods in many games things clicked, and those little things worked and the much vaunted Boks, French and Irish struggled...problem was, these new things still weren't instinct, and when the heat came on they struggled to stick in thier patterns.

So I absolutely believe we had the cattle to win, and based on some of the rugby we played this year, we actually had the coaching team too, but reckon things still weren't quite there, maybe another year or so...probably the biggest issue under Fosters tenure and even just prior when Hansen had talked about giving him more control, has been lack of discipline, so many cards in the past 5 or so years...

Sure, the players should take the heat for the dumb action, but there was obviously something else not quite right for players to keep making mistakes leading to cards.

Anywhoo, fuck all this looking back now, look forward, with all these retirements we could be in for another ride...

@Catogrande said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Victor-Meldrew

Yeah but other teams also have the cattle. Boks, France, Ireland have many very good players too.

Exactly my point. I find the argument that NZ will always have a superior talent pool both wrong and, well, arrogant.

IMHO, we need to look carefully at how the likes of France & Oireland have developed their top level players.

@taniwharugby

I'm simply testing the view that (a) NZ currently has all the cattle and talent it needs and (b) a new/better coach is all that's needed to do way better than we have done in the recent past.

If that argument did hold water, then anything less than an improvement (e.g winning RWC 2027 comfortably) would clearly be a coaching failure. That's obviously way too simplistic and fails to take account of how far other countries have come in developing their structures and player development at the top level.

On a positive note, NZR do seem to be looking to improve development with initiatives like the AB XV

@Victor-Meldrew having the cattle to win doesn't imply you are saying your cattle is superior to other teams, just that that you have the players to win.

Shit, we came within a few inches of doing so.

I still feel there is a bit of a disconnect along the way of us trying to ensure the talent coming through has the tools, both physically and mentally to get the job done, having varied styles of play and players...an old style 10s whose natural instinct to kick it out wouldn't go amiss...

We absolutely need to be looking at Ireland, France, SA, England and seeing what they are doing below International rugby and see if there is anything there we can use and even improve.

@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Catogrande said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Victor-Meldrew

Yeah but other teams also have the cattle. Boks, France, Ireland have many very good players too.

Exactly my point. I find the argument that NZ will always have a superior talent pool both wrong and, well, arrogant.

Not sure why you think this is the case. Not many have held this view for a number of years, definitely not on TSF. It's actually been the other way around, where we have underrated our talent.

10 -15 years ago we had the cattle to be better than the next best team by at least 10 points.

Today we have the cattle to compete against the other top 4 teams and beat them on our day. Until this RWC, poor coaching had fooled many of us into thinking that we couldn't compete against the best and that our players were not as good as our main rivals.

@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Catogrande said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Victor-Meldrew

Yeah but other teams also have the cattle. Boks, France, Ireland have many very good players too.

Exactly my point. I find the argument that NZ will always have a superior talent pool both wrong and, well, arrogant.

IMHO, we need to look carefully at how the likes of France & Oireland have developed their top level players.

A couple of shit teams that couldn’t even get past the quarter finals ?

No thanks, give me SA any day. I expect all NZ Rugby players to be put on a strict biltong diet starting right now

@akan004 said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Victor-Meldrew said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Catogrande said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Victor-Meldrew

Yeah but other teams also have the cattle. Boks, France, Ireland have many very good players too.

Exactly my point. I find the argument that NZ will always have a superior talent pool both wrong and, well, arrogant.

Not sure why you think this is the case. Not many have held this view for a number of years, definitely not on TSF. It's actually been the other way around, where we have underrated our talent.

10 -15 years ago we had the cattle to be better than the next best team by at least 10 points.

Today we have the cattle to compete against the other top 4 teams and beat them on our day. Until this RWC, poor coaching had fooled many of us into thinking that we couldn't compete against the best and that our players were not as good as our main rivals.

This! And the ABs have traditionally punched above their weight beating teams potentially better on paper. Progressive coaching, innovation, and the "a champion team will beat a team of champions" mentality have been the hallmarks of AB teams going up against massive Bok and super-talented Northern Hemisphere sides in the past. It is these qualities that have been lacking in Foster's era. This was probably a hangover from a golden age where we did have superior cattle which was an abnormality not a norm in AB history.
Foster was a continuation of coaching strategies from an era when there was superior talent. It did not match the current times and watching the ABs flounder around was in stark contrast to the strategy battles the Crusaders and Chiefs were having in Super Rugby. In my many years of following the ABs never have I been so frustrated.

@booboo said in Foster's Firsts.:

@junior said in Foster's Firsts.:

@taniwharugby said in Foster's Firsts.:

@Chris-B I think the final was probably a summary of the team under him in the past 4 years.

Poor discipline, lack of composure, poor decision making mixed with some excellent rugby, doing enough to win the game, but not quite finishing what was started.

I think this is what is and has been so frustrating - this tournament showed that actually we did have the cattle (despite being told for years that we didn’t). I do think with better coaching over the previous 4 years the team would have won that match.

Did we have the cattle? Or did the coach get a performance out of them greater than the sum of the parts?

How could anyone look at the Ireland game and what they achieved with a man down in the final and claim we didn't have the cattle?. I'm over this nonsense that Foster was simply working with the poor hand he'd been delt and turned water into wine. IMHO a better coach would have not only have won the Cup but also had better results in the interim.