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'It's a scar that will stay with you': Historic results 'gut-wrenching' for All Blacks hooker
While everyone outside of New Zealand raised their hands in celebration following Los Pumas’ first-ever victory over the All Blacks earlier this month, the beaten side were left lamenting the second time in just four years that they’d broken terrifying new ground.
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History isn’t made just by winners, of course, and it wasn’t just a historic win for Argentina – it was a historic loss for New Zealand.
In 2016, Ireland finally broke their duck in their 29th test match against the All Blacks and achieved their first win over the side after over 110 years of head-to-heads.
Argentina’s history with New Zealand isn’t quite as long, with their first match coming in 1985, but the result was one worth celebrating regardless.
Unless, of course, you were supporting the beaten team – or even worse – on the beaten team.
When Ireland earned their first victory over the All Blacks in Chicago, Dane Coles was the starting hooker for the losers. It was a similar story two weeks ago, with Coles again wearing the No. 2 jersey in the loss.
“If I’m honest, it probably is [one of the more gut-wrenching losses],” Coles told media following the All Blacks team announcement on Thursday. “I’ve been in this team twice when we’ve been the first team to lose to a country and I don’t think you’ll ever lose sight of that feeling. It’s a scar that will stay with you probably for the rest of your rugby career.
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“It’s something that hurts but the fortunate thing with rugby, you get another week to play them again. We get to heal that scar a little bit and get on with life.”
Coles has again been named to start at hooker when New Zealand and Argentina clash in Sydney this Saturday, and the 33-year-old is more than ready to right the wrongs of the last match after having the past weekend off.
“[The post-match review] was pretty brutal,” Coles said. “Especially coming off a loss, it’s an emotional, gut-wrenching kind of review.
“It’s been a long couple of weeks, to be fair. Obviously we had the bye so we couldn’t really wait to get into a working week. We took a few things out of it and just got to make sure we walk the walk this week and put those learnings into action on Saturday.”
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Coles revealed some of the key areas that the All Blacks have focussed on improving at training, including reining in their discipline while also playing a more instinctual game.
“I think a big thing out of the game was probably just some of our option-taking as a unit. Pulling the trigger on stuff that we can see but we were probably a bit structured and missed opportunities and that was a big thing that probably came out [in the review].
“I thought our passion was there but obviously our discipline was a massive factor in keeping that scoreboard pressure. So those two things, we’ve had to work hard on this week.”
The 73-cap hooker will start alongside Joe Moody – who also played against Argentina – and Nepo Laulala in the All Blacks front row.
Listen to the latest episode of the Aotearoa Rugby Pod below:
