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Jeff Wilson on the All Blacks win: 'I'm not sure they could do much more'

Rieko Ioane with ball in hand for the All Blacks. Photo by Phil Walter/Getty Images

For the third consecutive Rugby World Cup, Namibia and New Zealand squared off in pool play and once more, New Zealand won the match while Nambia won the hearts of fans.

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The 71-3 scoreline reflects the mostly one-sided nature of the battle but neglects the multiple scoring opportunities Namibia earned, with eight entries into the New Zealand 22.

Stoic defence kept the Welwitschias at bay in difficult conditions after an early All Blacks lead forced the Namibian side to chase seven-pointers, instead of the occasional three that came on offer.

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For the All Blacks, the win relieves some of the tension that has arisen after two poor results against the Springboks and France.

The match offered a chance for New Zealand to reset and according to former All Black Jeff Wilson, they did just that.

“Absolutely, they really, really did,” Wilson told Stuff’s Newsable. “In regards to their accuracy, their discipline, other than that late yellow card to Ethan de Groot.

“They conceded a couple of penalties earlier on but ultimately, they came out and made some really good decisions in trying conditions.

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“Look, Namibia probably didn’t threaten them as much as we anticipated them to do so. Their defence was probably not good enough against an All Black team which was determined to play and they showed that from the opening minute; holding onto it for multiple phases, scoring a 60-70 metre try on the back of multiple plays from quality players.

“All of a sudden you got a sense that the All Blacks were prepared, were up for the contest and then the dominance started up front.

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“Overall, you’ve got to look at their performance and they’ll be really pleased in that it’s easy in those sorts of games to get loose.

“There were only probably a couple of moments, probably in the last 15 minutes where they got that way and maybe tried to do a little bit too much.

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“I’m not sure they could do much more than what they did tonight really, given the fact that it did bucket down for about 10 minutes, which just made some work in the last 20 minutes of the first half a little bit more challenging.”

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New Zealand’s cohesion faltered when the back reserves took the field, Richie Mo’unga stepped into his familiar first-five role and Damian McKenzie dropped to fullback while Aaron Smith assumed the halfback assignment and Rieko Ioane joined the midfield.

The bench came on with the intent to play at speed but often looked out of sync and there were numerous knock-ons as well as penalties to finish the game.

The brightest positive from the game was Man of the Match Cam Roigard. The young halfback scored twice and was an ever-present threat around the park.

“He was amazing but interestingly enough, he’s got a really calm head on his shoulders,” Wilson remarked.

“I had a chat to him after the game, interviewed him, and it was almost as if he was matter of fact that he knows that that’s not the standard that it’s going to take to win a Rugby World Cup. He knows that.

“He literally went ‘Yeah, I had a great night, but I had the platform in front of me, there were spaces for me to run into’.

“He knows that’s different to what he’ll face in a tight game so he was matter of fact about it. I think he really enjoyed the occasion and he should celebrate because of that but also, he knows that he’s just got to keep working.

“I like the head on his shoulders.”

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Comments

14 Comments
y
yster 463 days ago

Still taking cheap shots, have they lost their bottle when it comes to tackling. Jeff forgot to mention that, and their poor discipline, they should be cleaning up their game. Maybe next game they can throw in some eye gouging!!

S
Snash 463 days ago

came straight to comments to say cant watch, listen nor read Goldie any more - his arrogance and presumption now in full view.

C
Craig S 463 days ago

Roigard is making the most of his chances, looks the real deal. The game certainly lost momentum and cohesion when the reserves came on. Can’t read too much into this game but it will be interesting to see which combos the coaching team rolls out for Italy in 2 weeks time.

C
CT 463 days ago

Boring match switched off at halftime really don't see the point of these lobsided matches

J
Jonathan 464 days ago

I'm sure a certain superfan will be here soon to say it wasn't a red and shouldn't even have been a yellow........

G
Graham 464 days ago

For a side that was so dominant it surely must be concerning for the coaching staff that they conceded 12 penalties and a card? Accepting that the vast majority of penalties come when a side is under pressure, to conceded 12 when there is virtually no pressure does not augur well for games against more stern opposition. Also Namibia were in the red zone eight times. More stern opposition will not need that many invitations.

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T
Tom 59 minutes ago
What is the future of rugby in 2025?

Briiiiiiiiiiiiiiiistol! Briiiiiiiiiiiiiiiistol! Briiiiiiiiiiiiiiiistol!


It's incredible to see the boys playing like this. Back to the form that saw them finish on top of the regular season and beat Toulon to win the challenge cup. Ibitoye and Ravouvou doing a cracking Piutau/Radradra impression.


It's abundantly clear that Borthwick and Wigglesworth need to transform the England attack and incorporate some of the Bears way. Unfortunately until the Bears are competing in Europe, the old criticisms will still be used.. we failed to fire any punches against La Rochelle and Leinster which goes to show there is still work to do but both those sides are packed full of elite players so it's not the fairest comparison to expect Bristol to compete with them. I feel Bristol are on the way up though and the best is yet to come. Tom Jordan next year is going to be obscene.


Test rugby is obviously a different beast and does Borthwick have enough time with the players to develop the level of skill the Bears plays have? Even if he wanted to? We should definitely be able to see some progress, Scotland have certainly managed it. England aren't going to start throwing the ball around like that but England's attack looks prehistoric by comparison, I hope they take some inspiration from the clarity and freedom of expression shown by the Bears (and Scotland - who keep beating us, by the way!). Bristol have the best attack in the premiership, it'd be mad for England to ignore it because it doesn't fit with the Borthwick and Wigglesworth idea of how test rugby should be played. You gotta use what is available to you. Sadly I think England will try reluctantly to incorporate some of these ideas and end up even more confused and lacking identity than ever. At the moment England have two teams, they have 14 players and Marcus Smith. Marcus sticks out as a sore thumb in a team coached to play in a manner ideologically opposed to the way he plays rugby, does the Bears factor confuse matters further? I just have no confidence in Borthers and Wiggles.


Crazy to see the Prem with more ball in play than SR!

1 Go to comments
J
JW 4 hours ago
Does South Africa have a future in European competition?

In another recent article I tried to argue for a few key concept changes for EPCR which I think could light the game up in the North.


First, I can't remember who pointed out the obvious elephant in the room (a SA'n poster?), it's a terrible time to play rugby in the NH, and especially your pinnacle tournament. It's been terrible watching with seemingly all the games I wanted to watch being in the dark, hardly able to see what was going on. The Aviva was the only stadium I saw that had lights that could handle the miserable rain. If the global appeal is there, they could do a lot better having day games.


They other primary idea I thuoght would benefit EPCR most, was more content. The Prem could do with it and the Top14 could do with something more important than their own league, so they aren't under so much pressure to sell games. The quality over quantity approach.


Trim it down to two 16 team EPCR competitions, and introduce a third for playing amongst the T2 sides, or the bottom clubs in each league should simply be working on being better during the EPCR.


Champions Cup is made up of league best 15 teams, + 1, the Challenge Cup winner. Without a reason not to, I'd distribute it evenly based on each leauge, dividing into thirds and rounded up, 6 URC 5 Top14 4 English. Each winner (all four) is #1 rank and I'd have a seeding round or two for the other 12 to determine their own brackets for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th. I'd then hold a 6 game pool, home and away, with consecutive of each for those games that involve SA'n teams. Preferrably I'd have a regional thing were all SA'n teams were in the same pool but that's a bit complex for this simple idea.


That pool round further finalises the seeding for knockout round of 16. So #1 pool has essentially duked it out for finals seeding already (better venue planning), and to see who they go up against 16, 15,etc etc. Actually I think I might prefer a single pool round for seeding, and introduce the home and away for Ro16, quarters, and semis (stuffs up venue hire). General idea to produce the most competitive matches possible until the random knockout phase, and fix the random lottery of which two teams get ranked higher after pool play, and also keep the system identical for the Challenge Cup so everthing is succinct. Top T2 side promoted from last year to make 16 in Challenge Cup

207 Go to comments
J
JW 10 hours ago
Does South Africa have a future in European competition?

I had a look at the wiki article again, it's all terribly old data (not that I'd see reason for much change in the case of SA).

Number Of Clubs:

1526

Registered+Unregistered Players:

651146

Number of Referees:

3460

Pre-teen Male Players:

320842

Pre-teen Female Player:

4522

Teen Male Player:

199213

Teen Female Player:

4906

Senior Male Player:

113174

Senior Female Player:

8489

Total Male Player:

633229

Total Female Player:

17917


So looking for something new as were more concerned with adults specifically, so I had a look at their EOY Financial Review.

The total number of clubs remains consistent, with a marginal increase of 1% from 1,161 to 1,167. 8.1.

A comparative analysis of verified data for 2022 and 2023 highlights a marginal decline of 1% in the number of female players, declining from 6,801 to 6,723. Additionally, the total number of players demonstrates an 8% decrease, dropping from 96,172 to 88,828.

So 80k+ adult males (down from 113k), but I'm not really sure when youth are involved with SAn clubs, or if that data is for some reason not being referenced/included. 300k male students however (200k in old wiki data).


https://resources.world.rugby/worldrugby/document/2020/07/28/212ed9cf-cd61-4fa3-b9d4-9f0d5fb61116/P56-57-Participation-Map_v3.pdf has France at 250k registered but https://presse-europe1-fr.translate.goog/exclu-europe-1-le-top-10-des-sports-les-plus-pratiques-en-france-en-2022/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en&_x_tr_pto=wapp has them back up at 300k registered.


The French number likely Students + Club, but everyone collects data different I reckon. In that WR pdf for instance a lot of the major nations have a heavily registered setup, were as a nation like England can penetrate into a lot more schools to run camps and include them in the reach of rugby. For instance the SARU release says only 29% of schools are reached by proper rugby programs, where as the 2million English number would be through a much much higer penetration I'd imagine. Which is thanks to schools having the ability to involve themselves in programs more than anything.


In any case, I don't think you need to be concerned with the numbers, whether they are 300 or 88k, there is obviously a big enough following for their pro scenes already to have enough quality players for a 10/12 team competition. They appear ibgger than France but I don't really by the lower English numbers going around.

207 Go to comments
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LONG READ What is the future of rugby in 2025? What is the future of rugby in 2025?
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