Scotty Stevenson: What the Blues need to do to turn their fortunes around

Years of failure has taken its toll on the psyche of the Blues – bouncing back isn’t easy, but the other New Zealand franchises prove it can be done, writes Scotty Stevenson.

If you don’t believe you’re good enough, don’t expect anyone else to. That has got to be the message to the Blues this week after they came unstuck in (un)spectacular fashion at Eden Park on Saturday. This is a team that is carrying a heavy burden – year upon year of competition failure by any standard, not least of all by the standard this once great rugby team set for itself – and it is struggling under that immense weight.

It is easy to take shots at individuals, or indeed to say this team is nothing but a collection of individuals. On Saturday the Highlanders, shorn of their ever-trusty fullback Ben Smith and with a depleted pack, did what modern-day Highlanders teams do: they kicked the ball into the backfield, trusted each other to make tackles, and rushed out of the line to make them. In short, and without the need for statistics to back the assertion, they played with an esprit de corps that would be the envy of any team in the world.

There is no statistic for that, by the way. Belief is mystical, not statistical.

The Blues, on the other hand, seem incapable of finding the lightning, let alone bottling it. It is not because they don’t have a plan. It is not because they are not trying hard enough (conversely, they are quite likely trying too hard, as is inevitable when each player feels individually responsible for turning around the club’s fortunes. Teams win games, players make mistakes) and it is not because they lack playmakers. What they lack is the assertive self-confidence of winners. Far too much credence is given internally to the notion that this team is inferior to the other New Zealand sides.

To watch the Blues train, to see them work together, you would never get the inkling that the ghosts of self-defeat are hiding behind doors and lurking in the corridors. There is genuine bonhomie here, borne of the same boyish brotherhood boasted by every other team. The club has a new centralised headquarters, modern and gleaming, a vast improvement on the pre-fabricated nightmare of their former, shared, home on a tertiary campus.

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Everything is new, except the same old worries and the same old criticisms. Until they can shake the former and learn to ignore the latter, this team will be destined to get the same old results. The problem with that is the same old results are as hot off the press as last weekend. This team is stalked by its history, it keeps sneaking up on them and whispering ‘boo’ in their ears.

That the Blues could have and should have snatched a win at the end of the match on Saturday should be the silver lining. Instead, the heart-breaking, head-scratching loss remains the leitmotif of the Blues’ modern tragedy. The Highlanders’ plucky win, against the odds, is the recurrent theme of their recent success.

Belief is hard to quantify. A decade ago the Highlanders struggled to post three wins in a season. In 2008 and 2009 they finished 11th, in 2010 they were 12th. In 2013 Jamie Joseph shopped for a title shortcut and the Highlanders got lost, and came second to last. They haven’t missed the playoffs since, and won a title in 2015. How did they flick the switch?

In 2012 the Chiefs traded in a decade of false hope for back-to-back titles and an unbroken run of post-season appearances. What changed? The Crusaders haven’t won a final since 2008 but name a year in which you didn’t start the season putting them in your playoff bracket. Remember when the Hurricanes were that team that would never be able to win a final…

All of these teams have had players transition from bad times to good. All of these teams talk about the importance of culture, the imperative to build a strong identity. All of these teams have found ways to bury the bodies in the backyard and disregard the demons.

It is time for the Blues to draw a similar line. This team must refuse to be defined by its failures and find a rallying call for the future. This team must start to believe in something far more important and fundamental than its recent record. It must start to believe in itself.