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‘Wasn’t about the scoreboard’: Why last year’s clash with England meant more to All Blacks

The All Blacks perform the Haka at Tickenham. Photo by Warren Little/Getty Images

With a spot in the biggest rugby game on the planet up for grabs, the All Blacks were “outmuscled” by Eddie Jones’ England during their semi-final clash at the 2019 World Cup.

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It all started with a now-famous smirk from Owen Farrell. As the All Blacks laid down their challenge with a passionate haka, the playmaker couldn’t help but smile.

Farrell was ready for a rugby war, and so was England. They shot out of the blocks with an early try to midfielder Manu Tuilagi, and never really looked like losing.

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The All Blacks were beaten, and that hurt doesn’t just go away.

Three years later, the two sides met again during the Autumn Nations Series. The All Blacks travelled to London for a highly anticipated Test on the hallowed turf of Twickenham.

“For so much of the game, it wasn’t the scoreboard, it was the fact that three years earlier that team had outmuscled us in Japan,” coach Ian Foster said on NZR+ docuseries All Blacks: In Their Own Words.

“There we were on their home patch and I thought we played really well.”

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New Zealand put on an attacking clinic during the first term, and took a comfortable 17-3 lead into the break. Coach Foster was pleased, telling his players that their errors were “positive mistakes.”

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The All Blacks looked, at times, like a team possessed. England didn’t have any answers during the first half, and this trend continued for a period after the break.

Rieko Ioane finished a long-range try to extend the visitors’ lead, and nobody expected the All Blacks to give that up. But they did.

Following a yellow card to Beauden Barrett, the All Blacks lost their way. Flyhalf Marcus Smith ran riot in the final 10 minutes, and helped England claw their way back into the fight.

England levelled the scores at 25-all and had one more play to try and mount what would’ve been a match-winning drive. But the English kicked the ball out and settled for the draw.

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“You want to go and win everything but when you don’t, our job is to be as real in our assessment of where we’re at as possible,” Foster added.

“I came away from the northern tour thinking, ‘Okay, in terms of our big rocks, we’ve moved them considerably.’

“We should never think that we’ve moved them enough and I promise everyone we’ll keep moving them.

“I do know that we’ve got a lot of confidence in the direction we’re going.”

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2 Comments
P
Pecos 493 days ago

Too much propaganda leaking into media trying to rewrite the disastrous 2022 season. This "all part of the plan" "look at us now" revisionist nonsense needs to stop & coach/players need to go low key in media, not pump up expectations (& each other) based on retrospective false narratives. Heads down, minimal media, bring it home.

m
mikejjules 493 days ago

The English took the draw as a victory, rightfully so. They didn't deserve to be in the same paddock for 60 mins but the end of the game was 1 way traffic. The ABs had no answer and that was bizarre. With the momentum they had it's incredible the English didn't have the balls to go for the victory. Fear of the NZ counter and ability from anywhere won through

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JW 3 hours ago
'Let's not sugarcoat it': Former All Black's urgent call to protect eligibility rules

Yep, no one knows what will happen. Thing is I think (this is me arguing a point here not a random debate with this one) they're better off trialing it now in a controlled environment than waiting to open it up in a knee jerk style reaction to a crumbling organtization and team. They can always stop it again.


The principle idea is that why would players leave just because the door is ajar?


BBBR decides to go but is not good enough to retain the jersey after doing it. NZ no longer need to do what I suggest by paying him to get back upto speed. That is solely a concept of a body that needs to do what I call pick and stick wth players. NZR can't hold onto everyone so they have to choose their BBBRs and if that player comes back from a sabbatical under par it's a priority to get him upto speed as fast as possible because half of his competition has been let go overseas because they can't hold onto them all. Changing eligibility removes that dilemma, if a BBBR isn't playing well you can be assured that someone else is (well the idea is that you can be more assured than if you only selected from domestic players).


So if someone decides they want to go overseas, they better do it with an org than is going to help improve them, otherwise theyre still basically as ineligible as if they would have been scorning a NZ Super side that would have given them the best chance to be an All Black.

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