At least one change on the cards for New Zealand's World Cup semifinal
All Blacks coach Steve Hansen, still enjoying a special performance from his team and also one of his horses yesterday, has revealed that Matt Todd dislocated his shoulder before the World Cup and that after receiving a knock on the same joint during his team’s big quarter-final victory over Ireland the flanker is set to miss the semifinal against England.
Todd was absent from the All Blacks’ first pool game against the Springboks a month ago due to a sore shoulder but the full extent of his injury hasn’t been revealed until now.
Assuming the Crusaders player, who scored a try in the second half of the 46-14 win at Tokyo Stadium after replacing Brodie Retallick, is not available, the door will be open for Shannon Frizell to be the loose forward cover for Saturday’s sudden-death match at Yokohama Stadium.
“He’s hurt that shoulder again,” said Hansen, who confirmed that Sam Cane’s withdrawal for Scott Barrett at halftime was a tactical, rather than injury-related, decision. “We’ll have to see how he goes but it’s probably unlikely that he’ll be available. Everyone else is 100 per cent.
“He dislocated it a wee while ago and got a bang on it again yesterday.”
The clean bill of health for the rest of the squad, including first-five Richie Mo’unga who received attention late in the second half, bodes well for the All Blacks as they seek to find a similar level of performance against the English who demolished Australia 41-16 in their quarter-final in Oita.
The All Blacks are fully aware they need to maintain or better the level they got to against the Irish – which was spectacular at times as they ran in seven tries.
“That’s one of the key things about sport isn’t it; being able to repeat and repeat and repeat,” Hansen said. “It’s probably the hardest thing to do in sport. But one of the hardest things we’ve striven to do as a group is to be better than we were the day before. We don’t always achieve that but if you strive to do it you give yourself an opportunity.
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“We know that if we aren’t better we aren’t going to get what we want so it’s pretty simple.
“They’re playing good footy so they’ll be confident, as we will be. We’re playing well ourselves and we just have to make sure as a coaching group and management group where the players can express themselves on Saturday. That’s the task.”
Hansen said he felt England’s first-half defensive effort served to demoralise the Wallabies, who had to chase the game and became increasingly reckless as a result.
“I watched the first half of it and Australia hammered and hammered and got no success. When you get no success you get frustrated. Obviously we can’t afford to get frustrated against them. If we’re not having success we’ve just got to keep building the momentum and pressure until we do. Both sides are defending really well. It is going to be a big clash.”
‘Alleviating pressures is really important. It’s a hell of a complex job to create a winning, competitive environment’
– Former @AllBlacks Wayne Smith tells @JLyall93 about coaching and culture in Japan where @rugbyworldcup has captured hearts and mindshttps://t.co/Z4Qi0q8ZoI— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) October 19, 2019
At the end of a big weekend for him and his team as they chase their third consecutive World Cup victory, the All Blacks head coach was happy to reflect on the run by his horse Nature Strip, who ran fourth in the Everest at Royal Randwick in Sydney, five hours before kick-off in Tokyo.
Hansen part-owns the five-year-old gelding, who was a joint outsider in the $15.2million race, and very much in the running on the final bend.
He revealed he borrowed assistant Ian Foster’s headphones and watched the race on a very quiet team bus. Maintaining a calm facade was not easy.
“I’m watching on the Sky Go and got a little bit excited there,” Hansen said. “He kicked actually and I thought ‘ooh, we’ve got a show here’ and with 200 to go I thought, ‘we’ve still got a show’. With 100 to go I thought ‘hang on boy, hang on’ but they all came at him. I’m really proud of him, they broke the track record, all four horses… he actually started from barrier 12 so had to do a bit more work than some of the others. Then I had a look at how much I got paid for running fourth and I was reasonably happy about that, so…”
This article first appeared on nzherald.co.nz and is republished with permission.
Comments on RugbyPass
Danny Care. Lang in die tand.
1 Go to commentsBig empty stadium does nothing for atmosphere but munster are playing well with solid performance
1 Go to commentsYes, Fiji can win the World Cup! With that belief plus their christian faith🙏 and hard work it is achievable. Great article. Ian Duncan Fiji resident 1981-84
2 Go to commentsInteresting comments about Touch. England’s hosting the Touch World Cup this year and the numbers have exploded since their last World Cup in 2019, something like 70% more teams and 40 nations taking part. And England Touch have made a big thing about how many universities are in their BUCS University Touch Championship as well as Sport England membership. Can only see this growing even more domestically as more people become aware of it
10 Go to comments“Cortez Ratima is light years ahead of anyone on current form, while TJ Perenara has also skyrocketed into contention following the unfortunate injury to the talented Cam Roigard.” At last some sanity. Hitherto so many pundits have been wittering on about Finlay Christie to the point one wondered if they were observing a FC in a parallel universe where the FC they saw wasnt just the mediocre Shayne Philpott project of Fosters hapless AB reign in the real world. Ratima, Perenara and Fakatava are the ONLY logical 9s for Razor now Roigard is crocked.
2 Go to commentsThis game was just as painful as the Hurricanes game. It was real fork-in-the-eye stuff.
2 Go to commentsNow if they could just fire the Crusaders ground PA guy who likes to play his dance music and just loves the sound of his own voice the entire game, even when play is going on. And I thought their brass band thing of a few years ago was bad.
5 Go to commentsUnfortunately when you lose by far the two form players this season in Roigard and Aumua, you're left replacing two game changing Tanks with a couple of pea-shooters. Which is also about the speed of TJs pass.
4 Go to commentsBit rich coming from the guy with zero loyalty to anyone or any team, including happily taking a players place in a league world cup squad because well, SBW wanted to play in it and thus an already named player got told he was no longer going. And airing stuff like this, which may or may not be true, doesn't exactly say you're a stand up guy either SBW. Just looking to keep his name in lights as usual.
38 Go to commentsTamati Tua. …the Taniwha NPC midfielder. Ollie Sapsford, Hawkes Bay NPC midfielder…doing well
4 Go to commentsFiji deserve to be in the rugby championship, fans love seeing the Fijian national team play, the Fijian Drua is a wonderful idea but the players can still be stolen to play for NZ and AUS…
2 Go to commentsThe first concern for this afternoon are wheather forecast…
1 Go to commentsWhy cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to commentsBig difference from the Saders. Forwards really muscled up and laid a solid platform. Scooter brought some steel and I liked the loosie combination. Newell has been rather disappointing this season but stepped up big time - happy also to see Franks dot down. He should do that more often! Reihana had a good game and there seems to be more flair and invention with him in the saddle. McNicoll plays well from the back and is reliable plus inventive when he joins the line. Keep it up chaps!
5 Go to comments🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
35 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to comments