Elevator moment convinced Rokocoko about 'rugby scientist' Schmidt

Legendary All Blacks winger Joe Rokocoko has recalled the seminal elevator moment that convinced him that Joe Schmidt – Ian Foster’s new New Zealand team selector – was the real deal as a coach. Long before Smokin’ Joe blazed a trail on the Test level scene, winning 68 caps in a try-heavy international career between 2003 and 2010, he initially worked as a player under Schmidt at U18s age-grade level. 

Schmidt himself has come a long way since then, helping Clermont and Leinster to win club trophies before going on to win three Six Nations titles with Ireland, including the 2018 Grand Slam. He is now officially part of the All Blacks set-up, taking over as a selector from Grant Fox and helping formulate overall strategy and attack play as well as providing analysis on opposition teams for Foster. 

It is a change that Rokocoko has welcomed, the ex-prolific All Blacks scorer explaining his rapport with Schmidt from way back. “I know Joe very well,” he told the latest edition of Midi Olympique, the French rugby newspaper. 

“He was my coach with the New Zealand U18s and then with the Auckland Blues. He is a remarkable technician, very attached to the basic gestures of the rugby player. When I was young, he spent hours detailing the angles of the strikes, the degrees of orientation of these… Joe Schmidt, he is a rugby scientist.”

Asked to elaborate, Rokocoko added: “One day when I took the elevator with him when I was playing for the Blues, he used the floor numbers to detail to me the movements he wanted to work on, which areas to attack during the weekend and how to achieve it… He is incredibly smart but he demands real technical perfection from his players. Some make it, some don’t.”

Rokocoko watched the recent series defeat for the All Blacks against Ireland while on holiday in Fiji. Asked why they were beaten 1-2, he suggested: “The spiral is negative, the All Blacks remain on four defeats in the last five games… 

“The body language of the players does not deceive, they are sorely lacking in confidence. Moreover, the attack game is not varied enough and faced with these increasingly better-organised defences, these movements, which worked until now, no longer work. 

“The comparison with the Irish launches was also very unfavourable to New Zealand, so maybe the change of coaches will change all that… I don’t know.”