Everyone knows Robertson is not supposed to be doing the coaching

Except the team has a manager, so maybe Razor should have applied for that job instead. The NZR basically hired Scott Hansen as the coach, and I’m not even sure they’re any the wiser as to who he actually is than anyone else.

All Razor seems to actually do is sit around dreaming up cringe-worthy ‘themes’ that don’t help once the team is on the field falling asleep for half the game.

Clearly there is a problem with the coaching set up - two coaching assistants choose to depart the “ABs” - I’ll repeat - “CHOOSE” or “FIRED” either way the optics are not good.

And let’s not forget both Joe Schmidt and Tony Brown refused to work with Razor, or perhaps their refusal was directed more towards Hansen. And I heard on the grape vine - Vern Cotter refused Razor too.

Personally, I believe Jason Ryan has also been found out - our pack has not performed well this year. Line out yes, but our scrum was humiliated by the Boks, mastered by the English, and the Irish gave us trouble, and even the Wallabies pack held their own

Interesting early days for Razor, Hamish.

If the fixes are not made this Summer, the All Blacks will stumble on.

The culture coaching which is confusing players and fans has to stop. One capable Head Coach is required.

A cohesive group of assistants to support the Head Coach is required

A captain who can articulate a game plan and inspire the team is required.

Three new number 10’s who can drive the team are required.

NZ Rugby can build for the next two years of very tough rugby, or fall short sitting on their hands.

We hope they act.

Regardless on what he should be doing ,the bubbling displays of the All Blacks speak for its self ,sack them

The problem here is that Scott Hansen is poorlydoing the Head coach work described, and Razor is a hands off culture ideas guy. Leon and Holland leaving are due to that

I never agree with Bidwell but on this he is spot on. Whether Razor coaches or delegates, his job is certainly to select and recruit competent underlings. He clearly has not done that and we are worse off vs Foster (not a high bar of performance except vs Ireland in SF)

Where Robertson perhaps hasn’t done well, is in choosing those responsible for the actual coaching. Regardless of whether Leon MacDonald and Jason Holland found they couldn’t work for Robertson – or Scott Hansen for that matter – the optics of their departures looked poor. 

Just as the team’s performances often have been. 

Spot on. So regardless, he should be the one taking full responsibility for all performances and results. Particularly as he acted like he was the messiah before getting the job. Putting pressure on through the media, saying he wants to win 2 World Cups with different nations and undermining the previous coach. No wonder Joe Schmidt said no to working with him.

This is a good article however it's a very simple fix and that is NZ rugby hires a manager to deal with all the logistics and anything not specific to coaching such as physio's, travel, psychology, dietician, sponsors, accommodation, press.

Razor needs to be told he's got one year to turn it around and as head coach he has to be directly driving the on field coaching and specific owner of defence or attack and then an assistant coach and some specialists.

Hansen was never employed as head coach and needs to be dismissed for shockingly bad word salads and the Allblacks receiving two thrashings, one unprecedented at home the other at twickers.

Ryan needs to be retained but told the right tight five needs to execute.

The coach needs to be head selector with two outside independents.

Given the age of a lot of coaches at test level, it’d be naive to think most people critical of him expect your head coach to hold the tackle bags. It’s always cringey when they release those social media videos in a number of sports where the coaches join in with drills because what often seems to happen is that there are a number of ex-player coaches who can’t separate their playing persona from their coaching persona and many of them fall behind tactically (often after some initial success because players play hard for a guy who understands them). Regardless of the greater managerial role with modern coaching, there have still been plenty of coaches in the modern era with more of an oversight over the team’s overall strategy and it’s hard to look past the results.

Rassie for one, by the accounts of the many South Africans who comment here, is incredibly hands on and the bomb squad approach is definitely still his strategic innovation. Also you’re not getting away with something like that without also making sure that your coaches who do more of the formal tactical planning are on the same page with regards to making sure that personnel works. His director of rugby role too also helped establish the pipeline in the long term way that the Penrith Panthers have done in rugby league and that has also involved him being in sync with the next level down. Razor on the other hand was accused of being too Crusader biased in his first year with plenty of reason and while that died down in his second year, the pining for Richie Mo’unga hasn’t helped.

Shag was another, the game plans suited his personnel and a number of players talked about how much he nit picked players even in games where putting on massive scores. Even if he delegated, he still made sure the game plan made sense with selections and at least he held the forwards coach and defense coach portfolio for the team in the previous regime and translated those into the way the team played, with aggressive physical defense like in the revenge game vs Ireland, and the way the forwards were able to spread out around the field to help run the expansive game they played in his run.

And my personal favourite regardless of 2007, Henry, who throughout his time still directly coached a specific facet of the game (defense and then later forwards and then attack) and thought long term with rest and rotation. They also made sure there was constant improvement, much like in the build up to 2011 when we were once again looking vulnerable under the high ball, they brought in ex-AFL coaches and converted Kahui and Jane into wingers to deal with that. I don’t know what Razor’s done other than hope Caleb Clarke’s been healthy - the fact that Jane was in the Northern Hemisphere with the XV and seemingly not had his brain picked more feels like a missed opportunity for something similar. I still rate him over Hansen personally given the player development in that span and the fact that Hansen benefitted from a number of players that emerged under Henry.

Perhaps the fact that the All Blacks, especially with their Silver Lake deal, are spending all this extra time marketing has influenced his role, but while it’s up to the players to execute, there have been many who look like they’ve visibly regressed from Super Rugby in that month between the final and the test season. Having a greater managerial role around the game doesn’t mean the head coach shouldn’t still be involved in the tactics on game day or be unable to influence the focus of the preparation in the week. I’ve said this to death, a good head coach should be able to delegate when it’s working, but step in when it’s not and when it’s not working constantly, you question how capable they are of being able to do so.

🤣 hooohaaa razor ray hooohaaa razor ray !!! …

if mounga comes back and nothing changes … you got us …. buy if mounga comes back and the team clicks … get the music ready

True - but Borthwick seems to be much more hands-on with England, despite having 29 assistant coaches

the optics of their departures looked poor.

Youre no better than NZR Hamish! Thank you for the insight though, I’m teary.’’

Too add other things fans are frustrated with, I’ll repost an earlier reply of mine to Toko;

- NZR shouldn’t have made coaches apply with a team of assistants pitting groups of coaches against each other. (Because of this we missed out on experienced assistants going elsewhere (Tony Brown)

Agreed, but again, they don’t. The assistants aren’t pitted against each other, the exact same group of assistant could be part of all the prospective coaches teams, and are only prospective as in “these are the guys I want”.

For instance Tony Brown followed Jamie Joseph in resigning with Japan in 2019 because NZR delayed the interview process. Even Foster wanted both JJ and TB while JJs hat was in the mix himself! So the whole process is actually quite flexible.

"Tony made his call, it was a tough phone call to take. We'd planned for a while to work together, he's shown his hand with Jamie and shown his loyalties, I appreciate it was a tough call for him to make to me," Robertson said.

So the whole process is actually quite flexible, Robinson himself said after appointing Razor that they want to look at the assistants themselves later to ensure theyre worthy.

"In regards to a team, we were mainly focused on selecting a head coach," Robinson said. "Certainly we gained some insights in terms of the groups of people candidates might work with but at the same time they understand that's a process we want to have some sort of input and say in."

This is the kicker; What was thought to be a factor last time, in 2019

New Zealand Rugby (NZR) ultimately selected Ian Foster for the head coach role after the 2019 World Cup, partly due to the board's perception that Robertson's proposed team lacked experience at the international level. 

Lol. Here I suppose we have the exact reason that Hansen doubled up his Super job with an international spot under (for four years alongside TB) JJ!

Did they make a mistake in thinking that was enough? Seen as how they signed the team anyway, and how quickly Ryan helped (actually he went to Fiji first didn’t he) did they make a mistake in thinking it was a factor then? We certainly had an article from Razor saying it’s all or nothing in regards to him not wanting to join the ABs first as an assistant, so I guess he shipped Hansen off?

So back to flexibility anyway, NZR f$cked around in 2019, so this time they decided they needed to go early (personally it should be done more than a year out from a WC imo though) in 2023, fair enough. Problem is Razor probably had to come up with a team quickly in 2022, and at the time made sense to switch in MacDonald for Tony Brown (given he wouldn’t leave Japan/JJ), and as he says Razor is a loyal guy, so stuck with this group he formed instead of now being able to negotiate with high profile options for 2024 (remember anyone joining him in August 2022 would have needed to exit their current role). It’s reasonable to remedy the key factor in why we had to deal with problems in Fosters reign, but that incident created another problem (and if they try anything midway through again JJ won’t have his righthand man either, another calamity) for this cycle they might have been a bit naive in not predicting.

So I have to disagree with your last point as well, I think you’ll find most high profile jobs are down well out. I just think NZR were cramped for time and they would have liked to also advertise earlier, so that everyones not scrambling for a job in the next 8 months. This does not inhibit their options in the same way you suggest. Sure not everyone (like a Schimdt) would want to commit to another job 12-14 months out but I think yuo’ll be able to get most aspiring AB coaches to, and if the current head coach isn’t doing well enough in those first three yeaers, tough luck buddy you can’t rely on a saving your job by winning one thing at the end of your four year period.

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I could be completely one eyed here, but this (and potentially whats about to happen) is just a unlucky sequence of events. Much like against England, when BB got injured and missed his toucher, then Roigard got injured and missed his touch finder, then the ref absurdly sent Taylor to the bench and didn’t even blow the whistle when Earl slapped down an offload while offside. Everything could have been so much different if just the slightest improvement is made in decision making.

It seems reasonably clear that the problem here is Scott Hansen, and his “management style”. Possibly also true that Razor would be a better assistant coach than head coach like Wayne Smith. Good article.