Crusaders suffer loss as All Black prop ruled out for the season

General those trends develop as a counter. As in if theres no big teams then you don’t need big loosies to combat them.

So you’re looking at a team like the Chiefs who have Vaa’i at 198, Finau at 195, and Parker at 196 to run that team next year to flatten people before some of the others my decide to use their locks to combat it. And a new style of play/coach or course, because they played pretty wide with them this year.

But yeah, players like Akira get squeezed to the side if a smaller promising loosie like Sotutu comes through because Tuipulotu (Vaa’i height) and the likes have been brought up as a locks. Hell Canes had Blackwell locking for them for years and he must have been no bigger than Finau or Parker.

So yeah, to answer your question another way, it’s genetics.

You should always consider yourself lucky when you’re named an All Black.

Not being named an AB is then ‘normal’.

Not surprise I haven’t heard any Hansen quotes this time round though!

Jacobson got knocked out and jumped straight back in. Ethan hung his arm out and then warmed his arms about like a women who’d has her handback stolen.

Theres a massive difference between the two players.

Obviously they still wanted at least one wise head in the midfield, which may be why ALB is still there even though he’s injured. At least one of the midfield will be able to train in the back three at any one time as well, so ALB is their as the 6th, a leader watching the 4 train against each other. He’d eat up a bit of time if one of the two starters went down.

But you don’t really need to have two locks against you to train for lineout purposes (just someone to jump against), so they’d have 3v3 loosies (using a lock as 6) matchups which would be far more important for testing speed and position to getting numbers right during phase play. Admittedly the two that can cover 6 are the starting two lol but they probably don’t need to train on the same side at this point.

To expect him and his coaching team to achieve the above is setting him up for failure.

Will his job be on the line if they achieve another <75% win year? They haven’t done better than that in 6 years.

I think 10/13 is reasonable and par for the course this year.

France could reasonably offer one banana peel this year. The Boks another. These aren’t Mickey Mouse teams after all.

Beware of Australia and Argentina in 2027 in particular. These matches could be the difference between a great season and a terrible one by NZ’s lofty standards.

I issue this warning to the springboks too.

And then there’s Argentina - always the dark horse.

And I’m not saying this to be mean. I think each of those teams are good enough to beat you and will be gunning for those wins on account of how important it is to them to beat the mighty ABs.

All good things.

Over 100 years. Who cares?

We don’t play with leather balls, kick off mounds of sand or only select white teams anymore either.

NZ being as good as they were for so long is a fabulous accolade for the ABs and New Zealand. One to surely be proud of. But them winning all the time wasn’t necessarily good for the game as a whole.

And perhaps not good for future AB teams expected to live up to that standard - which (hopefully) may never be replicated again by any one team.

A competitive international scene is much better for the game and for more fans. It’s more exciting and interesting.

The ABs and NZ didn’t get worse at rugby. The rest of the world caught up. Because more people of diverse backgrounds are playing the game.

And that’s great!