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Ian Foster wants 'hesitant' All Blacks to react a lot quicker on the field
By Ben Smith
The All Blacks have been in camp on the Sunshine Coast reflecting on their completed Rugby Championship campaign where they finished first with five wins from six outings ahead of their final stretch of the season.
Head coach Ian Foster rated the campaign as 'pretty successful', despite finishing with a loss to South Africa, the last two games were a taste of what the side can expect when they reach the Northern Hemisphere.
“Overall, I think that it’s been a pretty successful Rugby Championship and we’re delighted with the wins and winning the title," Foster told media.
"Obviously the last game hurt a little bit, and the great thing about the Rugby Championship is we finished with those two tests against South Africa and probably got exposed to a lot of what will be coming on the northern hemisphere tour, so great preparation for us.
The All Blacks have not toured Europe since 2018, three years ago, where they beat England 16-15 at Twickenham before losing to Ireland 16-9 in Dublin a week later. They finished the tour with a comprehensive 66-3 win over Italy.
Since that tour, the squad has been through a number of changes and a new generation of young All Black players heading away to experience playing in Europe for the first time.
"We’ve done the southern hemisphere part now, now we go to the northern hemisphere and it’s been three years since we’ve been up there," Foster said.
"We’ve got a whole lot of players that wouldn’t have seen a lot of the big stadiums up north and been exposed to rugby there, so, again, it’s going to be a great learning curve, but we’ve just got to make sure we keep driving our standards and we want to keep growing and playing well up there.”
The All Blacks will be looking to improve on their last performances against South Africa, where the played two tight games for one win and one loss.
Foster wants the side to make 'on-field decisions quicker' to capitalise on opportunities that were there for the taking that they missed against the Springboks. He thought the side was 'hesitant' to make the right call once space had been created.
“If you took away the last-minute kicks in both games, they were two similar games, very tight. We did a lot of good things. I thought the first half of the second test, up three tries to one, we played well," he said.
"We had come through a rough period but played well. We’ve still got to keep learning and make on-field decisions a little bit quicker than what we are.
"We created some space and created options, particularly off lineout time that were there, ready for us to take, and yet we seemed a little bit hesitant to call that.
Foster attributed the hesitancy to the 'big occasion' for some of the inexperienced players in the squad who were 'surprised', but believed that there are positive signs the squad is heading in the right direction ahead of their end-of-year tour.
"I think that’s just big occasions, it’s some new players playing new opposition for the first time, so there’s a real learning curve to that, but the positive signs are that we know that we’re not too far off, and, going forward, we’re going to a northern hemisphere tour where, again, we’re going to get met with a little bit of the unknown for many players.
"I think that’s what I’m really excited about with this tour.
"We’ve got a chance to keep learning the lessons that, when we do get surprised on the park, we need to react a lot quicker than what we did.”
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“He won a ECL and a domestic treble at the beginning of his career.”
He won 2 ECLs at the beginning of his career (2009, 2011). Since then he’s won 1 in 15 years.
“He then won 3 leagues on the bounce later in his career”
He won 3 leagues on the bounce at the start of his career too - (2009, 2010, 2011).
If we’re judging him by champions league wins, he peaked in his late 30s, early 40s. If we’re judging him by domestic titles he’s stayed pretty consistent over his career. If we’re judging him by overall win rate he peaked at Bayern, and was better at Barcelona than at City. So no, he hasn’t gotten better by every measure.
“You mentioned coaches were older around the mid-2010’s compared to the mid-2000’s. Robson was well above the average age you’ve given for those periods even in the 90’s when in his pomp.”
Robson was 63-64 when he was at Barcelona, so he wasn’t very old. But yeah, he was slightly above the average age of 60 I gave for the top 4 premier league coaches in 2015, and quite a bit above the averages for 2005 and 2025.
“Also, comparing coaches - and their experiences, achievements - at different ages is unstable. It’s not a valid way to compare and tends to torpedo your own logic when you do compare them on equal terms. I can see why you don’t like doing it.”
Well my logic certainly hasn’t been torpedoed. Currently the most successful premier league coaches right now are younger than they were ten years ago. You can throw all the nuance at it that you want, but that fact won’t change. It’s not even clear what comparing managers “on equal terms” would even mean, or why it would be relevant to anything I’ve said.
“You still haven’t answered why Kiss could be a risker appointment?”
Because I’ve been talking to you about football managers. If you want to change the subject then great - I care a lot more about rugby than I do football.
But wrt Kiss, I don’t agree that 25 years experience is actually that useful, given what a different sport rugby was 25 years ago. Obviously in theory more experience can never be a bad thing, but I think 10 years of coaching experience is actually more than enough these days. Erasmus had been a coach for 13 years when he got the SA top job. Andy Farrell had been a coach for 9 when he got the Ireland job. I don’t think anyone would say that either of them were lacking in experience.
Now - what about coaches who do have 25+ years experience? The clearest example of that would be Eddie Jones, who started coaching 31 years ago. He did pretty well everywhere he worked until around 2021 (when he was 61), when results with England hit a sharp decline. He similarly oversaw a terrible run with Australia, and currently isn’t doing a great job with Japan.
Another example is Warren Gatland, who also started coaching full-time 31 years ago, after 5 years as a player-coach. Gatland did pretty well everywhere he went until 2020 (when he was 56), when he did a relatively poor job with the Chiefs, before doing a pretty poor job with the Lions, and then overseeing a genuine disaster with Wales. There are very few other examples, as most coaches retire or step back into lesser roles when they enter their 60s. Mick Byrne actually has 34 years experience in coaching (but only 23 years coaching in rugby) and at 66 he’s the oldest coach of a top 10 side, and he’s actually doing really well. He goes to show that you can continue to be a good coach well into your 60s, but he seems like an outlier.
So the point is - right now, Les Kiss looks like a pretty reliable option, but 5 years ago so did Eddie Jones and Warren Gatland before they went on to prove that coaches often decline as they get older. If Australia want Kiss as a short term appointment to take over after Schmidt leaves in the summer, I don’t think that would be a terrible idea - but NB wanted Kiss as a long term appointment starting in 2027! That’s a massive risk, given the chance that his aptitude will begin to decline.
Its kind of analagous to how players decline. We know (for example) that a fly-half can still be world class at 38, but we also know that most fly-halves peak in their mid-to-late 20s, so it is generally considered a risk to build your game plan around someone much older than that.
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