No one fears the All Blacks anymore, the team's reputation is in tatters

Man, I enjoyed Saturday night.

We can use red cards and Ardie Savea’s absence to obscure the facts. We can huff and puff about World Rugby and the laws of the game.

We can point to South Africa, Australia and Argentina and say that they lost to Northern Hemisphere foes too.

But what we can’t do is pretend Ireland didn’t make a laughing stock of New Zealand Rugby (NZR) at Forsyth Barr Stadium.

You know, that organisation who trumpeted a partnership with an American private equity outfit, predicated on the aura of All Blacks invincibility.

Silver Lake and NZR are going to make the All Blacks one of world sport’s most powerful and profitable brands, apparently. Yep, from Shanghai to Sao Paulo and everywhere in between, the All Blacks’ unrivalled excellence is going to set cash registers alight.

A penny for Silver Lake’s thoughts on Saturday night, then.

Ireland barely bothered to celebrate their 23-12 win. Victory over these All Blacks is so commonplace as to only merit a high-five or two.

Maybe NZR won’t be so quick to appoint a head coach and captain next time.

I’m not going to round on Ian Foster or Sam Cane.

I wrote that Foster should never have been appointed head coach and have never wavered. Same with Cane.

The latter’s actually very likeable, but his presence on the park causes compromises elsewhere. As we saw with Savea having to sit much of Saturday night out.

No, the decline in the All Blacks’ playing and commercial fortunes is solely on NZR.

The smugness and complacency of succession was scandalous, as I’ve written countless times before.

Coaching the All Blacks should be the most-coveted role in the rugby world and yet NZR could only rustle up Foster and Scott Robertson as candidates.

Poor Razor. Everyone else knew Foster was assured of ascending from assistant to head coach, but not him.

Still, NZR could yet have saved face. Following Foster’s abysmal first year in charge, which saw the All Blacks lose to Argentina and Australia, no-one would have minded if they’d admitted their error.

But, no, in true NZR fashion, they prematurely extended Foster’s contract instead, then sat back and watched him lead the team to defeats against South Africa, Ireland and France.

Cane wasn’t captaining the team by then. Savea and Sam Whitelock both had a go and both looked like better options.

Again, there’d have been no criticism of NZR had they announced Whitelock or Savea were going to take it from here.

The All Blacks might beat Ireland by 20 points at Sky Stadium this Saturday night, but the damage is done. Fans and pundits have become openly hostile in their views about Foster and Cane and the team’s reputation is in tatters.

Far from fearing the All Blacks, most international teams would fancy their chances against them right now.

That would have been unfathomable prior to Foster’s appointment, but that’s how far NZR have allowed the All Blacks’ fortunes to plummet.

The irony is that even the most opinionated armchair selector among us would only make cosmetic changes to the side. It’s not a lack of talent that’s ailing the team.

You could change the coaching staff and captain tomorrow and the All Blacks would immediately be borderline-unbeatable again.

Only NZR appears far too bloodyminded for that.

Well, I have to say that amuses me. In fact it amuses me very much.

I don’t see any point in criticising Foster and Cane. They didn’t appoint themselves, after all.

No, it’s NZR who decided that and it’s them who deserve all the condemnation should performances continue to be as insipid as last Saturday night’s.