1
The winners and losers from Ian Foster's first-ever All Blacks squad announcement
By Alex McLeod
It's come about three months later that originally anticipated thanks to the disruption COVID-19 has caused, but new All Blacks coach Ian Foster was finally able to name his first All Blacks squad on Sunday.
The unveiling of the squad was met with much anticipation, with punters eager to see who from the highly successful Super Rugby Aotearoa stood out enough to warrant inclusion for a yet-to-be-confirmed test schedule.
With seven players named in the All Blacks for the first time, and a handful of others who have been omitted or were unlucky to miss out, here are some winners and losers from Foster's 35-man squad.
Winners:
Akira Ioane
Arguably the biggest 'winner' from the newly-announced squad. After years of showing a multitude of potential but failing to fully deliver, it seemed his All Blacks prospects were over when ex-head coach Steve Hansen publicly grilled him for being too lazy last year.
However, Ioane has taken that criticism and used it to adjust his mindset and improve his defence, work rate and ability at the breakdown.
All of that culminated in a standout Super Rugby Aotearoa campaign with the Blues, and the 25-year-old has deservedly won his first All Blacks call-up since 2017.
Alex Hodgman
Few would have expected loosehead prop Alex Hodgman to earn All Blacks selection this season, with the former New Zealand and Fiji U20 representative hardly setting the world alight since making his professional debut for Canterbury in 2014.
That changed this year, though, as he shone as part of a vastly improved Blues forward pack through his defensive work ethic and strong scrummaging to win national honours for the first time at the age of 27.
Tupou Vaa'i
The biggest bolter in Foster's squad, Tupou Vaa'i didn't even have a full-time Super Rugby contract at the beginning of the year.
In fact, he hadn't even made his Chiefs debut until Super Rugby Aotearoa kicked-off in June.
It's taken just under three months for the All Blacks selectors to deem him worthy of a call-up, though.
With Brodie Retallick, Scott Barrett and uncapped prospect Pari Pari Parkinson unavailable, New Zealand's depth at lock has been exposed, but the selection of 20-year-old Vaa'i - who should become the first All Black born in the new millennium - looms as a long-term fix to that predicament.
Trending on RugbyPass
2
Sale Sharks part ways with coach with immediate effect
3
Ex-All Black accused Ireland player of 'disgusting' antics against Arg
4
New Zealand miss out in Player of the Year awards
5
Latest Comments
I think there's a lot of truth to that. Improved fitness, which is something that can be improved at least, would help make for better decision-making in the latter stages of the game. I also feel though that we just haven't developed enough depth yet, as they allude to. That should be the focus looking ahead. Considering how well England have done at age-grade level in recent years, we can clearly see the talent is there. It's just a case of stepping up to senior level. I do believe that Conor O'Shea has implemented a few things that will pay off. How the EPS contracts play out will be interesting and you would think would help get more out of the players, so, unlike the media storm out there, I'm not overly concerned with England at the moment. I'm more concerned with Wales. We need to be giving them encouragement and helping where we can there. At the end of the day international rugby needs to be as tight, exciting and competitive as possible if the game is to develop and spread worldwide, which it really hasn't done that well over the decades, until maybe more recently.
Go to commentsPSDT for me. I keep seeing Ox getting a lot of support in the various threads, I’m not going to pretend to know enough about font row sorcery to dispute it.
Go to comments