Graham Henry: ‘Give praise where it’s due to Ireland’
In November 2013 Schmidt’s side had their famed visitors on the ropes, leading 22-17 entering injury time at the Aviva Stadium. But a Ryan Crotty try and Aaron Cruden’s conversion snatched victory from the jaws of defeat and left the Irish shell shocked and still searching for their first win over the All Blacks.
That duly arrived in Chicago last weekend and Henry insisted New Zealand should “give praise where it’s due.”
He reasoned: “The Irish should have won [in 2013], and if they’d won in Dublin maybe the All Blacks would have won on Saturday. That [loss] focused the Irish more, and they learned from that defeat. In 2013 they closed up shop and tried to protect the lead; they didn’t do that yesterday.
“A prime example was when Robbie Henshaw scored off that scissors move. Everybody was expecting them to go for the eight-man shove ... but they picked it up and ran which I think caught the All Blacks unawares.”
“That was a good example of execution on Joe’s strategy. They learned from that game three years ago where they closed up shop. They tried to score points in the second-half and that [try] was crucial at that point in time.”
The World Cup winning coach believes the loss will bolster the quality of World Rugby, but is confident the All Blacks will have a steely response for the month of November.
“It’s not great for New Zealanders maybe, but to create interest in the game you’ve got to have competition, and this just proves there’s still competition there, and that every side is beatable.
“Every time you get beaten in an All Black team it galvanises people, and it focuses people, You learn more from defeat than you do from winning, and they haven’t had that opportunity for 19 tests.
“They’re very, very professional, and have certain things they do every week which will not change. The calendar is pretty much the same for every test.”
“Some people were starting to wonder if this team was beatable. Well Joe and his team have certainly proved that. That return game in Dublin is now going to be very, very interesting.”
Henry’s successor, Steve Hansen also addressed his side’s defeat. Speaking on the New Zealand Herald’s podcast, the All Blacks coach believes the result is only a hiccup on the All Black’s tour of Europe.
“We know we’re not a bad rugby side because we lost one game but Ireland played particularly well. “
The 57-year-old admitted their 18 win streak was always going to be hard to top, as the team can sometimes crumble under the mental pressure.
“The record’s 18 for a reason, it’s very hard mentally to get up to be in the right place, to play the best you can play all the time. Slowly but surely complacency creeps in and so too vulnerability. Sometimes coaches might not be seeing the things we need to be seeing.”
He said: “We now have to make sure we’re right. We’ll get our two big boys (Retallick and Whitelock) back at lock. Not saying that’s the only solution, we also have to look at ourselves as a team.”
Meanwhile, others took a more scathing approach to the result with Newstalk ZB radio host Mark Watson attacking Steve Hansen’s charges.
“This is as bad a season as 1998 when we lost five tests in a row and 2007 when we went out in the quarter-finals.
“Great day for Ireland, not a great day for world rugby,” Watson said of the All Blacks first defeat in 19 starts. Forget your 18 consecutive test victories. Half of those were done in 2015. (It’s a) meaningless record,” said Watson.
Looking ahead to next year’s highly anticipated Lions tour of New Zealand, Watson said the Ireland defeat would ensure the All Blacks were at their ruthless best on home soil.
“This is the wake up that New Zealand rugby needed, this is the little reminder New Zealand rugby needed.
“The British and Irish Lions will get hammered here next year because of what happened in Chicago.”
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