Joe Schmidt joins All Black backroom after covid outbreak
Joe Schmidt has been rushed into the New Zealand set-up after Covid-19 felled the side's coaching stocks on the eve of Ireland's tour.
The delicious prospect of Joe Schmidt riding to the rescue of a Covid-hit All Blacks squad to guide them into this Saturday’s first Test against Ireland has emerged from a day of disruption and drama in both camps.
Five days out from the opening match at Eden Park of a three-Test series, the former Ireland boss was brought in by the New Zealand Rugby Union to train the All Blacks in the wake of head coach Ian Foster and senior assistant John Plumtree testing positive for Covid.
Schmidt had walked away from the Ireland head coach role in October 2019 following a World Cup quarter-final mauling by New Zealand in Tokyo to begin life away from professional rugby coaching. Or so it seemed.
In November 2018, a month before he would be crowned World Rugby’s coach of the year Schmidt had announced his decision to depart after guiding Ireland to six years of unprecedented success that had seen him deliver a Grand Slam, two other Six Nations titles and historic victories in one shape or form over the All Blacks, Australia and South Africa with the words: “I have decided to finish coaching and will prioritise family commitments after the Rugby World Cup in 2019.” Few believed the extremely driven, detail-oriented coaching obsessive would stick to the first part of that statement even if the second part was undoubtedly his priority. A role with World Rugby came in 2020 as Andy Farrell stepped up from defence coach to replace Schmidt and last November it was announced he had joined the Blues coaching staff in a supporting role for the 2022 Super Rugby season.
That culminated in the Auckland-based franchise reaching the final earlier this month on the back of a 17-game winning run that was ended in that decider by the Crusaders but Schmidt had by then already been handed a contract to join the All Blacks as an independent selector as analyst, although not until the series against Ireland had been completed.
That plan was accelerated yesterday as first Foster and Plumtree were forced into isolation in addition to centres Jack Goodhue and David Havili followed later in the day by defence coach Scott McLeod.
With only two healthy coaches in the All Blacks camp, including former Ireland scrum coach Greg Feek, Schmidt was drafted in to assist with preparations for the upcoming Test series with his old team.
"We need hands on the ground and that's a wonderful resource,” attack coach Brad Mooar said yesterday. “Who better to have than Joe to come in and cast an eye over a bit of detail and put his shoulder to the wheel for us."
Ireland are not without such issues themselves, with Farrell losing wing Mack Hansen to a positive Covid test and sending forwards Iain Henderson and Rob Herring for medical scans after picking up injuries in Saturday’s intense training session at North Harbour Stadium.
Farrell was set to name his team overnight to kick off the tour in Hamilton tomorrow when an Ireland XV will face the Maori All Blacks. His former boss will be sure to keep a close eye on both the selection and their performance at FMG Stadium Waikato though Mooar reiterated that Foster was still the head coach and would pick the team alongside former Ireland forwards coach Plumtree and fellow selector Grant Fox.
"Foz is the head coach and remains so,” Mooar added. “How that looks at the end of the week we'll deal with that once we get past the beginning of the week. Those things will bubble away."
The loss of Goodhue and Havili meanwhile offers the possibility of a Test debut for Blues centre Roger Tuivasa-Schek at inside centre although the front-runner appears to be the Chiefs’ Quinn Tupaea. There are also injury doubts concerning fellow backs Jordie Barrett and scrum-half Aaron Smith.
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