Kidwell will stay as coach of Kiwis
Incumbent will be given more support in the guise of a mentor to lift performance.
David Kidwell will be retained as Kiwis coach. Despite a disastrous end to the Four Nations campaign — where they were held to a draw by minnows Scotland, then smashed in the final by the Kangaroos — Kidwell has survived the New Zealand Rugby League’s review into the tour.
However, there will almost certainly be changes to his staff. There is uncertainty over the future of assistants Justin Morgan and Willie Poching, who were both contracted until the end of the tour.
There is also a recognition that Kidwell needs an experienced hand to guide him, in either a mentor or assistant coach-type role, similar to the support provided to Stephen Kearney by Wayne Bennett during the 2008 World Cup campaign.
The review — to be completed by mid-January — is being conducted by a four-man panel that includes an NZRL director, two representatives from High Performance Sport New Zealand and an “independent person” with a league background.
They have reviewed written reports from players and management, and a sample of players across the team have been interviewed.
The Herald on Sunday understands that while there are concerns over the performances in the past fortnight of the tour, there is an overall level of satisfaction with Kidwell’s performance, certainly enough for the 39-year-old to keep his job.
There is recognition that he came into the role with an extremely limited preparation, one of the shortest planning periods of any Kiwis coach in recent memory, following the sudden departure of Kearney to the Warriors.
It was also a reminder of the large gulf between assistant and head coach, which Kidwell struggled to bridge.
Kidwell had spent two years as Kearney's understudy but his first season in charge returned just one win from five matches, against England. Three of those losses were against Australia. He was also heavily criticised for his sometimes bizarre press conferences and uncertain team selections. The panel — and the NZRL — have also recognised that while it was a below-par campaign, the performances should be put in perspective. The Kiwis made the final, which they failed to do in the 2009 and 2011 Four Nations tournaments in England, and their victory in Huddersfield was just the third New Zealand win over the Lions in the Northern Hemisphere in the past decade.
But there were also some concerns. The Kiwis have a history of building through tournaments, of improving across campaigns, but they seemed to go backwards during the Four Nations. While Australia grew stronger, New Zealand peaked for the first match on tour and never reached those heights again. Kidwell and his assistants failed to get the best out of an extremely strong roster and that will have to change in 2017.