All Blacks snub Olympic sevens
No All Blacks wanted to represent the New Zealand sevens team at the Tokyo Olympics next year.
While four Super Rugby players have been released from their clubs to allow them to join the NZ sevens squad after the Mitre 10 Cup, no All Blacks accepted an invite from sevens coach Clark Laidlaw to add an Olympic gold medal to their CV.
Although NZ Rugby head of high performance Mike Anthony wouldn’t say which All Blacks were on Laidlaw’s wishlist, it’s highly likely speedsters such as Rieko Ioane, Sevu Reece and George Bridge would have been among those approached.
The selection process for Tokyo 2020 began in September last year when letters were sent to players, who were invited to attend a meeting. ‘‘At that point a number of them ruled themselves out when we got responses either from the players or their agents,’’ Anthony confirmed.
Laidlaw, who was unavailable for comment yesterday, then knew he had to look elsewhere for talent.
Super Rugby players Caleb Clarke (Blues), Etene Nanaiseturo (Chiefs), Salesi Rayasi (Hurricanes) and Scott Gregory (Highlanders) have been granted leave from their clubs to shift into the 2019-2020 sevens campaign.
‘‘At the end of the day those [All Blacks] players have made a decision that they want to focus their energy elsewhere, given the challenges at the end of the year and coaching and so on,’’ Anthony said. ‘‘They made that choice pretty early on in the process. So they let us know, which allowed us to focus on the group that were keen to be a part of it.’’
In 2016 All Blacks Sonny Bill Williams and Liam Messam were picked by former coach Gordon Tietjens to travel to Rio, where the team lost to eventual winners in Fiji in their quarterfinal.
The leadup to the tournament was messy, withall Blacks such as Ben Smith, Beauden Barrett and Ardie Savea declining the chance to play in Rio.
At one point it bordered on farce, with Savea having a change of heart during the Super Rugby season – much to the disgust of Tietjens.
Tietjens later described his shock decision as a ‘‘dagger in the chest’’, believing Savea had changed his mind because someone from with NZ Rugby had got in his ear.
Tietjens later lifted the lid on the ugly saga by unleashing in his autobiography.
‘‘Here was a guy who only weeks before had told me how much he was enjoying the environment and how excited he was to get himself into the best physical shape for the Olympics,’’ Tietjens wrote.
‘‘Now he was telling me he was refocusing on the fifteens game. I didn’t need to ask him for an explanation, so I wished him luck and left it at that.’’
Anthony said NZ Rugby didn’t want a repeat of this awkward situation; that was why it wanted to give Laidlaw a clear picture of where he stood in terms of being able to pick players.
Anthony wouldn’t give specific reasons why the All Blacks players declined to be make themselves available.
But with a new coach to be appointed as a replacement for Steve Hansen after the World Cup, it’s probable the All Blacks will be wary of sending the wrong message to his replacement by making themselves unavailable.