Character after fall from grace

directly to South Africa, he looks a certainty to start there next week against the Boks.

Continued Hansen: ‘‘Squire and Vaea took the opportunity to play well in his absence. He’ll have to wait his turn too.’’

These cannot be reassuring words for Kaino who is working his way through the most uncomfortable of final years as an All Black, if this indeed is his fate.

The personal issues which saw him return to Auckland early from the Bledisloe opener and then sit out the next few tests have certainly not helped his cause.

Hansen’s brutal honesty is to be commended, though.

His job is to send out the best possible All Blacks side to win test matches. It is not to cling to some misguided sense of loyalty to players who have served him well in the past. We’ve seen it before, of course. Buck Shelford was one of our greatest All Blacks, and an undefeated skipper to boot. But his career ended ingloriously when he was dropped in 1990 for the younger, more dynamic Zinzan Brooke.

He never made it back and in ‘91 he retired after that writing on the wall became so evident.

Others, too, have not ended the way their careers probably deserved. Christian Cullen was unceremoniously dumped (along with Jeff Wilson and Taine Randell) by John Mitchell in 2003, with the All Blacks coach declaring: ‘‘Christian was a bloody great rugby player, but that is the past. We look at current form.’’

If that has eerie overtones to Hansen’s comments on Kaino, you’re probably not a million miles from the truth.

Remember, it is the coach’s job to make the big decisions.

Right or wrong, they’ve got to call it as they see it.

Justin Marshall, a fine All Black halfback who played 81 tests between 1995 and 2005 was eventually politely told he did not figure in plans for the next World Cup, and was better off concluding his career in the north.

Even Julian Savea of the current crop of All Blacks has had to face the harsh realities of being an international in New Zealand.

He would assuredly waltz into any other international lineup in the world, but is surplus to requirements under Hansen, despite a remarkable record of 46 tries in 54 tests.

Time is on his side, at 27, but his replacement (Rieko Ioane) is just 20 and looks very much a keeper.

As Kaino watches on from the stands in BA, it’s worth wondering what will be going through his head.

Has he already read that writing on the wall? Has he started composing his retirement speech?

The All Blacks can be a joyous environment for a player on top of his game. But a brutally tough one when that form starts to wane.

No-one is more conscious of that right now than Jerome Kaino.