Coaches’ plea to playmaker

The Kiwis coaches want Shaun Johnson to ‘bounce forward’ from his axing, not backwards.

Johnson was the high profile casualty from the Kiwis’ 26-4 loss to the loss to the Kangaroos last Saturday.

It came as a surprise to no-one that he’s been replaced in the team by Kieran Foran for this weekend’s encounter against Great Britain in Auckland.

At an opposed training run against the New Zealand Residents XIII yesterday, Johnson lined up against players who were alongside him last weekend and Kiwis assistant coach Ben Gardiner says they hope Johnson takes his demotion the right way.

‘‘One thing with Shaun is that he is full of energy, he is happy to be amongst the group,’’ Gardiner said.

‘‘Like everyone in that situation, you take it pretty hard at first, but it’s your ability to bounce forward, not bounce back.

‘‘We want him to bounce forward, into a position where he’s ready to go for next week and he’s an option for us to select.

‘‘He’s definitely not banished or anything like that, it’s just an opportunity to give Kieran a go and after this weekend’s game we’ll see what happened and go forward from there.’’

There has probably never been a New Zealand league player who’s been equally praised and criticised as much as Johnson.

Yes, he can be a match winner, but he can also have shockers like last weekend and Gardiner says it comes down to Johnson himself to find that consistency in his game.

‘‘That’s the challenge for him,’’ he said. ‘‘People talk about consistency and stuff like that and at the end of the day it’s up to Shaun with how he deals with that and whether he bounces forward with it.’’