NZ Rugby World

World Cup years tend to run to a different pattern and throw up all sorts of intriguing stories. This year is unlikely to be any different.

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Internatio­nal teams will mostly have worked out the bulk of their World Cup squad a year before the tournament starts.

But coaches like to keep the door open for a new player or two to force their way into contention.

There's nothing quite like going to a World Cup with an element of surprise to unleash and of course the greatest example of all was Jonah Lomu in 1995.

The world really didn't know anything about the 20-year-old Lomu despite the fact he'd played two tests in 1994. He was essentiall­y a secret when he arrived in South Africa, but obviously not for long.

Never in the history of the game has one player transforme­d a team with such dramatic effect and never again has a World Cup been dominated so heavily by just one player.

The question ahead of Super Rugby kicking off in 2019 is whether we will see an All Blacks wildcard emerge so strongly that they have to be included in the squad that travels to Japan.

It's tempting to say not this time. The enormous injury toll the All Blacks suffered in 2017 meant they ended up using in excess of 40 players that year. And then last year the test against Japan saw the All Blacks include an additional 19 players so we know, really, not just who are viewed as the top 35 or so players, but who are the top 50.

So if there is a surprise selection in the World Cup squad it is unlikely it will be someone from outside the wider group.

All Blacks coach Steve Hansen believes he and his management team have built the requisite depth and that Super Rugby will provide more of a clue about pecking order rather than throwing up new players to consider.

“We have got some people putting their hands up so Super season is going to be important,” he says.

“I think there are two ways we can play. What we are going to have available to us is people who can play an aerial game in our back three.

“We know Bender [Ben Smith] can and Rieko [Ioane] is getting better all the time. We have seen Damian [McKenzie] go back there and he's happy under the high ball and Jordie [Barrett] can do that from fullback or the wing. So we have got plenty of people who can do that.

“We have got a midfield that is crammed through with possibilit­ies we just need them to get on the park and be able to play.

“We have got three very good first-fives. There is a good combinatio­n there. We can play Beauden [Barrett] with Damian or Richie [Mo'unga] with Damian or Richie with Beauden so that is a nice combinatio­n.

“At six we have seen Shannon play well earlier in the year. Liam played well in the middle and then Vaea played well late so there is a little bit of a contest going on there.

“Sam Whitelock getting 17 weeks off is going to be a totally different athlete to what we had this year and Brodie just needs an opportunit­y to play week in week out.

“And we have gone really deep with the front-row this year. The champ, Dane Coles, is back and in his absence Codie [Taylor] has done remarkably well. We have plenty of depth so we will see what comes out of Super Rugby and make some strong decisions.”

As Hansen says, the most contestabl­e position is blindside and by extension the make-up of the loose forwards they take to Japan.

It's a given that Kieran Read is going and if he recovers from his broken neck, Sam Cane will join him as a certainty. Ardie Savea has moved into the guaranteed category as well and probably so too has Liam Squire.

The remainder of the places will depend on whether the selectors want to take four locks and five loose forwards or do what they did in 2015 and take three of the former and six of the latter.

If they take four locks the best guess would be that Patrick Tuipulotu joins Whitelock, Retallick and Scott Barrett on the plane.

If it is six loose forwards then there will be a long list of players competing for two spots. Given his performanc­e in the last test of 2018, Vaea Fifita will be in a strong place to make it, heading a queue that includes Shannon Frizell, Jordan Taufua and Jackson Hemopo.

And probably Matt Todd is in line for the last place with others such as Dalton Papali'i, Dillon Hunt, Luke Whitelock and Akira Ioane hoping to change the picture.

And that's why Super Rugby carries so much intrigue in World Cup year. Take

Fifita as a prime example. His career went backwards in the first half of 2018 because the Hurricanes wouldn't pick him at blindside.

Hansen says that new Hurricanes coach John Plumtree has agreed to no longer use Fifita as a lock, but then injuries and form could require that decision to be reviewed.

The situation at the Highlander­s is even more intriguing as they have four capped bindsides in their midst and how and when they are used will have a huge bearing on the final mix of the All Blacks' squad.

Hemopo, while seen as a No 6 by the All Blacks, will again be used at lock by the Highlander­s. Squire, Frizell and Elliot Dixon are going to be battling it out for game time on the side of the scrum and it could be that one, if not two of them, end up being frustrated by their lack of opportunit­ies.

And then there is Ioane at the Blues. He fell away in 2018 but the arrival of Tom Coventry at the Blues and the prospect of them being greatly improved could yet inject Ioane into the frame.

Coventry is a renowned hard task master and he could be the man who gets Ioane running straight and hard and tackling more dynamicall­y with his shoulders and leg drive hurting opponents.

Sitting outside all of this is Gareth Evans at the Hurricanes who made an impressive debut against Japan last year. He is a high energy player who could force a total re-think if he can play as well again for the Hurricanes this year as he did last.

There is at least one former World Cup year problem that we are unlikely to see arise in 2019. Previous World Cup campaigns have been affected by a near paranoid obsession with resting key players earlier in the year to ensure they have something in the tank come September and October.

In November 2002, All Blacks coach John Mitchell left most of his best players at home in New Zealand rather than take them to Europe for a three test programme against England, Wales and France.

He wanted to stretch the off-season for the bulk of the players he was certain he would be taking to Australia 11 months later.

It's the same reason why Graham Henry was granted permission to keep 22 All Blacks out of the first seven rounds of the 2007 Super Rugby competitio­n.

He felt an extra month of conditioni­ng would ensure the likes of Dan Carter and Richie McCaw would arrive in France in

September 2007 in peak physical condition.

It was a sound theory but the execution wasn't good and when the All Blacks crashed out in the quarter-final, it thankfully ended this obsession with having to take drastic steps to keep players fresh.

What we will see this year is pretty much what happened in 2015. There will be a few senior players – most notably Sam Whitelock, Read and Taylor who will start Super Rugby in round four.

These three need a bit more time than their peers. But for the rest of the All Blacks, they will be heavily involved and managed to an agreement they will not play more than five games in a row and that they will miss at least two Super Rugby games.

And when they are not required, they will supposedly not train or be involved at all with the team so they can have a total rest.

This compromise plan allows Super Rugby sides to get plenty out of their All Blacks but not so much that they leave them drained and mentally exhausted by July.

This balance should, Hansen hopes, be the right way to play a handful of players back into form and produce more of his favourite World Cup year stories – which is veteran players all but written off proving everyone wrong for doubting them.

Top of that list is Sonny Bill Williams. He had a horrible 2018 where his body just wouldn't hold up at all.

His critics say his frailty was a result of his age, but it was more likely simply bad luck and Hansen is confident that with regular game time, Williams will prove he's still a world class player.

Read is another hoping an extended off season will help him eke out the last part of his physical recovery from major back surgery 12 months ago.

The skipper hasn't recovered 100 per cent yet, but again, an extended period of conditioni­ng without playing, should provide him with the chance to find the missing five per cent.

It's critical he gets there so his attack game can be restored to the point where he is able to use his stunning off-loading game to create opportunit­ies that no other No 8 in world rugby is currently able to.

Whitelock, who will have had 17 weeks off before he plays, should return a different player.

The big lock was troubled by a groin injury for most of last year that made it hard for him to run at full speed.

He was also dented by the volume of rugby he played and while he ground through the last few tests, he wasn't at his imperious best.

Time off should enable him to not only fix his muscle strain but rediscover the dynamic edge that was such a feature of his game in 2017 and saw him earn the accolade of New Zealand player of the year.

“That's why I find the comments about Reado and Beaudy quite laughable,” says Hansen.

“We ended 2018 with the same winning average as we did in 2014 so we lost two games. People were saying in 2014 that Richie is too old and that he's got to go and that Carter is finished.

“But when you keep the faith and you know how good they are...both those guys were instrument­al in us winning the World Cup. Beauden Barrett has been world player of the year for two years. He might not have been world player of the year in 2018 but he was still a very good player and even where he is at when he's not having a great game he's still a good player.

“Our job is to keep growing him and Reado is such a calm, influence on the group that his leadership is not even in question.”

It won't just be form and injuries providing the sub text to this year's Super Rugby. There will of course be the story of who will replace Hansen as All Blacks coach after the World Cup.

Having been in the top job since 2012 and with the All Blacks since 2004, Hansen revealed in December last year that he will be standing down after the World Cup and it is an open field in terms of who his replacemen­t might be.

Ireland's Joe Schmidt was probably the favourite until he too announced that he will be taking a break from coaching to spend time with his family.

If he does indeed commit to a long break then current assistant coach Ian Foster will be in a good position to take over should be interested with applicatio­ns possible from Warren Gatland, Vern Cotter, Jamie Joseph, Dave Rennie and Scott Robertson.

Media interest is only going to intensify as the tournament nears but no matter what happens, NZR boss Steve Tew says they won't bring the appointmen­t process forward to before the World Cup.

“There's no point in hiding it, we are hoping Ian [Foster] will be a candidate and the last thing you would want to do is distract him and the people around him before the World Cup,” said Tew.

“Other candidates might well be coaching at the World Cup too, so we'll give them their space until it's finished.

“We stay in contact with all the people you anticipate we should stay in contact with. No one should be surprised about the process we're going to follow because it's been well signalled and communicat­ed to all the people on your current 'who's going to be next coach' list.

“While that [World Cup] review is being done we'll be in the market. And we'll feed the findings from the campaign into the process. That will tell us some things about where the team is at and might change the

emphasis you put on the new coach required. But we'll have it done by Christmas of 2019.”

And the final piece of the World Cup year story puzzle will be player movements. There will be plenty of movement and many careers that come to an end.

Read confirmed in November last year that he would not be staying after the World Cup and is expected to sign with Racing 92. Ben Smith has signed with Pau and Milner-Skudder is heading to Toulon.

Retallick, Barrett and Whitelock are all expected to re-sign with NZR through to 2023 but the former two especially may have playing sabbatical­s built into their contracts.

None of Dane Coles, Owen Franks, Aaron Smith or Ryan Crotty have given much clue about what they will do and it is as easy to see all four heading overseas as it is to them all staying on for more.

Whatever the various players decide, there is no escaping the fact that in World Cup year, player movement becomes a massive story.

In 2007 there was some angst before the tournament because Carl Hayman, Luke McAlister and Aaron Mauger all announced they would be leaving when all three had a huge amount still to offer.

In 2015 Charles Piutau dominated the headlines when he changed his mind about a contract extension and instead signed with Ulster. He was only 24 and seen as a probable big part of the back three in 2016.

All we can be sure of is that 2019 won't be dull. World Cup years never are.

 ?? LONG REST ?? The extended break that both Sam Whitelock and Kieran Read will have should help them reach Japan in top condition.
LONG REST The extended break that both Sam Whitelock and Kieran Read will have should help them reach Japan in top condition.
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 ?? SECOND COMING ?? Sonny Bill Williams is under pressure to prove he’s not past his best after a difficult 2018.
SECOND COMING Sonny Bill Williams is under pressure to prove he’s not past his best after a difficult 2018.
 ?? POLE POSITION ?? Ian Foster will be one of the favoured candidates to take over from Steve Hansen.
POLE POSITION Ian Foster will be one of the favoured candidates to take over from Steve Hansen.
 ?? SURPRISE PACKAGE ?? The Highlander­s were a massive surprise winner of Super Rugby in 2015.
SURPRISE PACKAGE The Highlander­s were a massive surprise winner of Super Rugby in 2015.
 ?? BAD BLOW ?? Jason Eaton was missed at the 2007 World Cup after damaging his knee in Super Rugby. february/march 2019 | NZ RUGBY WORLD |
BAD BLOW Jason Eaton was missed at the 2007 World Cup after damaging his knee in Super Rugby. february/march 2019 | NZ RUGBY WORLD |

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