All Blacks wary of that Cardiff calamity

NEW Zealand’s shock loss to France at the 2007 World Cup continues to burn deep with the All Blacks drawing on the defeat as motivation for the second Test in Wellington tomorrow.

The world champions expect a French backlash after last week’s first Test thrashing, and said the 2018 defeat in the World Cup quarterfinals 11 years ago had taught them never to underestimate their mercurial opponents. It condemned the All Blacks to their earliest exit at a World Cup – just four months after they had beaten France 42-11 and 6110 in a two-Test home series.

That, according to head coach Steve Hansen, is why last week’s runaway 52-11 over France in Auckland was no indication of how the second Test will pan out.

“We worked that out in half-anhour sitting despondently in a changing shed in Cardiff,” Hansen said yesterday after naming an unchanged side, referring to the 2007 game.

French coach Jacques Brunel has made five changes and while he downplayed the chance of an upset he said Les Bleus “will not make it easy” for the All Blacks this time. “We want to win, but first it will be necessary to stem [the All Blacks attack].”

In a loose-forward shake-up, Brunel has rushed Kelian Galletier and Mathieu Babillot into the starting lineup, replacing Judicael Cancoriet and Fabien Sanconnie, while Kevin Gourdon, who started on the flank in Auckland, moves to the backrow. Galletier and Babillot were late arrivals in New Zealand after playing in the Top 14 final between Castres and Montpellier, along with Benjamin Fall, who takes over the fullback role from Maxime Medard. Gael Fickou comes into the side for injured wing Remy Grosso.

“We made big mistakes [last week]. We cannot do that against the All Blacks,” Brunel added.

However, Hansen said he was trying not to read too much into last week’s result.

“One of the big lessons we learned [in Cardiff] was that if you don’t plan for the unexpected then you’re going to get smacked by it and ever since that day we’ve always expected the unexpected to happen,” he said.

“Whilst it was a painful moment in All Blacks history, particularly for the people involved in it, me being one of them, I think that game has had a significant bearing on what’s happened since.”

New Zealand have played 138 Tests since that fateful day, winning 120 including two World Cups for an 87% success rate.