Aussies have All Blacks targeted

MELBOURNE: Australia’s top rugby brains meet in Sydney this week to plot the end of New Zealand’s dominance and the Wallabies’ restoration to the top of the rankings.

Since the Wallabies’ run to the 2015 World Cup final, Australian rugby has been in a funk. None of the country’s five Super Rugby sides were able to snag a win over New Zealand opponents this season and the Wallabies gave up the Bledisloe Cup to the All Blacks for a 15th successive year.

Crowds have turned away from both Super Rugby and Wallabies games, and the Australian Rugby Union has endured a storm of criticism over its axing of the Perthbased Western Force.

With that backdrop, Wallabies coach Michael Cheika and former Test centre Rod Kafer have championed the formation of a national coaching panel to improve standards and retain the nation’s brightest rugby minds.

Coaches will meet in Sydney for a two-day forum starting today and receive leadership training from the Sydney University of Technology with input from the Australian Institute of Sport, local media reported.

“It is borne out of the fact that we had no Super Rugby wins against the Kiwis and 15 years of Bledisloe Cup losses,” Kafer told Sydney’s Daily Telegraph. “People at some point have got to say, ‘maybe we need to do something a little bit differently’, and I reckon we’re at that point.”

The Wallabies won the 1991 and 1999 World Cups and reached the finals in 2003 and 2015, but have been second fiddle to the All Blacks for over a decade and won only one of their past 18 matches.

Pundits have long lamented Australia’s provincial parochialism and argued they need to emulate New Zealand, where the provinces and Super Rugby teams are more closely aligned with the national union in terms of player management and talent development.

The forum will bring in assistant coaches, analysts and team managers to work out ways to lift performance.

“We’re trying to answer the question of what does the player of the future look like, and are we preparing for the player of the future,” Kafer said. – Reuters

NICK Kyrgios said a stomach bug and a shoulder problem had forced him to retire after losing the first set in his Shanghai Masters first-round match against American Steve Johnson yesterday.The mercurial Australian, who lost to Rafa Nadal in the China Open final on Sunday, took a 4-2 lead in the tiebreak before Johnson fired a series of winners to take the set 7-6(5).Kyrgios then ran up to his opponent, shook his hand and walked off court to boos from the crowd, leaving Johnson and chair umpire Fergus Murphy confused.Local media reported that Kyrgios received two code violations during the set and was docked a point in the tiebreak.Reports also said he told officials he would quit if he lost the set.Kyrgios was fined $16 500 by the ATP last year for tanking during his second-round defeat by Mischa Zverev in Shanghai. – Reuters