Win or lose, the reign of an international rugby coach is judged by more than just stakeholders. It’s both a popularity contest and a statement of their talent and intent.
Warren Gatland knows that heat well. Over two decades in the kitchen where if ‘the heat is too hot, just grin and bear it mate’. Successful, yet maybe this Lions Series tour will not engrain his mantle on the game and like many others, the facts have to be accepted and put into that learnings basket.
Two other current leaders have been in direct offensive battle recently, with Dave Rennie and Ian Foster each knowing the heat well. Two men who have seen the flames growing around them incrementally…. and that is when they are winning!
Rennie took the French Test series by the merest of fractions, while Foster remains the most successful coach ever to be under huge immense local pressure. These men all are used to the continuous exposure to the assault of sports media. Yet for many, the ups and downs of the game add both intrigue and a real case of ‘sticks and stones’.
Gatland, Rennie, Foster feel International rugby coach heat
Opening with the most recent British and Irish Lions excursion, this one has brought a taste of melancholy to the management and members. These are directed by Warren Gatland, although few will have avoided the scrutiny of a 1/3 winning record.
Sure, for many players like Finn Russell, Marcus Smith, Robbie Henshaw, Luke Cowan-Dickie, Jack Conan, and player of the series, Maro Itoje, they have emerged with their pride in place. The pride of participating in a Lions tour will boost theirs, and many others’ careers. A lost effort but the circumstances did make it a trial more than a triumph – though ultimately, the head coach holds the largest target for the slings and arrows of rugby pundits across the United Kingdom and Emerald Isles.
‘He is used to it’, is what some will say. And the image of Gatland parrying off the lunges at his reputation is probably slightly exaggerated. At this point, they must be leaving a mark though. It has to; especially after his terms with Wales, as Lions coach and as the man who came to symbolise the huge resources employed for a modern Lions enterprise. From this viewpoint, the 2021 entity faced more challenges than any other before it and the Coach will pay for the lasting bad taste.
Breaking this analysis into two spheres is practical. On one hand, is the moral dischord of touring during a pandemic. It stripped away the very heart of any touring Lions group; its support base. Not that the group would not have done all they could to make it ‘feel normal’. The fact they had to put on that face, is one historical point that Gatland will be associated with.
Secondly but even as important, was performance. Kicking for the sake of it, not using the people he selected in the first place, and the inability to register his voice in the media scrum are factors to argue over.
Not simply who played, or what direction it took. For all his motivating force, Warren Gatland seemed to not be in command of this tour. He was uneasy – not willing to bite back – and in the end, too many cooks spoiled the broth.
Note: Warren Gatland will now return to New Zealand to prepare for the Chiefs 2022 Super Rugby season (calendar tbc).
Dave Rennie cannot step confidently in Wallabies golden veil
For an International rugby coach, you need to step out on your own. To cast your shadow on the side you’ve been tasked to drive. The same can be said of Eddie Jones, Joe Schmidt, Jake White, and even Fabien Galthie.
Jones and White had the glory of seeing their men hold aloft the greatest prize, others feel the weight far too much, too early. Dave Rennie appears to suffer that fate.
The Kiwi was brought in to lead the Aussie men. Tt was an opportunity which he might never see in his homeland. So All Black was swapped for Gold. That was a bright colour in 2020, where he could only do the most with what he had. And it wasn’t all that bad. A win over the All Blacks a big plus, though the draw and loss were as per usual.
With a disrupted Super season and a tough assignment against France, Rennie looked to have avoided the pressure pot. 2/3 wins in a home series (the first since 1985 against Les Bleus) was a measure he must have wanted to celebrate but in his downplayed manner, Rennie only wanted to pass on the congratulations. If ever the head coach of the Wallabies would have been excused for a fist pump, Dave stood back like usual. Opportunity lost.
The squeaky-slim nature didn’t give him the confidence base, and with James O’Connor injured, he was limited in the proficiencies of his young pivot. As he had with the Chiefs and with Glasgow, it made his choices more finite. And when you need to face the All Blacks, any blemish is used against you.
Not that his boys in gold were not unable to put a dent in the New Zealand armour. They not only held the side within range, a better final quarter saw a better outcome than had been predicted. While he enamored their potential, unlike Eddie Jones – who drives home his team’s qualities – Rennie wore his veil and did not give his men the big endorsement required. Some sides deserve ‘full credit’ but you imagined a “good work boys BUT…” was how the team might have received it.
No wonder the all too familiar follow-up Test ended badly. Again, the Australian team did very well in the first 40 minutes. It is just that fans saw it coming before the Aussies did. Waves of All Black attack, that rattled up a new record score. The heads dropped, and Rennie will no doubt return home to calls for a change.
No less pressure on New Zealand head coach Ian Foster
How can that be? The All Blacks are unbeaten in 2021….why has that not extinguished all the external pressure points? Well, there are factors from within, and factors that are both employment and perception-based.
Beginning from within, the idea that a challenged All Blacks team can be rattled has been in the background since October 2019. Foster was not the head coach, but he was a part of the problem. And if you are painted with the same brush, it will take a long time to wash it off.
A less than impressive opening season did very little to quell the voices of media and of his team’s fans. They are always split you might think but in Fozzy, it is more vocalized than ever.
The way Foster interacts with others has also not changed since his inclusion in the Steve Hansen clique. He gruffed at questions from Last Word on Rugby on whether a (then) 27-year-old Beauden Barrett was focusing on his kicking. He brushed off questions like that right through 2020, and when his initial appraisal that an ‘unpractised Los Pumas’ would be unprepared for their opening Test of that season turned into a sour loss, it saw him react indeterminately.
The results so far have been better than average while not exceeding the recent levels. Besides scores aggregating over 300 to date, few will put their full support behind his place. Why? For a lot, it is because he is still on a 24-month trial.
New Zealand Rugby is yet to underline his place as the head coach to take the All Blacks to Paris 2023. A point that speaks volumes of both the key figure, and the ones who might appoint him. And even a committee recommendation to engage in dialogue for a contract extension has been refused by the NZR Board. Is this going to play out in a performance-based reappointment? Or is there a personnel issue that sees the coaching group not having the confidence of the decision-makers?
It can only make for conjecture, and might even infect the team and senior leadership. The NZ Herald has reported that senior players want Foster to be retained yet a poll of stakeholders could be anywhere from 50/50 to even an endorsement of the Board. The winning results need to continue – and specifically, against the World Champions. Until then, the vote can wait.
Pressure cooker on International Rugby Coach in 2021
Chances are, the pressure cooker atmosphere for pretty much every International rugby coach will exist this season. Beginning with Wayne Pivac, who must want to get his side together early and plan for a great November International series. As will Gregor Townsend.
Eddie Jones must still be confident even though members of his side are deflated by the outcome in Cape Town. Expect Jones to be vocal in how he saw that tour operate. As Gatland hibernates in Waihi Beach, it will be easier for the English coach to fire barbs at the tour – easier than Lions assistants, like Andy Farrell, and Townsend. They will want to avoid being labeled.
And from the Southern Hemisphere, three or four coaches will want a successful Rugby Championship to promote their agenda. It would just be better when you have been winning, rather than as a defeated director. On that standing, the heat just gets higher, and higher, and the end-of-year review looks any bleaker than it would have been expected to.
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