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I don’t know what’s caused it, and I’m a little nervous about how it potentially ends, but the coaches are fired up about something ahead of the year’s first Bledisloe Cup clash in Sydney on Saturday night.
It all started innocently enough. Wallabies coach Michael Cheika was last week asked a question about the All Blacks’ embarrassment of riches around flyhalf and openside. He replied that having to select between Aaron Cruden and Beauden Barrett, and likewise Sam Cane and Ardie Savea, was going to be a “selection headache” for his counterpart Steve Hansen.
I don’t know how Cheika said it; I haven’t been able to find the vision to observe the context. In fact, even the straight quote itself is a little difficult to nail down, though there are plenty of references to the comment being said. As a result, it’s difficult to know if Cheika was speaking in flattering terms or through envy of being forced to decide between such abundant and worthy talent himself.
And either way, it’s a difficult point to argue. Whichever way Hansen goes, he’s going to name a wonderful player, but choosing between the options in both positions is going to a difficult one to make.
So it was rather surprising that Hansen bit back as he did on arrival in Sydney this week.
“It’s good of the Australian coach to start picking our team. I’d say he’s got enough problems of his own, probably,” Hansen said, when asked how he thought the clash was stacking up.
“But we’ll pick ours and he can pick his and he’ll have a lot to say, no doubt.”
Sorry, what now?
Why did such a simple commentary warrant such a passive-aggressive reaction?
Yes, Hansen plays along with it, and it undoubtedly he’d argue that it’s all just part of the fun, but that being the case, why the snide little “I’d say he’s got enough problems of his own, probably” and “he’ll have a lot to say, no doubt” additions?
It seems most un-Steve Hansen like. Or it was.
Two years ago, Hansen was rather supportive of then Wallabies coach Ewen McKenzie.
“It’s not a matter of having sympathy or not having sympathy, it’s just about understanding that coaching an international team is tough work and you don’t want rugby teams anywhere in the world to be under that sort of pressure because it’s no good for rugby,” he said only a day before McKenzie sensationally took that long, lonely walk down that dark Suncorp Stadium corridor in Brisbane.
Even toward Robbie Deans, Hansen was generally supportive in what he called a ‘big brother-little brother’ kind of way.
“Just because Australia aren’t winning against us doesn’t make Robbie a bad coach. He had a great record with the Crusaders where he obviously had a really good team,” Hansen said after the 2012 Bledisloe series was quickly wrapped up and Deans found himself under pressure.
“I’ve spent a lot of time coaching with him, he’s not a bad coach. Any team that gets his services are going to benefit from it. They’re still the No.2 side in the world. He’s copping a lot of flak for losing to us, rather than people looking at the bigger picture.”
It’s one thing to come back with a snappy line when responding to comments from other coaches. But it seems like this year, Hansen has decided to play off the front foot.
Back in June, Hansen took the opportunity to suggest Cheika had let himself be “bullied” by Eddie Jones. And that was in response to a question of how he thought three of the ‘home nations’ had approached their southern hemisphere tours.
Cheika did have something to say in return this time, but probably not in the way Hansen suggested at the arrivals gate.
“I don’t know why he’s upset or what he’s upset about, that’s up to him,” Cheika said bemused, when Hansen’s comments were inevitably raised on Monday. “For us, we know how we’re thought of; they think we’re no chance to do anything.”
“And they’re validated, we haven’t beaten them for ages in the series, so it’s understandable they’d think that.”
So what’s going on, Steve?
If it’s a man worried about the state of his nearest rugby rival assisting in the marketing of the biggest game of the year, then it’s a job well done. Here are talking about the Bledisloe clash, again, now that the glow of the Olympic rugby triumph is moving on.
Surely it’s not a man actually showing signs of stress about a selection decision? It will be a tough choice for Hansen, no doubt, but surely it’s not so bad that it’s making him a bit snippety? Strange that that’s what’s pushed him over the edge, if it is. It’s not like the All Blacks are anything other than raging favourites on Saturday night.
Only Steve Hansen knows why he reacted the way he did. And whatever his reasons – however logical or hare-brained they might be – it’s certainly added a bit of spice to the clash.