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Rugby News: 'Special job' - Razor reacts to England links, Aussies dominate WR POTY category, Ireland big guns ruled out

14th November, 2022
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14th November, 2022
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Crusaders coach Scott Robertson says coaching England would be “a pretty special job” if he doesn’t replace Ian Foster at the All Blacks.

With Eddie Jones on the way out after the World Cup, Robertson is being touted as a contender to replace him. There are plenty of Australian fans who believe Razor might be the cure to the ills currently affecting the side under Dave Rennie, who has failed to curb the team’s terrible disciplinary record.

Robertson meanwhile led the Barbarians to a 35-31 win over the All Blacks XV in London on Monday, raising more questions about his future.

The 48 year old is contracted to the Crusaders until the end of 2024, but he has a clause which allows him to leave after the 2023 World Cup if he doesn’t replace Foster.

“I’ve said it many times that the All Blacks is my preferred choice but if it didn’t work out that way, you know, England’s got so much potential, it’d be a pretty special job,” he told inews.co.uk.

“There is potential to any international job, I’ll make that clear, because there’s a few coming up (after the 2023 World Cup).

“My first choice is to be at home. And then what other potential, if it is England, Scotland or Australia or any other team that’s out there, you’ve got to look at it.”

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Robertson admitted his immediate future will depend on New Zealand Rugby’s plans for Foster post World Cup.

“I’m in constant contact with the NZRU, but you consider any opportunity in international football because there’s not many of them, and it’s a four-year cycle,” Robertson told inews.

The other candidates include La Rochelle coach and former Ireland flyhalf Ronan O’Gara, who has expressed his interest, and Leicester’s Premiership-winning coach Steve Borthwick.

Bill Sweeney, the head of the RFU, said an announcement on the next coach would likely come in May at the latest, well before the World Cup.

“‘We’re still on the same track. We said we’d announce in May,” Sweeney said.

“It could be earlier than that. It’s in good shape. We’ve got a list of candidates we think could do a very good job. It’s not just the head coach, it’s the whole coaching set-up.

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“It has to be the best coach, the right coach for the job. If it was an English person it makes life a bit easier. The first priority is it’s got to be the right person.

“If they are English then that’s great.”

Aussies dominate World Rugby category

The Wallabies and Wallaroos might be struggling but there’s no doubt where the strength of Australian international teams lay right now. The success of Aussie sevens outfits has been reflected in the nomination of finalists at the World Rugby Player of the Year awards.

Aussies missed out in the 15s nominations but three women – Maddi Levi, Charlotte Caslick and Faith Nathan are on the four person shortlist for the female sevens player award, with two men – Corey Toole and Nick Malouf – out of the four represented.

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Levi recently signed a new deal to continue in sevens while Caslick has announced she wants to represent the 15s team and the next World Cup.

Meanwhile there were two former winners on the list of four nominees for the 2022 World Rugby Men’s 15s Player of the Year. Johnny Sexton claimed the award in 2018 and is back on the list this year alongside 2021 winner Antoine Dupont. Sexton is joined by Ireland team-mate Josh van der Flier while South Africa’s linchpin Lukhanyo Am is also there.

The big omissions are Ardie Savea, who seems to have p[aid the price for the All Blacks poor start to 2022, and French forward Gregory Alldritt.

Australian Mack Hansen has been nominated in the breakthrough Test player category, having starred for Ireland, along with Italian jet Ange Capuozzo, who scored two tries in the win over the Wallabies.

2022 World Rugby awards nominees list

World Rugby Women’s 15s Breakthrough Player of the Year

Maud Muir (ENG)
Vitalina Naikore (FIJ)
Maiakawanakaulani Roos (NZL)
Ruby Tui (NZL)

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World Rugby Men’s 15s Breakthrough Player of the Year

Henry Arundell (ENG)
Ange Capuozzo (ITA)
Mack Hansen (IRE)
Dan Sheehan (IRE)

World Rugby Coach of the Year

Andy Farrell (Ireland Men’s 15s)
Fabien Galthié (France Men’s 15s)
Simon Middleton (England Women’s 15s)
Wayne Smith (New Zealand Women’s 15s)

International Rugby Players Women’s Try of the Year

Sylvia Brunt (New Zealand v Wales on 16 October)
Emily Chancellor (Australia, v England on 30 October)
Abby Dow (England v Canada on 5 November)
Linda Djougang (Ireland, v Wales on 26 March)
Nomawethu Mabenge (South Africa, v Spain on 12 August)

International Rugby Players Men’s Try of the Year

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Rodrigo Fernandez (Chile, v USA on 9 July)
Lalakai Foketi (Australia v France on 5 November)
Chris Harris (Scotland, v Italy on 12 March)
Edoardo Padovani (Italy, v Wales on 19 March)
Louis Rees-Zammit (Wales, v South Africa on 2 July)

World Rugby Women’s Sevens Player of the Year

Charlotte Caslick (AUS)
Maddison Levi (AUS)
Amee Leigh Murphy Crowe (IRE)
Faith Nathan (AUS)

World Rugby Men’s Sevens Player of the Year

Terry Kennedy (IRE)
Nick Malouf (AUS)
Kaminieli Rasaku (FIJ)
Corey Toole (AUS)

World Rugby Men’s 15s Player of the Year</b?

Antoine Dupont (FRA)
Johnny Sexton (IRE)
Lukhanyo Am (RSA)
Josh van der Flier (IRE)

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World Rugby Women’s 15s Player of the Year

Sophie de Goede (CAN)
Ruahei Demant (NZL)
Alex Matthews (ENG)
Laure Sansus (FRA)
Portia Woodman (NZL)

Irish missing two key men

Ireland will be without Joey Carbery and Robbie Henshaw for Sunday’s Test against Australia while Wales are also suffering injury concerns ahead of Australia’s visit two weeks later.

ales have already ruled out lock Will Rowlands and loose-forward Dan Lydiate.

Kiwi-born five-eighth Carbery will have to complete return to play protocols following his removal from Ireland’s win against Fiji on Saturday for a head injury assessment (HIA).

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Centre Henshaw, the 29-year-old British & Irish Lion, missed the 19-16 victory over the Springboks but returned for the 35-17 success over Fiji in which he suffered a recurrence of an injury.

“Robbie Henshaw’s hamstring issue will rule him out of this week’s game … he will continue his rehab at Leinster,” the the Irish Rugby Football Union (IRFU) said in a statement.

Fullback Jimmy O’Brien will complete the HIA process on Monday and is expected to be available to train after that.

“The players who picked up knocks against South Africa — Johnny Sexton, James Ryan, Andrew Porter, Josh van der Flier and Hugo Keenan — will be monitored across the early part of the week and re-integrated into training according to their individual management plans.”

Jonny Sexton

Jonathan Sexton (Photo By Ramsey Cardy/Sportsfile via Getty Images)

Lock Joe McCarthy returns to the squad having completed his return to play protocol, while Connacht centre Bundee Aki – who has trained with the squad for the last few weeks – is available for selection again having completed an eight-match suspension and the coaching intervention programme.

Players who sustained knocks against South Africa – Johnny Sexton, James Ryan, Andrew Porter, Josh Van Der Flier and Hugo Keenan – will be re-integrated as they return to fitness.

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Wales’ Lydiate has a broken arm after being forced off in the first half of Saturday’s 20-13 victory over Argentina. Rowlands hurt his shoulder in the same match.

Coach Wayne Pivac has called up teenage Exeter Chiefs lock Dafydd Jenkins and 23-year-old second-rower Rhys Davies as cover. Both are uncapped.

Eddie and the samurai sword

Kyle Sinckler has revealed the role played by an unorthodox team meeting involving a samurai sword and kiwi fruit in one of the greatest results in English rugby history

Sinckler is braced for “big boy” rugby when New Zealand visit Twickenham as Eddie Jones’ men enter the business end of an autumn that concludes against world champions South Africa a week later.

Underpinning the conviction that the All Blacks can be toppled on Saturday is the emphatic 19-7 victory in Yokohama when the rivals last met in the semi-finals of the World Cup three years ago.

England were unstoppable with the final score failing to reflect their dominance and Sinckler, the outstanding Bristol prop who was a starter that day, insists the foundations for the performance were laid a week earlier by their Australian coach Jones, who has a part-Japanese mother, a Japanese wife – and a Japanese sword.

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Addressing his squad, Jones used an authentic Japanese samurai bought from an antique shop to slice a kiwi fruit in half before declaring “there you go boys, see how we do it now?”. The stunt had the desired impact.

“We played Australia in the quarter final in Oita – I scored a try – and then we had a team meeting on the Sunday which is very strange. Normally Sunday is a day off, we do recovery and you never really see Eddie,” Sinckler said.

“But he called a players’ meeting at 9am. Everyone was like ‘what’s happened here? Has anyone done anything!?’ And he set the tone for the week.

“I’ll never forget that meeting in terms of how we set the week up with our game plan – talking about putting pressure on them, going at them, walking towards the danger.

“It was a surreal experience as we had no doubt after that meeting we were going to win and it was the only game in my rugby career where everything went to plan.

“Literally everything Eddie said would happen, happened. Usually on a Sunday you wake up going ‘how am I going to do this again?’, but after that meeting I felt ‘we’ve got this’. It was so special.”

England set the tone for a momentous victory by audaciously confronting the Haka with a V-shape that had Owen Farrell at its apex instead of the customary straight line of players strung out across the centre of the pitch.

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It was a captivating moment of sporting theatre, but brought with it an additional layer of pressure.

Sinckler said: “How many times have we seen opponents walk towards the Haka and New Zealand put 50 points on them? We felt if we were going to do that we needed to back it up. We had better play well!”

Sinckler highlighted an underrated aspect of New Zealand’s game.

“When people watch the All Blacks, they say ‘great play, loads of offloads, great running game,” the Bristol tighthead said.

“They’re great ball in hand players, but they’re also unbelievably physical – really good scrum, great set-piece. Put your head in a breakdown and they’re absolutely clearing you out.

“That was the biggest surprise for me when I first played New Zealand – I thought ‘these guys are really physical’.

“If they need to play wide, they can. If they need to play through and use their set-piece, they can.

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“That was a real eye-opener for me. They can do the flashy stuff but the nuts and bolts of their game are also very impressive.”

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