Month: August 2022

New Zealand Cricket has declined to respond in detail to Ross Taylor’s claims that chief executive Dave White over-ruled his nomination for a player-of-the-year award in 2018 and that “someone from NZC” also asked a panel to reconsider his 2014 award.

Taylor won back-to-back Sir Richard Hadlee Medals in 2012-13 and 2013-14, but the former Black Caps captain has said NZC questioned his second-year selection.

He made the claim in his new book, Ross Taylor: Black & White, published this week, and also alleged he was snubbed by NZC’s then-chairman Stuart Heal at the awards ceremony in 2014.

Taylor also claimed in a Sky Sport interview on Thursday that he missed out on the 2017-18 award – it was given to Trent Boult – after chief executive David White questioned an independent panel’s nomination of Taylor.

READMORE:
* Ross Taylor claims current Black Caps made racially insensitive comments
* ‘Undermined’: Ross Taylor lifts the lid on the ‘ambush’ that cost him the Black Caps captaincy
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NZC declined to stuff request for an interview about Taylor’s claim, but said in a statement that it “acknowledges Ross Taylor’s wonderful career for the Black Caps and the huge contribution he’s made to cricket in New Zealand”.

“We’re comfortable with the judging process for our annual awards, we note Ross has won the supreme award on three occasions, and we congratulate him on a stellar career.”

when stuff sought direct comment about the claim about White’s involvement in the 2017-18 award decision, a NZC spokesman said they did not want to comment beyond their initial statement.

Taylor told Sky interviewer Laura McGoldrick on Thursday that there was no awards ceremony when he got the 2012-13 award.

“It might not have been a good look if I ended up winning the Sir Richard Hadlee Medal after the way I had been treated. [in losing the captaincy].”

In his book, Taylor recalled the backdrop to the Hadlee Medal award in 2013-14, Brendon McCullum’s first full season as Black Caps captain after taking over from Taylor, who was sacked in 2012 after a tour to Sri Lanka.

“I’d made five centuries [in 2013-14], but given that Brendon had become the first New Zealander to make a test triple century and had also made a double hundred, I knew it had to be a close call,” Taylor wrote. “I didn’t realize just how close.

“The player of the year was chosen by a panel of former New Zealand selector and cricket identity Don Neely, the then convener, Ian Smith, and Bryan Waddle.

“They deliberated and communicated their decision – that Ross Taylor was player of the year – to New Zealand Cricket. NZC came straight back asking them to reconsider.”

Taylor’s claim was backed up by Smith, who said in the book that Neely “said we’d been asked to review”.

“I don’t think he said we must make another choice, but someone from NZC told Don we had to look at it again.

“We did get pressure, there’s no doubt about that. In the end, we basically said, ‘No we’re not looking at it again. We made that decision in the first place and that decision stands’.”

Smith said their decision to award Taylor the Hadlee Medal “wasn’t out of sympathy or anything like that. We didn’t pick Ross because we felt sorry for him – he just had a damn good year.”

Taylor said it was “an interesting awards night” when he received the medal in 2014.

“Stuart Heal, the recently installed NZC chairman and a former chairman of Otago cricket, presented Brendon with a special award to mark his triple century.

“During the evening I walked past Heal three times; he didn’t say a word to me.

“A couple of board members did congratulate me on winning back-to-back Sir Richard Hadlee Medals, but they were certainly in the minority.

“I assumed the others categorized me as a troublemaker because I hadn’t gone [from the captaincy] quietly.”

Waddle said in the book he wasn’t sure about the background to the 2014 medal discussions because he wasn’t panel convenor then, but he did recall an exchange when Taylor was shortlisted for the 2017-18 award.

Waddle said the panel had narrowed their choice down to three names and were “pretty much deadlocked” at 1-1.

“Someone from NZC got in touch with me a couple of times to find out where we were at.

“I explained the situation to him and said that it looked as though it was going to be Ross Taylor. That led to an exchange of views: he expressed a preference for Trent Boult.

The panel “held firm”, said Waddle, who went back to NZC and said: “This is our recommendation, this is what you’ve asked us to do. They’re your awards and you don’t have to accept our recommendation if that’s the way you feel about it.

“I thought that was the only reasonable way to get out of it. They could do whatever they wanted – and they did. Trent Boult was the winner.”

The identity of the NZC official who spoke to Waddle was not revealed in the book.

But Taylor told Sky Sports this week that Waddle had told the book’s co-author Paul Thomas that it was David White, who had asked the panel to reconsider the 2017-18 award.

“Bryan Waddle told Paul he was the convenor in 2018 and that ‘David White rang and asked who was the player-of-the-year?’,” Taylor said. “Bryan Waddle said to David White, ‘Ross Taylor’s our Sir Richard Hadlee medalist. David White said, ‘I don’t think so’.”

Waddle went back to the other panellists, and then told White their decision was unanimous, Taylor said, but the broadcaster also said to White, “it’s your awards, David you can change it if you want’ … and they went with Trent Boult.”

Taylor said he “wasn’t sure what David’s reasons were, but they took it off me”.

He said he did not know it had happened at the time, but when he learned about it later in the year “it probably didn’t sit that well with me at the time”.

Taylor went on to win his third Hadlee Medal in 2020.

10:15 a.m., 12 August 2022

The Springboks believe that the wounded All Blacks will be ‘even more dangerous’ as a result of starting first-five Richie Mo’unga at Ellis Park on Saturday.

Mo’unga starts at 10 for the first time this year in place of Beauden Barrett, one of four changes to Ian Foster’s New Zealand team to face South Africa in their Rugby Championship clash at Johannesburg.

Barrett fell heavily on his head and neck during last weekend’s opening 26-10 loss to the Springboks following a collision with Kurt-Lee Arendse.

Although trained this week, Barrett is named on the bench, with Mo’unaga preferred to start. Springbok assistant coach Mzwandile Stick believes it’s a call that makes the men in black even more of a menace.

“The All Blacks are a world class side, and with Richie Mo’unga at flyhalf they will be even more dangerous. He can mix up his game with kicking and running, so he will bring something different to the team.

“We know for a fact that we can’t switch off for a moment against them because they have world class players that can punish you. It is going to be a massive challenge, and we have to be at the top of our game to beat them.

“In my lifetime in the Bok team it is the first time we will be playing back-to-back Tests against the All Blacks at home, and we know it is going to be a massive challenge, but we’ll give everything to do well. We have a massive tour ahead, but we don’t want to look too far ahead.

“Emirates Airline Park is a great venue for both teams. I certainly will never forget the Rugby World Cup final in 1995 with Nelson Mandela in attendance and Joel Stransky’s drop-goal.

“The big factor for us, however, is to keep building and hopefully we can do that, and the scoreboard will take care of itself.”

Skipper Siya Kolisi is also wary of the threat New Zealand bring.

“We had a look at last week’s game, but we cannot dwell on that result too long,” said Kolisi. “New Zealand are a very good team, and they are one performance away from turning things around.

“From our side, we had a good review of last week’s game, and we feel there is a lot we can still improve on.”

If the whole industry you work in was poring over your reviews, performance improvement plan, final warning and running betting pools on your time of termination, you’d feel it a bit.

Ian Foster is crispy. Well done. He’s a hot chicken with the oven beeping. It is not even clear if a narrow win at Ellis Park can save his job from him.

Maybe it should. The All Blacks are only five wins from 14 in Johannesburg’s rugby citadel; one of their worst returns in a stadium they’ve often been to.

A big win for the All Blacks may keep Foster for the Bledisloe Cup, where he could sweep and buy his ticket to France on NZRU bucks.

A loss seems doom; another trouncing and he may have to fly coach, using his severity allowance from him.

(Obligatory caveat: Foster seems a very nice man and we Bok fans all wish him long and continued employment as the head mastermind of Kiwi rugby; we suggest he hire Allister Coetzee as his attack coach).

But which players are also under the pump in Round 2?

I’ll look at two per team in this fascinating and more even Rugby Championship.

new zealand

The coach-captain bond in rugby is deeper, richer than in any other sport. Coaches in the NFL call every play; in volleyball, netball and in the NBA, the coach is shouting into players’ ears almost the entire game. Baseball and football managers use hand signals and bring their players to them for conference continually.

In rugby, a captain is an extension of the coach; his handpicked voice and mind of him.

On The Roar Rugby podcast this week we were joined by Stuart Lancaster and our own Nick Bishop.

One topic was captaincy; leadership. Lancaster made a good point: in life, in business we know leadership doesn’t peak in our twenties and thirties. Yet a Test captain (usually about 30) is asked to lead 23 highly competitive players in the heat.

There are passages of play in which one voice becomes more vital than any other.

sam cane is a quiet sort. Peter O’Mahony sledged him and there has seemed to be no response from Cane. He looks slow to the loose ball and breakdown. Siya Kolisi beat him to the floor in Round 1 and to be honest, Cane had a better position. He also could not dent Malcolm Marx at the ruck.

Can you imagine the French pack simply not being able to move Marx?

So, Cane must rise. Or he may be sitting in 17B next to Foster.

The other Kiwi upon whom pressure sits is young Ethan deGroot. There is no greater scrum examination for a young loosehead than to try to decipher the strange and wonderful and 50-cap successful long bind of Frans Malherbe.

If de Groot gets it wrong on the hard, hard field with 60,000 sauced up Saffas baying for more scrums, that fast start the All Blacks need will be gone.

Referees are human and a dominant Bok scrum in their fortress with perfect turf is a fearsome thing for a young lad.

Territory cannot be won with a faulty scrum. There is not a good reserve loosehead, either.

If Cane captains better and gets to the right spots sooner than Kolisi, Marx, and Kwagga Smith, the All Blacks will be better. If de Groot can split Malherbe and his hooker, he will have done his part of him and may have that No 1 jersey for a while.

south africa

Marx’s reward for being Man of the Match is his more familiar Bomb Squad role. He will likely be the first book on the pitch.

So the pressure resides on joseph dwebaa muscular bloke last seen brushing Dan Biggar aside.

His throws will need to be perfect, his brake foot must satisfy Luke Pearce, and he needs to get off the floor to carry as quickly as he dances with the Gwijo Squad. Crucially, he will need to make good decisions at the back of the Bok maul.

Dweba can cement his spot as the third string hooker for the World Cup, and then, anything can happen. Remember, Marx played over 70 minutes of the 2019 final.

Australia

James O’Connor, in your long and distinguished and roller coaster career, you have seen almost everything. In 2011 he coolly slotted the match winner at the Cake Tin to oust the Boks in a quarterfinal, and here he is over a decade later steering the Wallaby ship in Argentina.

He does not hop like a bunny any more. He isn’t a running threat. But he has seen every eventuality on a rugby pitch.

He’s the closest thing Australia has to Jonny Sexton (without the perfect touch off the boot).

Far from home, in the dreaded second match on tour, it is possible a few young Wallabies can melt or aging stars can go down.

JOC is the stabilizer. As odd as that sounds, friend.

But that makes him essentially the captain. Pressure.

In the pack, I see Rory Arnold as playing for one of the three Giteau spots later, even next year if that is still the rule.

He will be working against good locks, even if Guido Petti would have been the best benchmark. A bad performance here and Arnold may be seen as a mere luxury?

Look for him to be highly motivated to show why he is a cut above the locks seen in the English series.

Argentina

thomas rooster is 23. He is very short. He is very heavy.

Argentina has a big pack problem. They have wonderful hookers and a big angry back five. But no notable props.

Gallo could be an answer. He has only four caps for Los Pumas. He’s up against Taniela Tupou, who is also not tall.

This sumo wrestle will greatly interest both Michael Cheika and Dave Rennie, who both know even as the number of scrums has fallen steadily at Test level (with longer advantages and better hands) the “penalisable” portion has risen. Referees like Angus Gardner ping half of all scrums.

You cannot go far in a World Cup with a suspect tighthead.

The other player who has a lot to show is Gonzalo Bertranou. On our podcast with Marcelo Bosch I listed him as one of the four Pumas I was most impressed with against Scotland. With Tomas Cubelli on the bench, and Nic White his opposite number, this is a perfect time for the nippy and intelligent Bertranou to shine.

Round 2 will have its winners and losers; who do you see as carrying a big load this time?