(Photo by Ross Land/Getty Images)
“It was the worst All Black team on record, and the result proves it."
It was a team where from the 2008 All Blacks squad, 17 players were injured, three were unavailable, and a further eight were simply not selected. Some remark this is an excuse, it is merely a fact.
So in theory, they should be cut some slack.
But, when you have a 74.4 percent winning record with 331 test victories over 106 years of test rugby, you are a heavily marked side.
By both foes and friends (supporters) alike.
It wasn’t so much that the All Blacks lost, but the way in which they did.
One could argue that the most positive thing to come from the loss was the margin, to lose by only five points when completely outplayed is the mark of a team that has something to offer.
But unlike last year, when humbled by the Wallabies in Sydney, there will be no Richie McCaw to come in and add not only his mercurial brilliance to the team, but the talismanic leadership that this All Blacks team seems to thrive on.
As Rodney So’oialo found out last year, now Mils Muliaina, who had a brilliant debut year as captain for the Chiefs, has discovered the same difficult principle.
Captaining a Super 14 team is one thing, but leading your country is an ordeal that makes mortals of otherwise outstanding players.
And never has it been shown so apparently that the domestic competition that is the pride of the Southern Hemisphere, is an unsuitable testing ground for the rigours of test match rugby.
The blowtorch has now been applied, and Henry and his troops will go back to try rediscover the mana and the intensity that has allowed them to dominate world rugby by and large since 2004.
For in Wellington, no excuses will do.
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