All Blacks 2025
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@nostrildamus said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@taniwharugby said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
Was neither here nor there re Akira, but Hoskins IMO had the soft skills to go with the physical requirements to make it at the next level.
The both sides of the ball thing was odd as he did great things on both sides, for him to be completely ignored is most bizarre.
Yeah, he had really exciting and unique skills. I guess I will just have to wait and see if an English coach can polish those at international level
Yup. I believe Hoskins is lost to NZ now. He will play out his time and go
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Actually, I think @Steven Harris knows about Dunedin.
As I've said before, I've got nothing against Akira and would have liked to see him used more and occasionally persisted with when things went wrong.
But, the polarization on here between his fans and his detractors meant no-one got a fair hearing at blindside for seven or eight years..
Yes - the Razor era has been something of a disappointment to me so far, compared to what I'd hoped for. But, I keep thinking we're not far off.
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@nostrildamus said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@nzzp Yes - Akira is very much a coulda, woulda, shoulda. But, Hansen was the guy who didn't pick him and took the pretty unusual step of giving him a public serve - "he needs to get thirsty". I don't think he played a test under Hansen.
He did however get called down to Dunedin early on to train with the ABs and something went wrong down there, because he never featured again. Not even vs Japan later that year when every man and his dog got a test cap.
You know, if you really wanted to nip Blues conspiracy theories in the bud, suggesting it goes even deeper to an earlier ex Crusaders assistant coach isn't really going to help!
This stuff isn't half-arsed rumours - it's on the public record.
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I think with Akira there's a number of sections to his career
- breakout star in npc/super rugby
- was on fringe of ABs/publicly lambasted by Hansen. Around this time he was being played into the ground by Umaga
- Fozzie era ABs where Tom Conventry was Blues forwards coach where Akira cracked the ABs.
- Jase Ryan took over as forwards coach in ABs and Akira was fairly quickly discarded not to return
- Akira not picked under Razor/had already signalled his intent to sign overseas despite a standout campaign for the Blues under Vern Cotter and incredible shift at 6 in the Super Rugby Final.
Now with the last part of Akira's NZ career I would agree with what @nzzp said below, bearing in mind there had been a lot of talk on here for a long time that Razor didnt rate Akira combined with Jase Ryan fairly quickly getting rid of him once he came on as forwards coach in the Fozzie era
And for those who say he left early - go look at his leaving interview again. The body language screamed someone who was making a financial decision as the pathway in NZ had stopped. Akira looked like he didn't want to leave, but with no future who can blame him. -
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@nostrildamus said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@nzzp Yes - Akira is very much a coulda, woulda, shoulda. But, Hansen was the guy who didn't pick him and took the pretty unusual step of giving him a public serve - "he needs to get thirsty". I don't think he played a test under Hansen.
He did however get called down to Dunedin early on to train with the ABs and something went wrong down there, because he never featured again. Not even vs Japan later that year when every man and his dog got a test cap.
You know, if you really wanted to nip Blues conspiracy theories in the bud, suggesting it goes even deeper to an earlier ex Crusaders assistant coach isn't really going to help!
This stuff isn't half-arsed rumours - it's on the public record.
You are deliberately misreading my posts. And of course I know what Hansen said.
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@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Nepia Yeah - he preferred Frizell.
But, where was Shannon in 2024? He'd taken the yen and was unavailable for selection.
The blindside position was pretty open for someone to take and it still seems to be.
There's a raft of posts saying the coaches are actively discriminating against Blues players, so I'm perfectly accurate in labeling it a conspiracy theory.
Just to confirm who were the standout loose forwards in SR 2024 and their performances were instrumental in their team's success?
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@nostrildamus said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@brodean said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
Things are worse than what they are under the Foster era. Foster won all 3 of the RC's his teams competed in. Robertson is 0 from 2.
A number of the players that were bagged under the Foster era are better than the ones we have now.
I surprise myself here defending the current coaching record but the Boks are arguably much superior now so that could be a factor however small.
They won the RWC in 2019 and they won it in 2023. They hammered us in 2023 over in London and our senior players cracked with poor discipline - a red for Scooter and a yellow for Cane. 28 points in 2023 vs 33 points in 2025. The Springboks are much the same for me. We have gone backwards. Our players lack spine and our loose forwards are too focused on making glamour plays instead of securing the ball and making tackles.
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@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
Actually, I think @Steven Harris knows about Dunedin.
As I've said before, I've got nothing against Akira and would have liked to see him used more and occasionally persisted with when things went wrong.
But, the polarization on here between his fans and his detractors meant no-one got a fair hearing at blindside for seven or eight years..
Yes - the Razor era has been something of a disappointment to me so far, compared to what I'd hoped for. But, I keep thinking we're not far off.
Optimism is good and healthy. I feel like I'd be better off following other pursuits because I don't see any evidence of improvement.
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@KiwiMurph said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
I think with Akira there's a number of sections to his career
- breakout star in npc/super rugby
- was on fringe of ABs/publicly lambasted by Hansen. Around this time he was being played into the ground by Umaga
- Fozzie era ABs where Tom Conventry was Blues forwards coach where Akira cracked the ABs.
- Jase Ryan took over as forwards coach in ABs and Akira was fairly quickly discarded not to return
- Akira not picked under Razor/had already signalled his intent to sign overseas despite a standout campaign for the Blues under Vern Cotter and incredible shift at 6 in the Super Rugby Final.
Now with the last part of Akira's NZ career I would agree with what @nzzp said below, bearing in mind there had been a lot of talk on here for a long time that Razor didnt rate Akira combined with Jase Ryan fairly quickly getting rid of him once he came on as forwards coach in the Fozzie era
And for those who say he left early - go look at his leaving interview again. The body language screamed someone who was making a financial decision as the pathway in NZ had stopped. Akira looked like he didn't want to leave, but with no future who can blame him.Yes those three Blues loosies had an amazing season and a terrific finals series. They were all the form loose forwards in their respective positions and it boggles the mind that only one of them got selected only to be dumped after 4 games.
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@antipodean said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Nepia Yeah - he preferred Frizell.
But, where was Shannon in 2024? He'd taken the yen and was unavailable for selection.
The blindside position was pretty open for someone to take and it still seems to be.
There's a raft of posts saying the coaches are actively discriminating against Blues players, so I'm perfectly accurate in labeling it a conspiracy theory.
Just to confirm who were the standout loose forwards in SR 2024 and their performances were instrumental in their team's success?
I've got no problem saying Akira had probably his best season in 2024.
But, once he signed in Japan it would've been moronic to pick him. Just about everyone drew a line through his name at that point.
Same reason they're not picking Mark Tele'a this year - even though he might be quite handy.
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@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@antipodean said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Nepia Yeah - he preferred Frizell.
But, where was Shannon in 2024? He'd taken the yen and was unavailable for selection.
The blindside position was pretty open for someone to take and it still seems to be.
There's a raft of posts saying the coaches are actively discriminating against Blues players, so I'm perfectly accurate in labeling it a conspiracy theory.
Just to confirm who were the standout loose forwards in SR 2024 and their performances were instrumental in their team's success?
I've got no problem saying Akira had probably his best season in 2024.
But, once he signed in Japan it would've been moronic to pick him. Just about everyone drew a line through his name at that point.
Same reason they're not picking Mark Tele'a this year - even though he might be quite handy.
What you are missing is this
Razor knew he had the AB job before the end of the 2023 Super Rugby season
He had ample time to map out a path with Akira
That didnt happen and Akira left
By all accounts Razor didnt want Akira. Fine. But don't use the signing overseas as an excuse.
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@Nepia said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
It doesn't really matter which franchise a player plays for
I agree.
Isn’t it great to see Havili, Ennor, McLeod, Fihaki proudly representing their
championship winning franchisecountry. -
@taniwharugby said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@African-Monkey who was the last AB picked off an NPC campaign (with no super rugby) was it Joe Rok?
Isaiah Toeava after 1 NPC game?
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@KiwiMurph said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@antipodean said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Nepia Yeah - he preferred Frizell.
But, where was Shannon in 2024? He'd taken the yen and was unavailable for selection.
The blindside position was pretty open for someone to take and it still seems to be.
There's a raft of posts saying the coaches are actively discriminating against Blues players, so I'm perfectly accurate in labeling it a conspiracy theory.
Just to confirm who were the standout loose forwards in SR 2024 and their performances were instrumental in their team's success?
I've got no problem saying Akira had probably his best season in 2024.
But, once he signed in Japan it would've been moronic to pick him. Just about everyone drew a line through his name at that point.
Same reason they're not picking Mark Tele'a this year - even though he might be quite handy.
What you are missing is this
Razor knew he had the AB job before the end of the 2023 Super Rugby season
He had ample time to map out a path with Akira
That didnt happen and Akira left
By all accounts Razor didnt want Akira. Fine. But don't use the signing overseas as an excuse.
How many of these special paths was Razor supposed to map for players?
Can you provide a link to one credible account that says Razor didn't want Akira?
Maybe just something where Rieko or Akira says something along the lines that Razor or Ryan says they're probably looking elsewhere.
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@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@nostrildamus said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@nzzp Yes - Akira is very much a coulda, woulda, shoulda. But, Hansen was the guy who didn't pick him and took the pretty unusual step of giving him a public serve - "he needs to get thirsty". I don't think he played a test under Hansen.
He did however get called down to Dunedin early on to train with the ABs and something went wrong down there, because he never featured again. Not even vs Japan later that year when every man and his dog got a test cap.
You know, if you really wanted to nip Blues conspiracy theories in the bud, suggesting it goes even deeper to an earlier ex Crusaders assistant coach isn't really going to help!
This stuff isn't half-arsed rumours - it's on the public record.
2017-2019 Hansen's man management compared unfavourably to his early era. He let Piatau and Luatua go, both had played a few tests and showed promise, and couldn't get a tune out of Akira either (some of the fault probably lay with both men)
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@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@antipodean said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Chris-B said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@Nepia Yeah - he preferred Frizell.
But, where was Shannon in 2024? He'd taken the yen and was unavailable for selection.
The blindside position was pretty open for someone to take and it still seems to be.
There's a raft of posts saying the coaches are actively discriminating against Blues players, so I'm perfectly accurate in labeling it a conspiracy theory.
Just to confirm who were the standout loose forwards in SR 2024 and their performances were instrumental in their team's success?
I've got no problem saying Akira had probably his best season in 2024.
But, once he signed in Japan it would've been moronic to pick him. Just about everyone drew a line through his name at that point.
Same reason they're not picking Mark Tele'a this year - even though he might be quite handy.
In my mind one of the following is most likely true:
- The All Blacks coaches were in conversation with him and told him he wasn't likely to be selected, hence he took the contract.
- They didn't have any communication with him, which makes NZR look even more incompetent.
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@African-Monkey said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@taniwharugby said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
@African-Monkey who was the last AB picked off an NPC campaign (with no super rugby) was it Joe Rok?
Isaiah Toeava after 1 NPC game?
How ballsy was that compared to now?
Joe Rokococo would have had to wait until he was 26 now days before being selected when his speed had long since departed.
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@African-Monkey yeah was Ice, he had played 8 games for Auckland (according to Wiki)
Rokocoko debuted at both super and ABs in 2003
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Discarding Akira Ioane and Hoskins Sotutu would have made sense if we had replacements who were better. We didn't. So journeymen like Luke Jacobson, Du'Plesis Kirifi and Christian Lio- Willie got the nod instead, "spiritual leader" Ardie Savea gets 200 tests to swan around on the wing and we have a string of frustrating "not quite what we need" like Finau and Sititi.
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@sparky said in All Blacks & All Blacks XV EOYT Squads 2025:
Discarding Akira Ioane and Hoskins Sotutu would have made sense if we had replacements who were better. We didn't. So journeymen like Luke Jacobson, Du'Plesis Kirifi and Christian Lio- Willie got the nod instead, "spiritual leader" Ardie Savea gets 200 tests to swan around on the wing and we have a string of frustrating "not quite what we need" like Finau and Sititi.
What a waste, and a case of what might have been
