Deans: Fighting for coaching future
Australian newspapers said Monday coach Robbie Deans's future was on the line after the Wallabies' shambolic loss to the Springboks in South Africa at the weekend.
The Springboks ended a run of five losses against the Wallabies to inflict a crushing 31-8 win in Pretoria on Saturday and push the Australians down to third place in the four-nation Rugby Championship.
New Zealander Deans was already under scrutiny following comprehensive defeats to New Zealand in the southern hemisphere tournament and hollow home wins over South Africa and Argentina.
The Australian media said Deans was fighting for his coaching future in next weekend's final Test against the Pumas in Rosario.
"The coaching future of Robbie Deans will go on the line in Argentina when a second-string Wallabies side takes on the Pumas," reported the Daily Telegraph.
"The unnerving knowledge that the Broken XV in the casualty ward is a far superior line-up to the Wallabies flying into a wild Argentinian ambush is not how Robbie Deans planned to fight for his coaching future.
"Not after five seasons of triumphs and crashlandings in the big-ticket arenas of Sydney, Brisbane, Durban, Bloemfontein, Twickenham, Murrayfield and, of course, Auckland with that cursed Eden Park patch."
Former Wallaby captain Andrew Slack said the "messiest" fortnight in Australian rugby's professional history had pushed Deans's tenure as national coach close to breaking point.
"Nowadays is it perform or perish," Slack told the Australian Associated Press.
"People will be looking for a scapegoat and rightly or wrongly the responsibility for the performances rests with the coach.
"There will be a lot of pressure on Robbie heading into the (Argentina) game.
"And if it is a game they lose, that pressure will only intensify but I think even if they win that pressure will still be there."
The Sydney Morning Herald said "disruption and decay" were everywhere.
"Australian Rugby has endured the most dreadful of weeks. And next week could be even worse, with the Wallabies heading deeper into the horror tour from hell," it said.
"Disruption and decay are everywhere. (Flyhalf) Quade Cooper dumps on them, the Springboks smash them and now they head to Argentina with the fear that without enough fit bodies they could be decimated by the Pumas."
The Australian newspaper said Australian rugby was deteriorating fast and called on new ARU chairman Michael Hawker to act.
"If he doesn't hit the button for the crash cart now, the game will soon slip beyond the point of saving," the paper said.
"The defibrillator paddles have to be applied and the first jolt needs to shake loose Robbie Deans from the coaching position.
"There is not the slightest doubt that Deans has given his all over the past five years and tried to make the Wallabies work.
"But clearly they're not working and that was obvious at Pretoria long before injuries reduced the team to a shambles midway through the second half."
Comments
georgesmith says...
Sack him right now and lets not wait for another loss to happen (surely Pumas will beat the shameless R. Deans and his bunch of Wobblies). The return of players like J. O'Connor. J. Horwill and W. Genia will not resolve anything because the problem is R. Deans and his poor coaching. Tactically this guy is a massive failure. All his teams can do is kick the ball into opposition. Q. Cooper has rocked the boat. M. Giteau tried to put a point but he was made to be the villain. So now it has been revealed that R. Deans is the biggest embarrassment in world rugby then Aussies should just kick this Kiwi in the back and ship him to Libya.
Posted 00:20 02nd October 2012
LeftRightOut says...
@JayStarr
"With a coach like Ewan McKenzie those injuries would've never happened!!"
Unless Deans has been taking out Wallabies with a sniper rifle from the stands, I hardly think you could claim the majority of injuries are his fault.... or do you think Ewan would have ordered them not to run, tackle or jump?
Posted 23:39 01st October 2012
KiwiJoe says...
What do you expect with a team that lacks "mongrel" and insufficient depth.
There must still be a few hard nut aussie players around to give the side some spine, you can,t blame Robbie for that, however it wouldn,t surprise me to see them beat the Pumas this weekend.
They reckon he was also to blame for the poor showing in the Olympics and Ashes and Casey Stoner,s retirement too I hear...
Posted 22:53 01st October 2012
westwest says...
Im with you bk47 A coach is only as good as there worst player, and at the moment the Aussie's have an easy 15 to choose from. The lack of depth is easy for a blind man to see. This all comes down to no national conference and no money. I could not believe they thought they could support a 5th super team and it really shows I was all up for a Japan side to get the nod. I cant see the Aussies getting any better real soon with League, Aussie rules, and even football sucking up all the talent with big bucks and better comps. Dingo might not be the best coach they could have but could anyone else do better with the players they have at the moment?
Posted 22:19 01st October 2012
bk47 says...
@trader2
Im like you being saying for ages 4 aussie super teams was a push at best but 5 teams is just ridiculous. They do not have the players for it and now are just taking 2nd string kiwis from itm cup or wider nz training squads that would not get contracts in the nz teams to fill their ranks.
It is a sad state of affairs indeed and whoever thought it was a great idea to give melbourne a team should be fired. It was the prefect time to include a Pacific Island or Argentina team or maybe even look at the USA market for financial reasons but they blew it. Hell the Taranaki rugby union put a bid in for a team and I'll pretty sure they we would be competitive!
I do feel sorry for the aussie because there player injury list is massive but its showing how weak their player pool is outside their top 22 players.
As for deans, meh couldn't care less. I still laugh at the fact he told christian cullen, one the greatest attacking fullbacks of all time with a record amount of tries, he wasn't holding the rugby ball correctly and eventually lead to him being dropped out of the Ab's. And yes that was like 10 yrs ago and no I wont get over it because that is stupidity at its greatest :)
Posted 21:07 01st October 2012
runnrugby says...
@daibok Yea Genia at 10 was a brilliant move. Lets not forget how great Mckenzies record was with the waratahs and how successful he was in france.
Posted 20:35 01st October 2012
2eyedkiwi says...
Time to come home Robbie, you obviously don't have the dressing room, and whether its your fault or that of someone gutless wonders with no ticker (eg QC and his petulant mates), you're better off coaching a NZ Heartland team who will actually play for their jersey.
On your way out, give the keys to Ewen, thank John O'Neill for the hospital pass, and pick up the "blame the Kiwi coach" excuse card that Trinats6 keeps playing. You can leave him the "all those injuries", "last years champs", and "Richie is a cheat" cards, otherwise he won't have much to say on this site.
Posted 19:42 01st October 2012
tuffnut says...
Back to Deans however.,,, I'm not a supporter and I wouldn't have him as ABs coach given his reputation for his poor treatment of players, including past All Blacks players such as Christian Cullen and Anton Oliver. So if the ARU chooses to sack him for his management of the Wallabies then so be it.
I just hope people don't loose perspective of the bigger problems affecting rugby which has been the greatest contributor IMO to the Wallabies performance this year.
Posted 17:06 01st October 2012
atg77 says...
I think you have to see things in perspective a bit. Australia has never had a great amount of depth. With a horrific injury toll to the likes of Pocock, Oconner, Genia, Cooper and Barnes, it's not surprising they are struggling to compete. Win or lose this weekend they are still no.3 in the world, so it can't be that bad. I think they'll basically have to write this season off, but when all their key players get back to fitness they will be back in business.
Posted 16:58 01st October 2012
tuffnut says...
I too feel sorry for Deans, there's no way he can be blamed for all the Wallabies' woes with all their injuries. (IMO despite them all, Aus have still managed to do very well).
The Wallabies has been a victim of the overkill of rugby we've all been exposed to this year & last. Unfortunately, the gap between Oz's first and second tier players is greater than NZ and SA, so these injuries hurt them more.
Remember, in Australia rugby faces major competition from the higher profile AFL and NFL & with the NFL's expansion into Melbourne and Perth, it's understandable the ARU's decision to expand the SupeRugby competition into these areas to stop R League gaining too much dominance over rugby across the country.
Looking at it positively, the Rebels and Western Force have enjoyed encouraging crowd numbers, (despite performances). However, the increase in the number of games played has resulted in the top players being over played, resulting in more injuries, and lower quality rugby.
So what's the answers? Reduce the number of OZ teams in SupeRugby? I don't agree as would risk RL increasing its foothold in OZ and reduce rugby union's profile and broadcast opportunities.
Instead, IMO, SANZAR need to reduce the number of games played both in the S-Rugby competition and in any meaningless tests such as the 3rd game against the ABs in Asia.
Too much rugby has diluted the importance of S-Rugby, Curry Cup, & ITM and this is evident in the dwindling crowd numbers and extensive number of injuries. With so many injuries, we're being robbed of watching the best players in the world battle it out against each other. In addition, spectators only have so much disposable income to spend on rugby games per year so why saturate the market and water down these fantastic competitions? This'll only hurt rugby in the long term.
Posted 16:56 01st October 2012
Trader2 says...
Read my lips AUSTRALIA CANNOT SUPPORT 5 S15 TEAMS and this is why they are in this mess. Good to see a few more posters are now seeing this. It is time for the ARU to grow up and stop wanting to be the biggest boy on the block, NZ and SA just don't have the same problem competing with the AFL and that hybrid game, accept that, fix the game at grassroots and with the Oz competitive nature they can produce a team, that could be No 1 (although hopefully not in my lifetime)As for the next coach, who the hell would want it - Trinats maybe, he is dumb enough.
Posted 15:30 01st October 2012
letsgoboks says...
I stand corrected... Still not too bad though.
Posted 15:09 01st October 2012
TheTruthHurts says...
@abfixit, I hate to say it, but you are dead right! it's needs to change and the OZ public needs to be more patient and realstic, as well as the ARU structure needing a big revamp!!!
Posted 13:32 01st October 2012
Ferdie says...
letsgoboks - here are current IRB rankings 1 October 2012
1(1) NEW ZEALAND 92.43
2(3) SOUTH AFRICA 85.61
3(2) AUSTRALIA 85.21
http://www.irb.com/rankings/full.html
Posted 13:31 01st October 2012
TheTruthHurts says...
@JayStarr, settle down mate, no need to tar all of us with the one brush! After all are you Saffa's "all smart like that!?
Posted 13:30 01st October 2012
Phill_Moore says...
How Deans has managed to keep such a weak, injury-prone team in the world's top 3 for so long is nothing short of a miracle.
If you add that to last year's first 3-Nations title in a decade (of Aussie coaches...), then the guy is a magician... (Ok, the Boks and ABs were saving themselves for the WC, but still no easy feat.)
Face it, there's maybe 2-3 world class players in a fit Wallaby squad, tops (no, Queer Blooper is not one of them), and if just 1 is missing from the XV, the ship wobbles and is ripe for the picking. Compare that to the ABs, with a 5th choice 10, captain with a broken foot, and other injuries, and they still win the WC...
By all means aussies, fire Deans and let him coach a team with actual depth, so he can start winning championships again.
His reputation is still fine, it's clear that the fault lies much deeper, with a crap management that cannot assemble a provincial championship, but still aspires to "regularly beat the ABs" as John O'neil once said... before falling from his bed. LOL!
Posted 13:25 01st October 2012
Chinstan says...
@letsgoboks not anymore they're not!
Posted 13:24 01st October 2012
Willem says...
@letsgoboks
The Boks (85.61 rating points vs Australia's 85.21) are ranked 2nd after the past weekends game.
But agree that poor Robbie now has to take the blame because Australia has no depth. It is not his fault Australia has no decent players left as soon as injuries come into play. It is not his fault Australia had 1 team (only just) in the top 6 of the S15 competition. What do you expect from the guy? A miracle? Australians need to realise they are not as good as they think.
Posted 13:07 01st October 2012
abfixit says...
Agree with above comments. It is unfortunate that Robbie's 2011 season has all but gone into distant memory. However I think he will be more than welcome and have more success should he ply his trade in the NH. IMHO, a Kiwi and former member of the AB coaching team will always be bagged in Oz. That's just the competitive nature in Oz rugby. As an aside, when RD's tenure is over, whoever is appointed will also face the same torching as at present, it is a poison chalice from which to drink! Just mu opinion.
Posted 12:59 01st October 2012
APV1 says...
@ letsgoboks - Aus are now in 3rd in the IRB Rankings, with the Boks now in 2nd.
Posted 12:48 01st October 2012