Ted sends Dingo to the doghouse

Fantastic letter "captain Hurricane" 100% right. I think it's probably one of the best results in years, after all the rubbishing from(fan's) and media alike, how hard was it to go out there and play to the highest standard (for your country)with all that carry on all around you. Well it has built a special bond among the team. They are a "team".Plenty of courage and guts from coaching staff and players alike.The atmosphere in Brissy also showed Mr Dean's very clearly , how kiwi's feel about "their team"outside NZ. Good stuff.Did see one clown with a half Wallaby, canterbury jersey.He musta followed Deans, not the team.an insult to Ritchie etc I felt.

I have to take issue with captian hurricane, and his statement that "fair weather supporters that went out and brought canary yellow jerseys and supported the wallabies out of spite should feel very stupid". The jerseys they brought were the new baby poo orange, not the old canary yellow... otherwise spot on!

You guys must be dreaming - the all blacks only just won by 4 points against a wallaby team that practically gave it to them. Bear in mind deans has only been in charge of the wallabies for a few months and has largely second rate players. Henry has been in charge of all blacks for years and has at least 2 of the best players in hte world in his squad and other players that would walk in to any other team. That would indicate that Henry & Co are second rate coaches and Deans is a genius for getting the wallabies so close in such a short time. By rights the All Blacks should be all over them but were lucky to get away with it. It's a false dawn. Enjoy it while you can - it's downhill from here. The Wallabies will swat the All Blacks aside next year and Henry & Co will be exposed for the frauds that they are.

"But a coach can only take a small part of the credit for that kind of resolve. That's why Henry hasn't completely redeemed himself."

But when they don't show that kind of resolve, as in Cardiff last year, they are the ones to blame?? I sense some double standards here.

Putting faith in his players and keeping his team settled, along with a good match preparation are all down to the coach. I'd say Henry and the coaching team can take more than just a "small part of the credit."

Hopefully they can push on from here and win these tight ones like this. Over the last decade, that has been the greatest weakness of our All Black teams - to win when it is close, they are behind or playing badly. If Henry can correct this I'd say he would have more than made up for the World Cup.

Strange how all the talk before the match was on the risk of Deans putting 5 forward reserves on his team sheet, and after not a mention of it. Was it a decoy ploy, or did Deans drop a bollock? When Woodcock scored it was clear for anyone to see that the tide had turned in favour of the ABs, who themselves had injected fresh legs to swing the tide. Why did Deans not at least try to stem the flow by using his own army of forward reserves? Could it be that he simply did not have faith in those guys to do the job, and was playing mind games by his team selection? Regardless, his strategy clearly failed when it mattered. After the Sydney test Henry was man enough to say he was outcoached by Deans which really showed his class. After this test I think it is pretty clear for all to see that it was Deans who was off the mark, though never have we heard a single word from Deans about Henry's performance.

A picture of both teams at half time was a case in point. As Deans strolled around the ozzies as if they were a bunch of mates on a beach vacation, the ABs were in a group huddle revving up their intensity. At that point it was pretty clear to me that the ABs were going to be a determined outfit in the second stanza. Even after the try by oz, it seemed the ABs were always going to be favourites once they decided to commit numbers to the breakdown with urgency. When they do that they look tough to stop.

For my money, Decoy Dingo was simply outsmarted by Ted who has shown that his coaching ability is beyond question by uniting a young team on top of increasing their skill levels to offer a mentally strong team. For those reporters (in particular Hinton), please try to keep your grudges out of it future and focus on what is really happening.

Greg, Henry was appointed as coach and has come up with the standard and the goods others only envy. The media on the other hand just can't admit when they are wrong! One day they will remove their heads from up their own asknoquestions and replace their plate full of ego with humble pie. I await the man who is big enough to show it through this column!

When will you guy's just finally give it in regarding RWC 2007 and just get over yourselves... it's really got beyond being long winded, it's quite boring journalism.

Henry and his team started the year with an unprecedented 15 players from the World Cup squad going overseas, retiring or injured. He also he to start with a completely new squad under ELV's for the first time. Unlike Deans he did not have a whole pre-season and Super 14 to experiment and learn the tactics for the new rules. Add to this he had an angry Rugby media sharpening their knives and riling the public up with derogatory remarks about Henry and the NZRU, while simultaneously elevating Robbie Deans to demi-god status. To win the Tri-nations and Bledisloe after this level of adversity was probably the performance of the season.

I have said before that keeping the incumbent coach showed a new level of maturity and common sense from the NZRU and public. Too often we have thrown out coaches after World Cup failures. Imagine if the Brisbane Bronocs had chucked Wayne Bennett out after a bad year. This year bore the fruits of keeping that experience, coaches and players learned from their mistakes and the All Blacks became better for it.

I have much respect for Robbie Deans and feel he is a very good coach. But I am still shaking my head at the NZ rugby media's treatment of the coaching appointment process. Everyone has bias but the propaganda coming out of some scribes was almost Orwellian. Most wanted to get rid of Henry for losing a World Cup, while ignoring the fact that Deans, one of the most influential assistant coaches in rugby history, suffered the same fate in Australia with Mitchell. To his credit Deans learned from mistakes of that campaign. He now fronts the media better, doesn't play favourites as much and most importantly he learned that Leon McDonald is not Tana Umaga with a different haircut!

The "Deans mystic" was really built on his tremendous success at Super Rugby level. He had the fortune to have the two best players in the world in his franchise. Both McCaw and Carter were freaks before Dean's got to them, but both are better players for being coached by him. Its almost similar the NBA days, when the Chicago Bulls were led by Michael Jordan and Scotti Pippen and Coached by Phil Jackson. I would assert that if you put Carter and McCaw into any Super Rugby franchise that teams performance would dramatically improve, but in fairness most probably would not achieve the level of success the Crusaders achieved.

International coaching is the major league, super rugby are the relative minor league. Deans looked a million dollars coaching in Super Rugby, but when you start looking at some of the names he is coaching against its hardly inspired reading; Laurie Fisher (who looks like some vagrant the Brumbies picked off the street so the players can keep running the show), that guy from the Highlanders (whatshisname?), that guy from the Reds (again who?), the appalling John Mitchell, Ian foster, David Nucifora, etc etc.

One feels that if Jake White was still coaching the Wallabies would have finished last this year, the All Blacks probably second.

So to conclude enough with the Henry bashing. Those fair weather supporters that went out an brought canary yellow jerseys and supported the wallabies out of spite should feel very stupid, but we forgive them - come back to the good side and stop supporting the criminal network. The public and media have vented their anger at the coaching staff and players, who in turn have learned and improved on those criticisms. Its is time for people to acknowledge that and give Henry and his team their dues.

no the ABs still suck!

The critical difference between this year and last year, is that the team was consistently selected together, as a team. I still feel that the critical factor in the QF loss last year, was the rotation policy. Would they have dug as deep this year in the final match, if the team had been constantly chopped and changed like last year?

In terms of Henry's 'redemption', I feel that he and his team have done a good job this year (so far), but the real crunch will come at the end of next year, when contracts are up, and people will have to decide what commitments they are prepared to make towards the 2011 World Cup. Beyond that, while he is responsible for All Black rugby, he should always be scrutinised, accordingly, by all who have an emotional involvement in the team's history and future success.