Every incoming visitor’s first instinct upon arriving in New Zealand on Monday morning was to ask: “Where is it?” The fog over large chunks of the country was thick enough to ground many domestic flights, threatening to delay the bleary-eyed UK-based reporters heading down to the South Island for the All Blacks’ first squad announcement. The only thing currently less clear, say the locals, is the immediate outlook for their national rugby side.
Not for a couple of decades, the greybeards reckon, has there been less certainty around the All Blacks, as they prepare to return to the Test match fray next month. They have not played since last October’s Rugby World Cup final and are missing a Who’s Who of familiar names. Sam Whitelock, Brodie Retallick, Sam Cane, Aaron Smith and Richie Mo’unga are either retired or unavailable. Add in the arrival of a new head coach, Scott Robertson, and something even rarer then New Zealand’s endangered fairy tern hangs in the murky winter air: a discernible sense of Kiwi nervousness.
