The making of an All Black: how New Zealand sustains its rugby dynasty . Even people who hardly know him. At 1. 0am on a Wednesday morning, the Auckland stadium, the largest in New Zealand, is almost deserted. Except for me, my photographer and a security guard.? He was knighted soon afterwards for services to the game and, you suspect, services to his nation. New Zealand had not won a World Cup since 1. In 1. 12 years of playing rugby, New Zealand. In 2. 0 years since the sport turned professional, that figure has risen to 8. As world champions, the All Blacks have become even better. In 2. 01. 3 an English journalist wandered into New Zealand. In the four years since the last World Cup, the All Blacks. But how do the All Blacks remain at the pinnacle more. Rugby is not played all year-round and they will. On top of that, there is a structured weight-training program. The New Zealand national rugby union team, commonly called the All Blacks. During the 2011 Rugby World Cup the All Blacks had an embroidered William Webb Ellis cup on the sleeve of their jerseys with the year '1987. All Blacks Skills - Part 1 - Tricks at Training. The second clip made in early 2011 resulted in over 200 entries to our 'All Blacks Skills' video. All Blacks keep it simple with training methods. All Blacks v Springboks - Rugby Championship final round All Blacks v Springboks. While elite rugby league players have all the time in the world to. Because you're only training two. All Training Articles; Get Ready. Pre-Season Rugby Training! Weight Training Program For Rugby. Monday: Week 1: Week 2: Week 3: Week 4: Week 5: Week 6: Power Cleans Low pulls Back squat. Count the defeats on one hand and you will have two digits spare. In the same period there have twice been two new moons in the space of a single month. The All Blacks really do lose once in a blue moon. Henry arrives at Eden Park. His sense of humour is so dry that if you rubbed two of his jokes together they would catch light. Foxed by jetlag, I find it impossible to tell when he is joking. First question is an ice- breaker. This time the eyebrow stays down. Henry was head coach of the All Blacks between 2. In that time they played 1. He remembers the defeats more clearly than most of the victories. He is surprised an Englishman could feel in thrall to New Zealand given that England won the previous two editions of the World Under- 2. Championship, in 2. New Zealand won this year. Wales have beaten them three times, the last in 1. Ireland and Scotland have never beaten them at all. Put like that, the question makes more sense. Take your rugby game to the next level with RugbyIQ.com! Browse the video archive featuring hundreds of training drills for rugby league and union. Rugby Golf – All Blacks – Retallick. The Perfect Rugby Workout. Rugby is one of the toughest sports out there and it requires a multi. There are two areas of exercise and fitness that apply to all types of sport training. These are aerobic and anaerobic. RugbyIQ.com is an online rugby portal that offers free training drills. All Blacks Speed Training. Add to sessions All Blacks having fun. Add to sessions Catching a High Ball. Henry thinks about it. This country earned respect from the rest of the world for three things: what we did in two world wars, and to a lesser extent what we. So over time rugby has become a major part of our national identity. And the current All Black team, the All Black teams of recent years, have always tried to add to that legacy, that history. In particular, the 1. Europe and the USA or the . They played 3. 5 matches and won 3. Jock Phillips is perhaps New Zealand. After speaking to Henry, I catch him on the phone. The context of that was that New Zealand had always . Seddon was one of around 2. Auckland harbour when the team finally made it home. As a report in the Auckland Observer put it, the tour . Almost a century later, the prize- winning author Lloyd Jones wrote a novel about it, The Book of Fame. In it, Jones tracks the burgeoning celebrity of the team by counting up the lines they were awarded in the Times and other British newspapers. Versus Midland Counties ! Perfection became the All Black standard. Colin Meads, who played 5. Tests and was chosen as New Zealand. He was criticised for it. Photograph: Auckland grammar. A friend had put us in touch. Daniell was born in New Zealand and educated in England. After university he spent a decade playing professionally in France. Our Rugby Union training programs follow a progressive 4 week Training. The perfect Rugby Union athlete needs to posses all 5. These days he is a writer. His autobiography won awards and he has just finished his first novel. Six- foot something staggering. Daniell is an affable man, intelligent, with a thick French streak in his soul. He likes to live well. We drink far too much wine and my notes from the evening do not amount to much. Daniell explains that in New Zealand, . This is the fundamental skill, the first thing learned by kids, and still practised hard by the professionals. Daniell says a conspicuous difference between the teams he played with in Europe and those in New Zealand was the time spent drilling catching and passing. My mind turns back to the conversation with Henry. We were discussing New Zealand. A simple skill, perfected. Last time I was there I had a beard and the coach told me I was setting a bad example to his players. It was his idea to come here. Fifty- one of them studied at Auckland grammar, more than any place else in New Zealand. In New Zealand, school first XV rugby is a serious business. Sky broadcast the matches live, two every weekend. Here at Auckland grammar they pull in crowds of around 7,0. The standard is excellent, the competition intense. It is becoming increasingly common for players to make the leap from school straight into the professional game. Auckland grammar was established in 1. The first game of rugby in New Zealand was played in 1. It is a state school but receives a lot of money in donations. The sums top schools spend on rugby make many feel uneasy. A 2. 01. 3 investigation by the New Zealand Herald found that in Auckland the top schools were spending upwards of $5. Photograph: Scott Mc. Aulay for the Guardian. The main building was designed in the style of a Spanish mission, and would look wild west if it were not for the Latin tag . Like all sport staff here he. They are not paid to coach but the school does sponsor their training. Hansen leads us on a short tour. We start in the hall of fame, where he picks renowned players out of the photos. All illustrious, but none the most famous alumnus. That would be Sir Edmund Hillary. They have a pool of around 9. XV. By now it is lunchtime and kids are swarming the playing field. In every spare outdoor corner, kids are playing with rugby balls. Kicking them to and fro, playing keep- away or catch. Hansen nods towards one lad we pass. He stops and pulls up his socks. Rugby is not played all year- round and they will never pull a boy out of class to come and practise. They train on Wednesday and Thursday, practise skills on Friday, and play on Saturday. On top of that, there is a structured weight- training program. There is a nutritionist and they have occasional coaching from men such as Henry, Fox and the All Blacks manager, Darren Shand. The New Zealand Rugby Players Association often comes, too, to talk about welfare and, in particular, how to handle approaches from professional agents. For all this, the school. The first XV have been successful and they have produced plenty of professional players for teams around the world . He thinks they will have another soon enough. His name is Rieko Ioane. Three months after he left the school, he was playing for New Zealand. It so happens that Ioane is playing across town the very next day. Then developers came and the demographics changed. A lot of those same families have sold up and moved on. Ponsonby RFC are still here, though, the oldest and most successful rugby club in Auckland. Just like Auckland grammar they are proud of their record of producing All Blacks. They boast 5. 2, putting them equal first among the 5. Added to that, another 2. Test rugby for Samoa. Ponsonby play at the Western Springs speedway stadium, their main pitch in the centre of the track, surrounded by steep grass banks on two sides. They run 5. 6 junior and 1. This Saturday there are three games on. Two junior matches, though you would never know it from the size of the players. The props must weigh 1. When those matches are over, the players gather around the main pitch to watch the seniors play Pakuranga. Rieko Ioane is easy to spot. He scores two tries. Ioane. At Ponsonby, Mum is the junior administrator and Dad helps manage the seniors. Earlier in the season Ioane was playing for New Zealand sevens in London. He flew home on the Wednesday, trained on the Thursday, played in a crucial match for Ponsonby on the Saturday. And scored three tries. After the match everyone gathers in the little clubhouse. There is a bar at one end and an astonishing collection of memorabilia at the other. Among it, sacred relics from the 1. Today, France and New Zealand play for the Gallaher Trophy. A 1. 90. 5 jersey belonging to another player, George Nicholson, is in a glass case. One like it recently sold at auction for . Ioane and the other Ponsonby players grow up surrounded by this history. Ponsonby. Williams played 3. Tests for the All Blacks in the 1. That was the era of dawn raids, when the government cracked down on . Williams was one of the very first of Polynesian descent to play for New Zealand and his first tour was to South Africa, of all places. The apartheid government there granted him what it called . Otherwise he would not have been allowed to play. He is pictured in the clubhouse, which contains photos of old Ponsonby players who played for the All Blacks and George Nicholson. Photograph: Scott Mc. Aulay for the Guardian. Suddenly it all hit me and I just thought: . Scored 1. 4 tries in 1. And what started as a trickle became a flood. I was followed by lots of young Polynesians, second, third generation, people brought up here in New Zealand. They were unbeatable but they weren. They were renowned for winning. With the Polynesian influence our rugby has become more adventurous. The Polynesian boys like to throw it around, and step, and laugh and joke. It has been superseded by Super Rugby above and school rugby below. Among them, his own grandson, Gianni. Photograph: Scott Mc. Aulay for the Guardian. After a week, it was time to head south, to Wellington and, specifically, the headquarters of the NZRU. Six feet five and 2. He was a good player and won a single Test cap for the All Blacks in 1. He has been part of the NZRU. In New Zealand people have their own job and an All Black managerial role. I know a lot of those kids will only be four or even three. At that age they play a game called rippa rugby, seven- a- side and tackles are made by tearing tags off your opponent. It is a simple, safe version of the game, easy to organise even if you know nothing about the sport. From the ages of eight through to 1. The teams expand to 1. Around the age of 1. At this point, the secondary schools take over so clubs lose their young players. The good thing about this is that kids are not playing too much. In the UK, a boy might play for his school one day and his club the next. As Graham Henry says: . Whereas when I was in Wales there were boys there playing 8. The best players get called up to play age- group rugby for their provinces. Your chances of identifying talent at under- 1. These used to start their talent spotting after kids had finished school.
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