Jamie Wall
Auckland, October 25, 2021
Samuel Whitelock, the sole All Black from World Cup 2011 (Photo for Photosport by Greg Fiume)
The All Blacks 104-14 win over the USA Eagles on October 23, 2021 in Washington DC came almost 10 years to the day when they won the World Cup.
Samuel Whitelock, who captained the All Blacks this time, is the sole remaining All Black from that World Cup night at Eden Park.
The night of October 23, 2011 heralded a new dawn for rugby in New Zealand – gone was the stigma of not having won the tournament since 1987, the massive weight lifted and replaced with a seeming contentment that justice had been served. The way that New Zealand views their most important national side has dramatically changed since then, with this result a very clear indication as to how.
Of the game itself, the flogging of a woefully underdone American team is summed up in the Scoreline. The fact that Ian Foster does not have any injury concerns is probably the only thing worth mentioning.
It is not right to compare a game like that to a World Cup final, but it is a good time to reflect on how things were ten years ago.
The criticism of Stephen Donald
Before the game, Stephen Donald was a much-maligned bit part All Black who would remove himself from social situations on a worryingly routine basis. The man known as ‘Beaver’ had been torched for the previous 12 months for supposedly losing a test against the Wallabies by failing to find touch on the final play, leading to James O’Connor scoring and banging over the winning conversion. Just to make matters even more galling, the traitorous Quade Cooper scored the Wallabies’ opener.
Donald got his redemption arc in the most cinematic way possible, coming into a banged-up All Black side and kicking the crucial penalty in the final while wearing a Jersey clearly cut for the much smaller Aaron Cruden. Arguably, the most memorable part was the look on Donald’s face when he realised he’d gone from the trash to treasure.
All for the money
The game against the US was essentially the same as the one that put Donald in the bin in the first place: a completely meaningless, tacked on test played in Hong Kong of all places.
The All Blacks were there for the money, the same reason they have been in Washington DC, but the fact that people cared so much about it and Donald’s unfairly perceived role in the result speaks volumes. Yes, it was against a much better standard of opposition and the All Blacks lost, but it is hard to imagine anyone these days getting so invested in a Mickey Mouse offshore test match that they end up making a movie about it.
The 2011 final itself was not just watched by New Zealanders, it was experienced. Not in a particularly good way either, any conversation about it feels like revisiting a traumatic event.
The tension that game built up, all the years of pain and misery that World Cups had wrought, felt like a million tons of bricks that night. Eyes were covered, heads were tucked between legs. Everyone knows where they were that night and how they felt when the final whistle was blown.
The 2011 Cup and after
When has an All Black test ever got anywhere near that sort of emotional connection since? The 2015 World Cup was a walk in the park, then by 2019 the loss in the semi-final was greeted with more of a shrug and feeling of ‘oh well, maybe next time.’
There is a lot of good to be taken out of New Zealanders not turning rugby games into such a serious source of angst, while Covid has done its best to take the All Blacks offshore for most of their schedule anyway.
This USA Test has come and gone with New Zealand Rugby making no secret of the fact that it was a payday with no one in New Zealand minding about the supposed sacredness of the All Black jersey being sold to the highest bidder. This is the reality of pro-sport, and much like the 2019 result, it has been met with a resigned acceptance, even faint enthusiasm. The aforementioned contentment about the World Cup has manifested itself into ambivalence.
Samuel Whitelock, who captained the All Blacks this morning, is the sole remaining All Black from that night at Eden Park.
Stephen Donald has leveraged his fame to have a broadcasting career and presumably gets free beer in any pub he visits. Even Quade Cooper is now held in high regard by Kiwis after his uplifting return to test rugby this year.
Who would have thought any of that, 10 years ago today?
Jamie Wall is a Contributor to Radio New Zealand. The above Report and Pictures have been published under a Special Agreement with www.rnz.co.nz
