Graham Lowe: A lesson (or ten)

In the aftermath of last Friday's brutal test defeat, Kiwi coach Brian McClennan would have been seeking one vital piece of equipment: a drawing board.

Chances are, in the euphoria surrounding last year's stunning Tri-Series win in England, Bluey threw the old one on the scrap heap, considering it unnecessary in his plans to ram home a dynasty of dominance against the seemingly wounded Kangaroos.

How quickly the 2006 Anzac test changed that thinking and the young Kiwi coach must now go back to the drawing board, to rebuild the shattered dream.

And loyal New Zealand league supporters must continue to do what they have always been asked to do - keep the faith.

One loss doesn't make McClennan a bad coach. On the contrary, the way he has handled the crushing defeat gives confidence for a bounce back in the end-of-year Tri-Series.

But while he's back at the drawing board, McClennan might be wise to consider the following lessons which have flowed from the wreckage at Suncorp Stadium.

1. Don't rely on administrators. The team selection process (yet again) seemed a fiasco, with one player (David Solomona) unable to retrieve a passport from the British bureaucracy and another, Shontayne Hape, repaying his coach's faith in picking him for the Tri-Series final by opting out of the Anzac test due to his wife's holiday commitments. Very Mickey Mouse.

2. Don't get too cute for your own good. Consider this in the Kiwis' run-on side: No 3 (Clinton Toopi) had swapped with loose forward (Sonny Bill Williams, No 13); No 7 (Benji Marshall) had swapped to the bench with No 14 (Thomas Leuluai), No 12 (Louis Anderson) had gone to hooker while No 9 (David Faiumu) was on the bench; No 15 (David Fa'alogo) had gone to ... you get the story. Too clever by half, and guess what? The Australians took the field 1 to 17 as named.

3. Beware. Your games may bite you where it hurts. The Ruben Wiki subterfuge was not only misguided but would have played into the hands of the Australians. What better pre-kickoff bonus could they have had than being told that Wiki was out on the park in his civvies?

4. Consider the what-ifs. Should the Kiwis really have been surprised that the Aussies came out with unbelievable intensity? Hell's bells, they'd been routed 24-0 just six months ago, and we should know by now Australians don't handle humiliation all that well. The only surprise was how surprised the Kiwis were.

5. Never provoke a hungry Lion (or Kangaroo for that matter). The Kiwis' talk-it-up approach before the test played right into the Australians' hands. What better motivation could they have asked for? Now the New Zealanders should reflect on Willie Mason's belittling post-match comments before they meet again in the Tri-Series.

6. Play your best cards every time, all the time. Williams has been rated the best player in the world (although Andrew Johns made his own statement about that on Friday night), and Marshall is a genuine gamebreaker. So how come Williams languished at centre, and Marshall spent more time on a warm-up bike than on the field in the first half? A test match is just that, and despite how their clubs would like to influence their involvement, it's crazy to think you can protect players from the heat of an international contest like Friday night's.

7. Analyse why you win, as well as why you lose. There's no escaping the fact that the Kiwis' win in last year's Tri-Series final owed much to the absence of Johns and Darren Lockyer. It should have been obvious that their return would be a key factor this time. Yet we went into the match without a competent field kicker, a centre playing loose forward, a loose forward playing centre and a halfback who clearly struggled. Keep your fingers crossed that Johns and Ben Kennedy are NEVER lured out of international retirement.

8. Don't buy arguments you'll never win. Did you notice how the Australian Rugby League responded to the Karmichael Hunt issue (which seemed to distract the Kiwis to a disturbing extent) by pointing out that the Kiwis were fielding five Australian-born players?

9. Cleverness is the key to winning. Surely we know by now that the Australians relish a hard, physical contest, and invariably weather a bashing to come out on top. Frank Pritchard's legitimately brutal hit on Hunt only served to fire the Aussies up more. The key to beating Australia is to out-think and out-skill them with stepping, linebreaks and off-loads. There were precious few of any of these skills from the Kiwis on Friday night.

10. When the oxygen is low, make sure the alert stays high. I certainly learned to my cost (Carlaw Park test 1985, John Ribot's winning try in the dying minutes) that a feature of Australian sides is that they almost never take their foot off the gas pedal. While Friday night's score wasn't really an indication of the intensity of the match, it did show that the Australians can put points on a side at a furious pace.

Undoubtedly, there'll be many other notes and designs on Bluey's drawing board in the months ahead.

So here's a warning and a suggestion to finish. As a coach, McClennan has already built a reputation for his genuine affection for his players.

But this should not be taken to the degree of blind loyalty. Good coaches usually work between a cuddle at one end of the spectrum and a length of barbed wire at the other.

And finally, if Sonny Bill Williams really is the future of New Zealand league (and I am a strong supporter of this theory), make him captain now, retain Ruben Wiki as his (on and off-field) mentor, and build a bold new Kiwi side around him.

I'll wager that after a decade the Aussies will be as relieved to see him depart, as we are to see Johns retire (with the deserved accolades) on Friday night.