Sporting glory 2005: Kiwi league dreams turned into reality

Fowlds Park, Mt Albert, on a sunny late-September day. And deja vu.

Seventeen years ago, on this same suburban rugby league haven, also with the sun on the back, one of the greatest of Kiwi players, Mark Graham, delivered a prophetic message.

Just days before the Kiwis were to take on Australia at a packed Eden Park in the 1988 World Cup final, I approached Graham after a training session to see if he was happy with the match preparations.

Graham grumbled that, to paraphrase, there was too much haka and not enough hard yakka in the Tony Gordon coaching regime.

Graham cut short his reply, maybe realising that open dissension wouldn't help the cause either. He then climbed on to the team bus, joining an illustrious bunch who were widely expected to finally lower Australian colours when it counted most.

Days later, we came to a familiar conclusion. Wally Lewis, Allan Langer and friends had won the day. Another Kiwi side had bitten the dust. And Graham's pre-match words held true.

Kiwi league is full of such trauma, snatching defeat from the jaws of victory and invariably getting mangled by the Australian league shark.

Few would have shared the optimism the latest Kiwi coach Brian McClennan displayed when he met the Herald at his Mt Albert club, that day last September. After all, it had been more than 50 years since the Kiwis had enjoyed a series victory over the mighty foe.

This was just another day for McClennan at the club which has for much of his life been another home.

He tried, in vain, to find the key to the club's gym. The remnants of his side's Bartercard Cup victory celebrations were still strewn about. Outside, a couple of sunbathers stretched on the Fowlds Park grass. A woman wandered by with her kids and a dog. The power and prestige of Australian league seemed in another world.

But while McClennan was keeping a judicious lid on the bubbles underneath, there was no mistaking that this pot was on a vigorous boil.

He certainly gave no appearances of being in awe of the job, and was defiant in declaring that the Kiwis had rolled over, accepted second best, for too long. He had already lined up decent ammo for his team, about injustices real and maybe even perceived that the Kiwis have had to deal with. The team had a right to know, said McClennan, that the international board had only booked Australia and Great Britain into hotels for the Tri-Nations final.

There is an infectious enthusiasm about McClennan, an honest down-to-earth rigour with manic edges, which had already found favour in the various club teams he had coached to national titles.

Mixed in with an almost lifelong passion for analysing the game, it always had serious winning potential with a mainly young but talented Kiwi side. Still, beyond an inner circle of McClennan backers, there would have been few believers.

Yet by late November, dreams had turned into reality when the Kiwis smashed Australia 24-0 in Leeds to win the Tri-Nations final.

Three players stood at the centre of the Kiwi's series and final triumph. Ruben Wiki, Nigel Vagana and Stacey Jones led the campaign, but around them so much talent is blooming.

It wasn't just McClennan's tactical nous, such as his shifting of centre Shontayne Hape to lock for the final, which came through. After another arduous season, he had the players' enthusiasm pitch-perfect for the final, whereas a tired looking Australian coach Wayne Bennett not only missed the boat, but the flotilla, on this score.

As the mistakes mounted up among the Kangaroos, not one of their players looked capable or overly interested in turning the game around in the face of Kiwi gang tackling.

The result forced Bennett to quit the job, and there has been blood-letting in Australian league since.

For this fan of the football codes, nothing came close to matching the Leeds' triumph in the 2005 sporting year. The only dampening note was that the final was so far away, turning it into a surreal TV event.

Early morning television was also central to the event which most pundits would pick as the magical sporting moment of the year: Michael Campbell's victory in the US Open. That he held off the great Tiger Woods made it even more special.

To produce shot after shot of the highest quality while on the verge of scoring your first major was magnificent enough. And US Open courses are notoriously tough. To hold off the man set to become the greatest major winner in history was something else.

This will go down as one of the greatest of New Zealand sporting achievements, one that will gain more status as time goes on.

And talk about firing shots. New Zealand rowing won four gold medals in 45 minutes at the world championships in Japan in September: the victors being Mahe Drysdale (single sculls), Juliette Haigh and Nicky Coles (coxless pair), George Bridgewater and Nathan Twaddle (coxless pair), Caroline and Georgina Evers-Swindell (doubles sculls).

One international report following this stunning achievement read thus: "New Zealand has a population creeping just over four million - roughly a fifth of the population of Metropolitan New York - but is punching well above its weight in sporting competition." And how.

Later, back in New Zealand, Drysdale showed me the calloused hands which tell the story of a rower's lot, the endless physical pain and exhaustion that it takes to make a world champion.

There are no short cuts in this game, and the lanes to success are quiet and painful, away from the limelight, where pride and steel are the important oars. Drysdale believes he gets his pig-headed determination from his late grandfather, the self-made business winner Sir Bob Owens. Drysdale's inspiration has come from those dedicated rowing machines, Rob Waddell and the Evers-Swindells.

It is a sport where strong personalities can cause friction in a small community, but the bonds of rowing invariably come through. There is always a sense that the baton is being passed on, even if the changeover can be muddled.

But in Drysdale, New Zealand may have found a successor to the magnificent Waddell with a relatively smooth transition, and remarkably fortunate haste.

Glory also found its home in the All Black camp this year, although the failure of the Lions to produce credible opposition diminished their achievements.

The Lions test team were rubbish. Coach Sir Clive Woodward's preparation was appalling. The decision to play Jonny Wilkinson out of position was, quite frankly, absurd.

A Lions test side was never given the chance to gel, and Woodward's over manipulation of the press and everything else undoubtedly robbed the tourists of that vital ingredient, spirit.

But the All Blacks did everything to ram the advantage home, with captain Tana Umaga among the most magnificent of contributors.

Nothing could touch Dan Carter's second test performance in Christchurch. Rugby perfection was the general verdict on Carter, who notched 33 points in the 48-18 victory.

To cap off a magnificent year the All Blacks mainly cantered to the Grand Slam - being tested only by England - having also won the Tri-Nations.

It's what's going on in the dark places though that suggests the All Blacks are headed for more bright lights.

Among the stellar achievements of Graham Henry and his high powered coaching panel is the development of the tight five, and particularly the front row.

Props Carl Hayman and Tony Woodcock are grunting their way to legendary status and hooker Keven Mealamu was also among the season's best.

The 2005 Silver Ferns will also be long remembered, for their record 61-36 win over Australia in October, having also won in June. As for the star, guess who? The usual suspect. Irene van Dyk was supreme.

Like most of this year's sporting highlights, the Silver Ferns' record victory came overseas, in Sydney.

It was especially satisfying, given that the promise of 2004 had given way to a series defeat against Australia in November last year. Not only did the Silver Ferns re-establish our preferred order, but a whole new order given the size of the victory.

Michael Campbell, the Kiwis, rowers, All Blacks and Silver Ferns. Quite a framework for what has been described as one of the great New Zealand sporting years.

So which events fill in the gaps?

Back to league for a moment.

Have we ever seen a player quite like Benji Marshall, one of the inspirations behind the Wests Tigers' unexpected triumph in the Australian league competition. They were 150-1 longshots early in the season.

Marshall engineered one of the great grand final tries, breaking the six-all deadlock with the North Queensland Cowboys via a startling kick return which started close to his tryline.

Marshall is a bewitching mix of a pogo stick and jack rabbit, cantering to slow defenders down before high-stepping past. He tore around the Cowboys and delivered a flick pass for wing Pat Richards to score.

You could also find glory in unusual corners: the New Zealand curlers qualifying for the Winter Olympics springs to mind here. And Sam Warriner, the transplanted Englishwoman who fits an exhausting triathlon training schedule around a teaching career in Whangarei, won two world cup races. And the Black Sticks women's hockey team beat Australia for the first time in five years, involving 21 losses and a draw.

Winning wasn't everything. There was probably nothing more surprising than Dan Shirley and Sara Runesten-Petersen winning the mixed doubles bronze medal at the world badminton championships in California.

Other highlights? The Black Caps whacked a world record to beat Australia in a one-dayer at Christchurch. And the Crusaders continued their domination of the Super 12 by winning a fifth title.

For this punter though, nothing touches that Kiwi league victory in Leeds. It was rooted in good old basic coaching values - from the heart of the game in Auckland - which state that league is a tough sport where you have to lay everything on the line.

A heady mixture of composure and desire brought them through, unlike that match in 1988 when a far more experienced Kiwi team unravelled on a foundation of distractions.

There has never been an occasion before or since like that 1988 World Cup final game, a stand alone event and hometown test farewell for Kiwi greats like Graham, Kurt Sorensen and Dean Bell. In contrast, the beauty about the triumph in Leeds is that it not only removed one of the biggest stains on our sports record, but is a genuinely promising new dawn.


Magic numbers

24-0
Kiwis v Australia Tri-Nations final, Leeds
4
golds in
45
minutes for New Zealand rowers at world championships
33
points for Dan Carter in All Blacks'
48-18
second-test win against the Lions