All Blacks coach Steve Hansen says he hopes Wallabies won't win Bledisloe Cup 'on his watch'

All Blacks coach Steve Hansen is hoping the Wallabies won't win back the Bledisloe before he leaves in 2019. Photo / Photosport

Just as George Gregan shouted "four more years boys" as the Wallabies side knocked New Zealand out of the 2003 World Cup, All Blacks coach Steve Hansen has declared he does not plan to lose grip of the Bledisloe Cup until he steps away at the end of 2019.

Having secured the trophy for a remarkable 14th straight year with a 29-9 win in Wellington last Saturday, Hansen said it is inevitable the Wallabies will win the Cup back one day, but he doesn't plan for that to happen for another three years.

"I thought about it at the start of the process, what it would feel like, and didn't like the idea of it, and I mentioned it to a few people and they didn't like the idea of it either, that's why they played as hard as they played," Hansen said.

"It means a lot to us, but one day it's inevitable someone's going to lose it for sure, I'm just hoping it's not on my watch.

"Along the line somewhere we'll get beaten and we've just got to cop that and take our lessons, understand where we went wrong and go and improve them.

"It's sport, people get beaten. There's a winner and a loser all the time.

"At the moment we're on a bit of a roll and things are going good for us. We've got to keep striving to be better, otherwise someone will come along and take it off us."

Hansen expressed concern about the state of Australian rugby as it struggles to hold footing with the dominant football codes, rugby league and Aussie rules.

"Rugby is an important game, it's a lot more important than just us, we need them to be playing well and getting people to go along and watch them in Australia," Hansen said.

"It's a tough market over there because you've got some other sports claiming part of the market.

"We want them to go well.

"Australian rugby is competing with other sports that might just be ahead of them at the moment, from a fan point of view.

"We want a strong southern hemisphere base for the game, we want our closest neighbours to be strong.

"They'll come right though, I'm confident of that.

"They've certainly got the players to be a very good side."

Wallabies vice-captain Michael Hooper, 24, can't even remember when Australia held the trophy back in 2002.

"So much has happened between now and then, I want to be part of making one myself and making one with a great group of guys but we fell short this year," Hooper said.

"There's another opportunity down the track where we'll grab that."

-News.com.au