Sean Fitzpatrick: Code can't afford years of B-team tests

The International Rugby Board has a problem. It's called the World Cup or, more accurately, the effect of the Cup on the quality of world rugby - I think it's dropping.

I am choosing my words carefully but I think one of the factors is the rotation policy pioneered by the All Blacks and now copied by many other teams.

I am being careful because I do not want anyone to think I am attacking Graham Henry or the All Black approach. How could I?

They are still winning and Henry is simply responding to the brief given by the NZRU - bring home the World Cup - and he's attempting to do so the best way he knows.

But we are deep into the rotation system now and well advanced in the Tri Nations and, on the evidence in front of us every week, few people could say the standard of rugby has improved. I am not just talking about the All Blacks or a pretty ordinary Super 14 this year and I am aware there are grizzles now about the quality of the Air NZ Cup rugby.

I'm talking world rugby. The Northern Hemisphere has its problems, too. The quality has dropped there because the players are simply thrashed by the amount of rugby they are asked to play.

In the Southern Hemisphere, the quality hasn't been great this year. So if you look at rugby's big picture, it is not particularly pretty - ordinary test matches, large gaps in the stands (as with Australia and South Africa in Sydney this month) and a general feeling that real test matches will not be seen until the business end of the World Cup.

There is a danger here for the game - I do not think international rugby is strong enough to stand years of rotation and B teams between World Cups. What do the broadcasters who help fund the professional game think when they see what is pretty much an All Black B team taking on South Africa?

I am sure South Africa's 49-0 hiding by the Wallabies affected Henry's team selection against the Boks. Fair enough - it works for the All Blacks. We might just have the best two teams in world rugby at the moment.

But is that doing the international game any good? I don't think so. There is a danger people will turn off if the quality drops too much, for too long. And I don't just mean TV sets. It's a big problem for the IRB.

I have always thought the World Cup is not the most important thing - winning the next game is most important. In placing emphasis on rotation, we are dropping the standard of our rugby but it is not really being illustrated by our Tri Nations opposition, who are themselves struggling.

One of the things that amazed me last year was that, after the Tri-Nations, there were a few All Blacks who didn't play for their provinces because they needed a rest. I find that bizarre. It's the thin end of the wedge which separates All Blacks from provincial and club play and hampers the development and quality of players on the way up.

Players want to play. I am not surprised at all about talk surfacing that the All Blacks opted to play more and that's why we are seeing more of them in the Air NZ Cup and people like Jerry Collins playing provincial and club rugby on consecutive days.

I do not want our players thrashed like they are in the north. But rotation means we are not yet finding the combinations, skills and sheer quality of rugby that we all look for from our All Black teams.

There is a happy medium but world rugby - and not just the All Blacks team - has yet to find that correct balance.