Rugby World Cup: Strange Days

No flies on him: John Mitchell awaits the kick-off of the World Cup semifinal against Australia in 2003. Photo / Getty Images

The 2003 World Cup campaign was a curious affair, an emotionally retarded seven-week hole in the lives of those sent to cover it. Some might even call it a strange journey.

If a single image could capture an entire World Cup campaign, what might it look like?

If it is 2003 we're talking about, the photo would look like this one: monochromatic, faceless and, ultimately, flyblown.

This was New Zealand's most joyless campaign, although the '91ers under Gary Whetton's bombastic captaincy might have run them close. John Mitchell had taken over from the affable Wayne Smith after the latter baulked following a Bledisloe Cup loss in 2001. Mitchell co-opted Robbie Deans and the pair set about circling the wagons.

It was soon obvious that media were very much outside the circle. This was not unusual in itself. The All Blacks had always treated the Fourth Estate with suspicion, but in '03 it was more like disdain.

If any of those holding notepads and dictaphones were in any doubt about where they stood, selector Mark "Cowboy" Shaw was there to remind them. In a piece with the New Zealand Listener, he said: "You've got a lot of fleas in the system. They write shit. They've got no idea of what they're talking about. We can't be sidelined or swayed by fleas.

"I'll talk to anyone about footy, who I respect, who understands footy, and has been there and done that, who has made contributions to the game at whatever level, but I can't waste my time talking footy with fleas."

The battle lines were drawn: the great and the good on one side, parasites the other.

Mitchell has said his approach was by design. He wanted to strip out all the peripherals and saw his job as simply trying to make the All Blacks as good as they could possibly be. The media and sponsors could not help the All Blacks improve, he reasoned, so why waste any more time than he needed to servicing their needs.

In a professional environment - and international rugby had ceased being amateur five years before Mitchell took over - it was the height of naivety, though the approach did inspire fierce loyalty among some of his players (though not all).

Perhaps surprisingly, given his embracing of the professional aspects of rugby and his post-playing career as a skilled and articulate analyst and media pundit, Justin Marshall was one of Mitchell's great defenders.

In his eponymous biography, Marshall wrote: "I know it was a big deal for a lot of people that John Mitchell often struggled to express himself clearly when he was talking to the media. But to me, that was irrelevant. As long as he was able to express himself clearly to the players and we were then able to express his vision successfully with the ball in hand, what did it matter?

"For us players, he was brilliant because he, to a certain extent, did what he felt was best for the team. For that reason he flagged the odd sponsorship thing we were supposed to do. He'd just say, 'No, I'm not getting the players to go to this dinner. It doesn't suit'. What he was doing was really looking after us, but getting himself more and more offside with the people at the New Zealand Rugby Union."

Marshall probably wasn't alone, but his wasn't a universal opinion. Christian Cullen, the fullback with magic in his boots, thought Mitchell was a "dick", while Anton Oliver, the most erudite and deep-thinking All Black, described his relationship with the coach as "two men separated by the same language". Neither of them made the trip to Australia, instead being passed over for the likes of Mark Hammett and the fullbacking Bens, Blair and Atiga. Seriously.

Christian Cullen cruises in for his try, 1997. Photo / Geoff Dale

The thing that perplexed the old-stagers who had covered the All Blacks when John Mitchell was a respected and well-liked captain of the All Blacks dirt-trackers, was: Where had that man gone?

Some of the blame fell on earnest communications manager Matt McILraith but in truth he was powerless to alter Mitchell's course. Blame was also apportioned to Mitchell's life coach Tony Wynne and it's hard to argue that a life coach who has seemingly sucked the life out of a coach has had a positive effect.

Then there was Mitchell's dark shadow, Deans. By the end, there was a genuine belief among many in the press corps that Deans was head coach in all but name.

Whatever the intricacies of those complex dynamics, the picture they presented to the outside world was one of aloofness, of arrogance and of sheer we-couldn't-give-a-s***ness.

The All Blacks sailed through pool play, as they always do, though they were given a hurry-up by Steve Hansen's Wales, throwing away a 28-10 lead to trail 34-37, before romping away to win 53-37.

In the quarter-finals they accounted for a lacklustre Springboks team 29-9, but then ran into old foe Australia at Sydney a week later. Confidence was high. On the same ground, just four months earlier, the All Blacks had won 50-21 and had run the Wallabies off their feet.

This time, the hosts put on a suffocating defensive display. Mils Muliaina had a try disallowed early and when Stirling Mortlock intercepted Carlos Spencer's hopeful pass in the ninth minute, the writing was on the wall. Seventy-one mostly futile minutes later the All Blacks, 22-10 down, faced up to the reality that they would be spending "four more years" without the Webb Ellis Cup.

The result was the first body blow for Mitchell and Deans. The presence of NZRU chief executive Chris Moller and late chairman Jock Hobbs in the changing rooms following the defeat was the second - they were not there for the purpose of draping their arms around the coaches' shoulders but to notify them their positions would be reviewed.

Moller and Hobbs would hold a press conference in North Sydney that week, confirming the review and leaving journalists in no doubt that the death warrants had effectively been signed. Even if Mitchell's record suggested he was being treated harshly (certainly, results-wise, he had more claims on keeping the job than his successor Graham Henry had four years later), few tears were shed.

"So how are Mitch and Robbie supposed to feel? They're suffering anyway from the loss, and yet the first thing they get told is, 'There's going to be a full review of your positions'," an appalled Marshall wrote.

They were feeling, you'd imagine, how they'd made a lot of people feel during their two years in charge - isolated, unwanted and downright confused.