The World's Cup: All Blacks afforded 'special privileges'

A sports writer has said the All Blacks "get away with doing a haka and get away with cheating at the breakdown." Photo / Brett Phibbs, NZ Herald

Steve Deane scours global media for an offbeat look at rugby's biggest show.

STAGE TWO

Former Times sports writer Simon Barnes has been trapped at stage two for pretty much his whole life. Now writing for ESPNscrum.com, Barnes might even be regressing to stage 1. In his latest column Barnes accuses the All Blacks of owning rugby and being afforded "special privileges" as a result of favouritism. "People are prepared to buy into the All Black myth." Barnes brings out all the staple complaints about the All Blacks - including that people reverentially refer to them as the All Blacks instead of New Zealand, they get away with doing a haka and get away with cheating at the breakdown. "Their nickname is used almost as often as the name of nation, slavishly, sycophantically." Chin up mate. You might just have found the answer to England's woes. If only we can come up with a cool name for them they'll be twice the side.

STAGE FIVE

Congrats to the Daily Mail for being the first British paper to graduate to the fifth stage of grief. For those who need a refresher, the Kluber-Ross model posits that in dealing with grief people go through denial, anger, bargaining, depression and, finally, acceptance. Back to the Mail.

"Let's not get too depressed," writes Dan Jones as he comes to terms with the Southern Hemisphere's utter dominance of RWC2015. "The Southern Hemisphere teams are not us. But they are not the devil. If we set aside our parochial heartache, then surely we will admit that, collectively, if in different ways, these four teams are bloody good to watch. We may as well accept the situation and enjoy them as they entertain us. All of these sides deserve their places in the semifinals. So we need to swallow our disappointment and admire them. It is sad that we northerners no longer have a dog in the race. But the race is no less exciting for it."

Well done. You've made it.

ULTIMATE RIVALRY?

There's been all sorts of talk about how South Africa are still the ultimate test for the All Blacks and our fiercest rivals and blah blah blah. But is that really still true? Not all that long ago the All Blacks had never won a series in South Africa and the win-loss ledger between the nations was level. Times have changed. The All Blacks - whom Springboks coach Heyneke Meyer has brilliantly labelled the greatest team ever (he must have missed the Georgia game) had won 18 of their last 27 matches against the Boks. "They are a special opponent, and it's a very special rivalry," says Ben Smith. "I grew up during the Apartheid era, when Australia were the traditional foes, but now South Africa have come back into it and I think it's got back to where it was and they are our ultimate rival." Dunno about that mate.

NEVER HAPPENED

In the spirit of tenuously linking just about any local story to the RWC, our mates at Stuff this week churned out a story about how the tournament hadn't contributed to a spike in drink driving rates in Wellington. A total of 33 drivers were caught over the limit last weekend but it had nothing to do with the rugby. "There was no evidence to suggest that drivers caught over the limit had been drinking because of cup matches," Stuff reported a local cop as saying. Hmmm. In other stuff that didn't happen this week because of RWC, Osama bin Laden didn't come back to life because he was desperate to see Argentina's quarter-final, Santa Claus didn't announce he was entering boot camp in a bid to play prop for the North Pole in next year's qualifying matches and Isis didn't declare a ceasefire in Syria to coincide with the All Blacks v Boks semifinal.

CODE WARS

There may have been a thaw in recent times but it would be wrong to suggest the war between rugby and league is over, particularly in England where the sports are still heavily divided on geographical and socioeconomic lines. English league fans tend to watch RWCs with a mixture of fear, loathing and grudging respect. This from the Guardian (founded oop norf). "Rugby league fans have been through the mixer over the last month as the Rugby World Cup has evolved. We've felt amusement (when hubristic England lost to Wales), elation (enjoying some vastly more entertaining play-off matches than several of the dreary higher profile group games), and smugness (when Leeds and Wigan put on a magnificent Grand Final while England exited their tournament across town in a festival of flagellation). Last weekend, we could only applaud the glorious Rugby World Cup quarter-finals and sneak in the occasional comment along the lines of 'that was rugby league, you know' as the Europeans tumbled."