Rotation post-mortem redux

Random items crossing the transom the other day ... all unrelated, but possessing a familiar theme.

Reflecting upon the injuries to star All Blacks Richie McCaw and Ali Williams last weekend, Lindsay Knight at Rugby Heaven concedes, "in the present environment some rotation is inevitable, even desirable." But Knight has reservations:

Rotate, but not to the point of dizziness

Of the many rods the All Blacks coaching staff made for itself with last year’s failed World Cup campaign the one which has returned to provide the biggest pounding has been the rotation selection policy.

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Unfortunately, where the mistake was made was in continuing to chop and change through the 2007 season, even at the World Cup itself, at an obvious cost to enhancing combinations and a team’s rhythm.

Blogger Dave, at the excellent Dave's Football Blog, looks at the NFL and EURO 2008 for his own impressions:

EURO 2008 Losers Should Have Learned From Tony Dungy

Three of the four Group Stage winners at EURO 2008 — Portugal, Croatia and the Netherlands — went out in the quarterfinals last week. The one thing those three teams had in common? They all clinched their groups after two games, then rested their starters for the third to avoid getting anyone else hurt before the Knockout Stage began. Result? They looked tentative and rusty, and their opponents, who all had to must-win third games in the Group Stage, looked sharper and played better.

This same sort of thing seems to happen to the Indianapolis Colts every year, doesn’t it? Most of the time, they clinch the AFC South with a few games to spare, and what does Tony Dungy do? He rests his players to avoid getting any of them injured. Every time he does that, the Colts get bounced out of the playoffs early.

Remember what happened the year the Colts won Super Bowl XLI? Dungy couldn’t rest his players. The Colts had to scrape and claw for playoff position right up until the end of the season, and they didn’t get a bye week in the playoffs, so they had to play right on through. They didn’t lose their edge, and they pushed through until they won it all.

I get that coaches don’t want their players to get hurt, but you know what? Injuries happen in football, and you can’t be scared of them. What’s worse: the risk losing a player to injury in a meaningless game, or the risk of losing your edge because all your players had a game off and bombing out early? This seems even more crucial in a competition as compressed as EURO 2008, which only lasts for a month. Are you telling me that these guys are so out of shape that they can’t play a full six games in 22 days?

So the next time anyone argues for resting players before a knockout stage, point them to the Indianapolis Colts. They’re as good a sign post as anyone here.

Now, taking all of this under consideration, I decided to compare-and-contrast the consistency of selection for New Zealand's greatest Rugby World Cup triumph (1987) versus their worst RWC flameout (2007).

The centre-position shows the All Blacks dilemma in glaring detail.

Check the All Blacks RWC-winning fixture list for the 1987 tournament versus the 2007 version, and look at who gets pencilled into the #13 jersey:

RWC 1987

05/22/1987
NZ vs Italy
13. JOE STANLEY

05/27/1987
NZ vs Fiji
13. JOE STANLEY

06/01/1987
NZ vs Argentina
13. JOE STANLEY

06/06/1987
NZ vs Scotland
13. JOE STANLEY

06/14/1987
NZ vs Wales
13. JOE STANLEY

06/20/1987
NZ vs France
13. JOE STANLEY

Fast-forward two decades --

RWC 2007

09/08/2007
NZ vs Italy
13. MILS MULIAINA

09/15/2007
NZ vs Portugal
13. CONRAD SMITH

09/23/2007
NZ vs Scotland
13. CONRAD SMITH

09/29/2007
NZ vs Romania
13. ISAIA TOEAVA

10/06/2007
NZ vs France
13. MILS MULIAINA

It's bad enough that John Mitchell inserted Leon McDonald into the center position for the losing 2003 RWC AB side. It was worse that McDonald was handed the goalkicking duties. McDonald, after all, had never handled either responsibility at NPC or S12/14 level, let alone the international level, let alone as the desperate solution for the RWC. (And 'twasn't Leon's fault that Tana Umaga was laid out in a freak accident in the opener.)

But it seems doubly silly that Graham Henry would do the same for Mils Muliaina for the 2007 tournament. Yes, Muliaina had covered #13 at varying levels in the past. But doesn't it seem restrictive and counter-productive to start Muliaina in a knock-out test, when he hadn't started the position in a month?

Rotation certainly has it's value, as any manager of the top football (soccer) sides in the world would attest (Sir Alex Ferguson, Jose Mourinho, etc.).

Nevertheless, the game of musical chairs that seeks to protect a players' welfare by mothballing him, might in the long run risk inflicting even greater damage to the prospects of the whole team.

Sumthin' to think about...