At the highest level of professional sport, it is not often that a coach feels empathetic towards his direct adversary. But I had precisely that experience after the 2003 Rugby World Cup quarter-final at the Telstra Dome (now the Etihad Stadium), in Melbourne.
Rudolf Straeuli, then the Springbok coach, and I had clashed the previous year during what was our first full season as international coaches. There had been an unexpected change in the New Zealand camp at the end of 2001, when Wayne Smith had walked out of the All Black coaching job ahead of an end-of-season tour to the northern hemisphere. I had been thrust into the role with just two years to go before the 2003 World Cup. Rudolf landed in the Springbok hot seat just a few months later, after the shock resignation of Harry Viljoen.
Before the first game between our two teams in the 2002 Tri-Nations in Wellington, Rudolf had tried to be clever by indulging in a bit of psychological warfare. The New Zealand media had previously made some comments about how my team did not include many Maori or Polynesian players, and Rudolf jumped on the race bandwagon after reading an article by Chris Laidlaw in the Dominion newspaper.
Verbal sparring before a major Test match was something at which Wallaby coach Eddie Jones was quite adept. He was a clever man, Eddie, but that sort of thing from Rudolf just came across as stupid, and I told him as much when we crossed paths at a press conference before the match.
‘Rudolf, what are you trying to do, mate? You’re not Eddie Jones, so don’t try to be Eddie Jones.’
But although I was cross with him then, ironically I felt nothing but sorrow for the burly South African coach when our paths crossed again – this time as I was on my way to the media conference after our impressive 29-9 win against the Boks, which had secured us a place in the semi-finals of the World Cup in Sydney the following week.
We had knocked South Africa out of the competition, and Straeuli wore the look of a man who was going to the gallows. He’d already been in the press conference, as the losing team goes first. His World Cup was over, and I could tell by the look on his face that he knew his international coaching career was over too.
South Africa is a lot like New Zealand when it comes to rugby. It is more than just a sport for a large segment of the South African population, just as it is for the Kiwis. New Zealand had played outstandingly that day and, frankly, I don’t think any team in the world would have been able to stop us in that form. In South Africa, though, people expect you to win, and going out at that stage of a World Cup was regarded as abject failure.
It was such a weird feeling for me. Straeuli’s race was over and he was going home, whereas I was still on my journey, at least for another week. Even though we’d had that clash in Wellington over the race issue, I really felt for the man, in the depths of my heart.
At the same time – perhaps for the first time in that World Cup – a flash of self-doubt or fear shot through my own mind: ‘What if that is me next week? How would I handle it?’
But it was only a momentary thought. We were on form and set to play Australia in the semi-final. We had already beaten them twice that year, just like we had beaten South Africa before that quarter-final, and both of the wins had been fairly comfortable. I was convinced we were better than the Wallabies.
In fact, although we’d lost to England, the tournament favourites, on New Zealand soil earlier in the year in a tight contest, I was still sure we’d go all the way and become the first All Black team since 1987 to lift the World Cup trophy. There had been mitigating circumstances in that loss to England. Justin Marshall had pulled a hamstring with a clear open line in front of him, and we’d started the game understrength.
I had also overhauled our attacking game in the intervening period, and with devastating effect, as we had put 50 points past both South Africa and Australia in the first two games of that year’s Tri-Nations. And they were away games, too. We smashed the Boks 52-16 in Pretoria and then the Aussies 50-21 in Sydney. I’m not sure any team will ever again achieve 50-pointers against South Africa and Australia in the space of seven days.
We scored 81 tries in 14 Test matches during 2003. You can work out that average yourself: it’s pretty close to six tries a game. In the process, we had comfortably won the Tri-Nations, the second time in two attempts since I had taken charge, and we had regained the Bledisloe Cup from Australia for the first time since 1997.
One of the frustrating things about the way people assess a coaching career is that there is a tendency to forget the starting point and focus only on the end point. When I took over, the All Black trophy cabinet had been empty and the team had been struggling to muster any self-belief. At that stage, the Wallabies had the psychological advantage.
During my tenure in charge of the All Blacks, there wasn’t much time to focus on anything other than performance. We got that right: by the time we reached the World Cup, I was convinced that we had the confidence and the self-belief to go all the way. I remember thinking that, after the loss to England, we’d bump into them again at the World Cup, and this time we would have their number.
In the semi-final, even though Australia got off to a quick start with the aid of a fortunate Stirling Mortlock intercept try in the ninth minute, I retained that belief for most of the way. Going into the last five minutes, when we were more than a converted try behind, I still fancied our chances of coming back to win because we’d scored some awesome tries in rapid succession that season and had shown our ability to strike. I just had massive belief in our capacity to break the game open.
But it didn’t happen, and as the clock wound down, it became clear that I would be following Straeuli’s walk of shame into the post-match media conference.
‘Four more years, boys, four more years.’
Those were the words of Wallaby scrumhalf George Gregan that became immortalised as he taunted the All Blacks while a scrum was being set during the game’s closing minute. We were trailing 10-22. Now I realised we couldn’t win.
Gregan’s words went like a rapier through many New Zealand hearts, but mine in particular. And the statement couldn’t have rung truer for me because what I was about to experience – failure – was not something I was prepared for. It was not an eventuality I had even contemplated. In fact, I don’t think anyone can be prepared for the vehement way in which the New Zealand nation expresses its outrage at its team’s failure in the Rugby World Cup.
The aftermath of the World Cup – the hurt, the self-loathing and the questioning – would live with me for exactly four years. It wasn’t until I was in France as a spectator during the 2007 World Cup that I was finally able to let go of those feelings. I was in a restaurant in Nice with friends watching as the All Blacks, coached by Graham Henry, got blown out of the World Cup in the Cardiff quarter-final.
It may seem bizarre to some, but, at that precise point, a great weight was lifted off my shoulders. That defeat brought home the realisation that what had happened to me could happen to anyone. And, back home in New Zealand, I would no longer be public enemy No. 1, as it felt I had been for those four years after the Sydney defeat – at least outside of my home city of Hamilton.
Henry’s defeat that day put my own loss into some perspective. In the semi-final against Australia, it had only been an intercept try, after all, that had put us out, and there had been some pretty puzzling refereeing from Chris White that had gone against us. What’s more, when you get to the knockout stages of a World Cup, it can become a bit of a lottery. It just takes being off form for a matter of minutes in a play-off game to blow four years of preparation.
Not that I’d had the luxury of four years of preparation. I had only had two. And in those two years, I had enjoyed an 86 per cent success record as coach. Many people outside New Zealand have reflected on that and wondered how I could get sacked on the basis of one poor outcome.
Well, the time has come when I can talk about things that I felt I was unable to at the time, and which I was also denied the opportunity of doing when New Zealand officials decided to hold a press conference in Australia while I was in a plane high above the Tasman Sea on my way home from that World Cup.
The press conference immediately after a game is not a good time to reflect properly on a career or give a decent analysis of where something might have gone wrong. You just feel too much emotion at that time. I am convinced that had I been given the opportunity of an exit press conference later on, I might have been able to make a better impression on the New Zealand people than I did immediately after our third and fourth play-off game against France, which was effectively my last game in charge of the All Blacks.
When I finally got to be alone in my room later in the evening after the semi-final, I was overcome with emotion, and the tears that I shed might have cleared my system and allowed me to be more reflective. But, at the World Cup, and at that level of competition, you don’t get second chances.
On my arrival back in New Zealand, I was assailed by an aggressive media posse, who jostled me in their attempt to get the sound bites they wanted on a press conference that had just happened, without my knowledge, on the other side of the ocean.
‘Mr Mitchell, what did you think of what Chris Moller said?’
‘Huh, what did he say and when did he say it?’
At that moment, in the arrivals hall at Wellington Airport, my life changed. I was vilified after that, and it became clear from the way the media went at me that I wouldn’t be able to tell the real story, even if I felt that I could. On the few occasions that I dropped my guard, such as when I allowed a journalist into my house when she asked for my side of the story, I ended up getting burnt. The article she wrote was accompanied by a caricature of me with horns coming out of my head.
It was a gradual process to get to the point where I felt I could talk about the World Cup defeat and properly face up to my demons. Along the way, there were many roadblocks that acted as catalysts by generating introspection and directing me towards the new perspective I have today. These key events have played a part in awakening a need to open up and re-evaluate where I have been, as well as where I am going as a coach and as a person.
One of those events was when I lay on my bed in my flat in Johannesburg in late 2010 bleeding from a stab wound and tightly bound with wires while two assailants searched for valuables. I thought I might die that night. The threat was real, and those terrifying minutes crawled by extremely slowly. I made a lot of decisions after that event. The assault had put my life into some perspective, and it was then that I resolved to stop chasing my career.
The real story about being axed as the All Black coach goes beyond just performance, and the same goes for my later acrimonious clashes at the Western Force and the Lions – unions that were both in a developmental stage when I was involved with them. There were issues simmering below the surface of those unions and, in retrospect, I am sorry that I chose to get into bed with them.
Not that my coaching career is all about regret. Far from it. I’ve had a varied career that has covered many levels of the game and has taken me to many different places. I have experienced many different cultures and immense highlights that few other people ever enjoy. In fact, I don’t think there are many professional coaches who have been fortunate enough to have experienced what I have. For instance, a week after my own team’s exit from the 2003 World Cup, I sat transfixed watching the World Cup final between England and Australia, willing England on to win that tight contest. I got so into the game that it was as if I was part of their group. And of course I had previously been part of the England group. For four years, as assistant coach to Clive Woodward, I had played a part in the development of one of the finest packs of forwards the game has seen. I had worked with the management guys; I had worked with the players and helped some of them develop. If the All Blacks weren’t going to win the World Cup, at least I was able to spirit England on to win it, so that all the meticulous planning and all the building I had been involved in had not been in vain.
And as I watched that game come to its dramatic conclusion, when Jonny Wilkinson slotted the drop goal that sent England into wild celebration, I was reminded of something else: four years earlier, England had been in exactly the same place that I was in now. When Springbok flyhalf Jannie de Beer kicked five drop goals to knock England out of the previous World Cup, in Paris in 1999, I had been part of the England group and had experienced the abject disappointment.
Woodward nearly lost his job as England coach then, and some would say he was lucky to survive. But survive he did, and England went on to reap the benefit of having him continue with what he had started when they won in Sydney in 2003. It was the same with my All Black successor, Graham Henry, who was allowed to bounce back from the 2007 disappointment and end his All Black career with the crowning achievement of winning the World Cup on home soil. I do sometimes wish the New Zealand Rugby Football Union (NZRU) had shown the same sensitivity and patience to me that they would later show to Henry.
Along my journey as a coach, I have encountered many people who are aware of the controversies that have dogged me and who are surprised to find that I am different from the person they had expected me to be. To them, I might not fit the persona of the hard disciplinarian that I have been made out to be, but I have to admit that there were times when I had to be tough on players. The job demands it sometimes, and you have to take into account that in many of my coaching positions, I had teams that were starting out from a weak point. I had to deal with player groups that needed to be pushed firmly in order for them to develop.
The job has demanded that approach and I feel that I have been misinterpreted as a person. My intentions, which have always been directed at maintaining the highest standards, something for which I make no apologies, have been misinterpreted too.
Readers can make up their own minds on this, and I will be the first to admit that I have made mistakes along the way. That is only natural: I was just 37 when I became coach of the All Blacks – there are some players on the international circuit who are older than that.
Hopefully, as you read my story, some of these misconceptions will be cleared up, and you will be able to reconsider what you thought you knew from a different perspective. Of course there will be some who will never change their opinion of me, probably because of the poor outcome of New Zealand’s Rugby World Cup campaign, but I am ready for that too!
This, then, is my story – the real story.