Recency bias in strategic planning is dangerous. All of us tend to use our short term memories to understand what’s going on and what might happen in the future.
This means that we focus too heavily on what’s just happened and not enough on everything else. So we make short term decisions that reduce long term success.
On the other hand, Empire Magazine film critic Chris Hewitt once said that he’d just found out about recency bias. Out of all the biases it had become his favourite.
We’re talking about recency bias because it’s impacted so heavily on the debate about Super Rugby and the future of the game in New Zealand. After Argentina’s latest giant-killing exploits we heard that Super Rugby isn’t strong enough to prepare the players for big Test matches, that the big Northern Hemisphere leagues are too rich, that the All Blacks’ aura has been lost. But after that things went quiet when New Zealand won comfortably at Eden Park.
Then Saturday’s defeat – to a team with relaxed selection criteria – reignited calls for a relaxation of the All Blacks’ selection criteria. Yes, playing some overseas-based recent All Blacks might have helped in that match. But what a textbook example of vivid memories of a recent event leading to short term decisions that put long term success at risk. We’ll see why later.
(Photo by Ashley Vlotman/Gallo Images/Getty Images)
In last week’s article, we saw how the “copper generation” of All Black forwards that came after the golden Whitelock/Retallick generation is damaging current performance. As promised, this week we will see how the All Blacks can raise up better generations and stay at the top table of Test rugby long term.
We’ll need to overcome our natural recency bias to do this.
RECENCY BIAS & MYTH MAKING
Recency bias can lead to myths because we jump to conclusions based on incomplete information. Here are some that have been circulating of late.
We’ll start with a subconscious one – the dominance of the McCaw/Read era has made people act as if the All Blacks have always been dominant. As we discussed in last week’s article that is far from the case, the team has just been more successful overall through history. We shouldn’t hold any All Blacks team to the standards of the recent GOATs or panic if we’re not at that level.
THE IMPROVED ARGENTINA MYTH
One thing people have been saying is that Argentina’s recent wins over New Zealand mean that they must have suddenly improved since leaving Super Rugby. Yet even a quick glance at the past ten years tells us that they have achieved big upsets both in and out of the comp.
Los Pumas beat South Africa in 2015 just before they joined. Then they beat the Springboks twice more and All Blacks once while playing for Los Jaguares. But due to recency bias it’s the two wins over the All Blacks after they departed that everyone seems to remember.
They remain a very inconsistent team capable of great performances, a bit like Ireland before their revolution. If that’s to change, something within Argentinian rugby needs to change, not the comp they play in.
THE CHANGING TIMES MYTHS
Another myth often repeated since the Springboks defeat is that the times are changing. Thanks to recency bias, South Africa’s selection from foreign clubs has somehow been extrapolated to mean that everyone selects from foreign clubs nowadays. Also, All Blacks leaving the country after the World Cup are so fresh in the memory that people are saying that more than ever are moving overseas.
(Photo by Morgan Hancock/Getty Images)
In reality, South Africa is the only one of the big five that selects from overseas. England and New Zealand never have. Ireland haven’t since Johnny Sexton returned from France in 2015 – for example Simon Zebo was absent from the green jersey while playing for Racing 92. Louis Picamoles was the only French exception – and it’s significant that he pushed to get himself back to Montpellier in 2017 less than a third of the way through a three year contract. Nobody else has tried since.
Also, if we’re going to trumpet the success of South Africa then we also should remember the failure of Australia. The Wallabies had a sugar rush when criteria were relaxed in 2015 but they dropped off a cliff the following year. From 1983 to 2015 every Wallabies coach had at least a 50% win rate but since then the rest of Michael Cheika’s tenure and that of his two successors have all been under 45%.
As for the more All Blacks leaving myth, far more players have left after previous World Cups. For example after 2007 the players in their 20s who left included Carl Hayman, Greg Somerville, Chris Jack, Jerry Collins, Reuben Thorne, Chris Masoe, Nick Evans, Aaron Mauger, Luke McAlister and Doug Howlett, while Byron Kelleher was older. People thought that the roof was caving in but nothing could have been further from the truth. Yes, the Northern Hemisphere pays higher wages but the black jersey remains a more powerful incentive.
THE MISSING AFRICANS MYTH
The final myth is that the reduced quality of the current All Black team is due to South Africa leaving Super Rugby. In reality though, the problem is the copper generation which came through while African teams were still in Super Rugby. That’s right – they came through at the same time as the current Springbok golden generation. And the ahead of schedule success of the young Springboks in 2019 shows that Super Rugby wasn’t the problem.
SO WHAT CAUSED THE COPPER GENERATION?
The problems for New Zealand were, and in some cases still are, closer to home. The huge number of players leaving the game in their teens. Wealthy schools caring more about the prestige of a winning First XV than the health of the national game. Provincial unions spending too much on their NPC teams and not enough on community rugby (South Africa despite their huge player numbers bit the bullet and now have fewer pro teams than us – thanks CPM for the info.) The disjointed development system where Super Rugby franchises and provincial unions both have academies that compete with each other. Fewer national age group representative team matches than other countries. Not enough emphasis on really big athletes.
All of these issues led to a reduction in quality of the New Zealand Under 20s and the players coming through to Super Rugby.
HOW TO IMPROVE ON THE COPPER GENERATION
The long term future of the New Zealand game will depend on how well these sorts of deficiencies are addressed. The good news is that NZR recognises them and commissioned an independent report which came up with some good solutions.
Maybe though we still haven’t reached a South African level rock bottom to jolt the provincial unions and schools to put away their small pond interests for the overall good. Progress has therefore been patchy.
Most importantly, governance reforms have been voted through, but provincial unions have watered them down and it’s possible that not enough of the right independent experts will be appointed. Time will tell how well the necessary changes are made.
On a brighter note, New Zealand already has big props performing at the highest level with even bigger ones like Tamaiti Williams and Pasilio Tosi on their way. Super-sized locks like Sam Darry, Josh Lord and Fabien Holland are also rising. We don’t know yet how good they’ll be but at the very least they’re bigger.
A weakness in the forwards is nothing new for our game, but we’ve always been able to come back from it. In the amateur era we tried to catch up to South Africa for decades. I forget the exact quote and person, but in the 90s either Sean Fitzpatrick or Laurie Mains commented that our problem was that we weren’t the physically strongest team. And in between two golden generations, Kieran Read was the only forward debuting between Jerome Kaino in 2004 and Owen Franks in 2009 to start in the two winning World Cup finals. Nobody remembers that last pretty recent one!
GETTING THE MOST FROM OUR STRENGTHS
Another result of recency bias in rugby is a propensity to copy the most successful team of the day. For example when the All Blacks were top dogs, England and South Africa tried to move away from their strengths and play Kiwi style attacking rugby. They only improved when new coaches Eddie Jones and Rassie Erasmus went back to their national DNA.
In any case, rugby tactics tend to go in cycles – attack dominates for a while, then it’s defence’s turn. Law changes and Erasmus hiring Kiwi attack coach Tony Brown suggests that this might be imminent.
New Zealand’s greatest success over the years has had skilful attack as its point of difference, supported by a forward pack that could hold its own against anyone, as well as having good skills themselves. So yes, big forwards are needed and are what we’ve been missing, but we can’t afford to just copy other countries who employ a more forwards oriented game. We don’t have the player numbers to produce enough of them for that to be our trump card, or to need experienced internationals to move overseas to make room in our teams for young talent.
First and foremost, it’s been the skills and teamwork that have kept us at the top despite our lack of grassroots depth. This has been made possible by our alignment, cohesion, culture and way of playing.
Also, it is the style as much as the winning that has earned a huge worldwide fan base and leads foreign sponsors to fork out $73m a year. That’s way more than any other team except France. An incredible and important achievement for a small, geographically isolated nation.
If New Zealand is to avoid the fate of Brazilian football – becoming just another country – we must protect our great advantages by staying in Super Rugby. Kiwi attack requires high cohesion and can only be developed and practiced with high quality like-minded coaches and teammates, including experienced All Blacks.
PLAYER WELFARE AND AVAILABILITY
Super Rugby is also ideal for workloads and player availability. Think of Dave Rennie’s inability to get his Japan based players to play in November during the Top League preseason. Think about the twelve month season of anyone playing in Europe, the July internationals and the Rugby Championship. Think about players having to fly to Europe and back for Rugby Championship rest weeks.
Do all those aghast at the close defeat at the home of the world champions really want key All Blacks to be absent from the South Africa tour or Nations Championship finals? Or too tired to peak when it really matters? Or to be absent from Super Rugby so that young players can’t learn from them or young fans be inspired by them?
IS SUPER RUGBY TOUGH ENOUGH?
People have been saying that the quality of Super Rugby isn’t high enough, an argument I used back in 2021 when advocating for the retention of Super Rugby Aotearoa and Super Rugby AU along with a short crossover comp. But at the time the players reported that the physicality of SRA was too high and would exhaust them before the international window.
Perhaps Super Rugby Pacific is about right after all, or if it isn’t maybe we should go back to Super Rugby Aotearoa, without abandoning our Pasifika brothers. Whichever option we go with, for the sake of cohesion, culture, teamwork and skills it’s vital that the All Blacks play in a small number of high quality teams with Kiwi players and coaches.
And what are the alternatives? A national comp with more teams would be lower quality with less cohesion. Japan isn’t higher quality – it’s lower. And Europe has the worst problems with player availability and welfare.
IS SUPER RUGBY TOO ISOLATED?
The remaining perceived problem for Super Rugby is its isolation. After all, club teams from most of the other major countries play each other every year. Since nobody’s moving the country closer to the Greenwich Meridian, if this is really such a big issue then other arrangements will be needed.
Existing ideas include the World Club Championship and out of season matches during preseason and international windows. If necessary we could even set up foreign exchange programmes, with European clubs temporarily hosting some of our young forwards and us some of their backs. And of course it’s not as if Kiwi rugby is homogeneous these days, with the Blues winning Super Rugby using pick and go, after Taranaki won the NPC with an Ireland-style attack.
CONCLUSION
The copper generation has been a major wake up call for New Zealand Rugby. The board know the underlying issues and have made some big strategic decisions to address them. For the sake of the game in this country it is vital that the provincial unions allow the necessary reforms to take place.
Now is not the time for recency bias influenced actions like relaxing eligibility criteria. This might or might not provide a short term boost but could damage the game severely long term. No sensible board will take such huge long term risks to deal with a short term problem. Once the can is open it’s tough to get the worms back in again.
The All Blacks can only stay at the top long term if New Zealand Rugby plays to its strengths. We don’t have the most players, the biggest players or the most money. We never have. Only by making the most of our skills, culture, cohesion, alignment and teamwork can we hope to succeed. And that means keeping the All Blacks in some form of Super Rugby, even if it’s a bit different to what we have now.
