New Zealand coach Steve Hansen dismissed as “baloney” suggestions his side had gained any sort of psychological advantage by beating England 24-21 at Twickenham on Saturday.
Some pundits had billed the match as a potential dress rehearsal for next year’s World Cup final, which is to take place at Twickenham.
While the All Blacks are reigning world champions, they have never lifted the Webb Ellis Trophy on foreign soil.
Photo: EPA
And the memory of their shock 2007 quarter-final loss to France in Cardiff in particular meant Hansen was taking nothing for granted.
“A lot of people have been talking about the psychological advantage of winning today [Saturday],” Hansen said. “There’s a lot of us think that’s a load of baloney. There’s no psychological advantage if we don’t make it to the next stage to play England.”
“There are some great rugby teams that are going to go to the World Cup,” he said. “The World Cup’s not about one team, it’s about five or six. The All Blacks have shown many times you can be top dog and not get there. So if you haven’t got your ducks in a row when the time comes, you don’t make it.”
“There’s no psychological advantage because World Cups have shown time and time again that prior history goes out the door,” Hansen added. “We beat France numerous times by a lot of points and we lost to them in 2007. We are not even assuming we are going to play England. We’ve got a round-robin and we hope we qualify first or second.”
Despite being a man down for 10 minutes when hooker Dane Coles was sin-binned in the 57th minute, the vastly more experienced All Blacks out-scored England 3-0 in the time they were understaffed.
The result meant England had suffered their fifth successive defeat by the All Blacks.
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