{"id":523350,"date":"2026-04-10T13:11:10","date_gmt":"2026-04-10T13:11:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/523350\/"},"modified":"2026-04-10T13:11:10","modified_gmt":"2026-04-10T13:11:10","slug":"ex-all-black-slams-naivety-of-new-zealand-rugby-over-ian-foster-treatment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/523350\/","title":{"rendered":"Ex-All Black slams ‘naivety’ of New Zealand Rugby over Ian Foster treatment"},"content":{"rendered":"

Former All Blacks back-rower Murray Mexted has slammed New Zealand Rugby for their treatment of Ian Foster after reading the ex-head coach\u2019s book.<\/p>\n

The All Blacks<\/a> are already on their second coach since Foster<\/a> led the team to the Rugby World Cup final in France, with Dave Rennie taking over from Scott Robertson this year.<\/p>\n

New Zealand Rugby\u2019s decision<\/p>\n

However, after reading Foster\u2019s book Leading Under Pressure, Mexted<\/a> has taken aim at NZ Rugby over their lack of support for the coach as they plotted to replace him with Robertson in 2022 before the players stepped in.<\/p>\n

The following year, the union confirmed that Robertson would be taking over from Foster following the World Cup, a decision that Mexted has blasted as \u2018lunacy\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cI can\u2019t believe the naivety of the people who made that decision,\u201d he said on DSPN podcast with Martin Devlin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was just incredible that they thought they could name a new coach before the Rugby World Cup \u2013 that is just lunacy.<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd having been in the team, I remember many occasions where teams were announced, and there were guys that were pretty bloody upset that weren\u2019t in the team, which is fair enough, but the key is to keep everybody involved, and that\u2019s probably one of the things that Razor was really good at, but Ian Foster was outstanding.\u201d<\/p>\n

The decision to announce that Robertson would be taking over from Foster before the global showpiece in 2023 was a clear indication that the latter didn\u2019t have the backing of the board.<\/p>\n

Ian Foster \u2018won\u2019t coach in New Zealand again\u2019 after the actions of NZR<\/a><\/p>\n

Rassie Erasmus contrast<\/p>\n

After reading the details of how events transpired from Foster\u2019s point of view, Mexted was left impressed by how the coach conducted himself but added that those kinds of pressures are part and parcel of the position.<\/p>\n

He believes that Springboks boss Rassie Erasmus had similar hurdles when he returned to South Africa but he has worked hard to get the support of SA Rugby and now does \u2018whatever he wants\u2019.<\/p>\n

\u201cAfter reading it, I thought, well good on you. You did so well in the Rugby World Cup despite all the things that happened,\u201d he continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean, getting within one point of drawing the World Cup final was a fantastic performance when you look at the background.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I say things like that, you\u2019ve also got to acknowledge and appreciate that\u2019s the way it is at the top sometimes but I do think that the body of support at the NZR level wasn\u2019t sufficient at the time.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou can look at Rassie Erasmus and how about the lack of support from the people who are running South African Rugby. He had to fight tooth and nail to be able to do some of the things he\u2019s done and he\u2019s won them all over now.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt took him some time, but he\u2019s won them all over and he\u2019s doing whatever he wants and he\u2019s doing it well, you know, and he\u2019s powerful.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s always a battle to get to the stage where you can do the things you want to do be that you need to do to achieve and be successful.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0Ian Foster claims NZR did not have \u2018clear strategy\u2019 as ex-All Blacks boss reveals all about job controversy during turbulent Springboks tour<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Former All Blacks back-rower Murray Mexted has slammed New Zealand Rugby for their treatment of Ian Foster after…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":523351,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[348,181852,3482,25010,620,50,7196,5903,4247,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-523350","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-home-page","9":"tag-ian-foster","10":"tag-internationals","11":"tag-murray-mexted","12":"tag-new-zealand","13":"tag-news","14":"tag-rassie-erasmus","15":"tag-rugby","16":"tag-south-africa","17":"tag-sports","18":"tag-uk","19":"tag-united-kingdom","20":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523350","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=523350"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/523350\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/523351"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=523350"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=523350"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=523350"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}