McKenzie & White?

Wallabies' Ewen McKenzie to bring back bluff against All Blacks

Australia have chosen the right man to replace Robbie Deans, and he has the guile to claim the Bledisloe Cup

Rajiv Maharaj Tuesday 9 July 2013 

Ewen McKenzie can add nuance to the Wallabies. Photograph: Chris Hyde/Getty Images

Forget that the new Wallabies coach Ewen McKenzie is an Australian. That's got nothing to do with his appointment ahead of the South African contender Jake White, Australian Rugby Union CEO Bill Pulver was at pains to underline at this week's changeover press conference. McKenzie, he said, was quite simply the best candidate to replace Robbie Deans. He's absolutely right.

Jake White is a fine coach; his recent work in turning around the Brumbies from an underachieving cabal of coup plotters to a unified team of equals on the cusp of the Super Rugby play-offs has been remarkable. And, of course, he won the 2007 World Cup with the Springboks. White would have made an excellent Wallabies coach. But the trouble with White – and most likely the reason he got pipped for the top job – is a perception that his methods, although highly successful at Super and Test level, are too predictable: solid set piece, territorial dominance courtesy of a long-kicking fly-half, impregnable defence, and a steady flow of penalties. It's simple stuff, more than sufficient to see off most teams but arguably not enough to beat the All Blacks with any regularity; and the Wallabies will need to beat them at least twice this year to reclaim the Bledisloe Cup, which, outside of the World Cup, is the only prize that really matters to Australian rugby. It has always been that way.

White hasn't taken the news well. He honestly believes he lost out to McKenzie because of nationality and suggested, tongue maybe only slightly in cheek, that he would consider taking out Australian citizenship for the next time he applies. He graciously wished McKenzie all the best. McKenzie, of course, sees things differently. And, crucially, he makes others see things differently too.

Trawl through the tapes and press clippings over the last few years at the Reds and one very significant McKenzie quote keeps popping up: "We have a number of different ways of playing, no two ways the same. It's all about giving the opposition something different to look at." That variety has been spectacularly successful for the Reds who did a clean sweep of the four New Zealand Super teams they have faced this season.

In fact, McKenzie's quote says everything about his mindset as a coach and why he was chosen in the end as the man most likely to bring back the Bledisloe. A former town planner with a passion for architecture, McKenzie could well to do an Inception on the All Blacks, get inside their heads, move the furniture around a little bit, and make them question if what they're seeing is real or an illusion. McKenzie will no doubt recall Quade Cooper to play the conjurer, Christian Lealiifano the foil, and Will Genia the able lieutenant charged with managing the game's pace.

The Wallabies have always been an enigmatic side, but in recent times only to themselves. The All Blacks coach, Steve Hansen, has cause for concern. For the first time in a very long time, the All Blacks can't claim to have the Wallabies sussed. In McKenzie, they're dealing with a chameleon, a master of constructing layered and nuanced game plans. Hansen may study the Reds and figure a plan based on disrupting the Genia-Cooper axis. But the Reds don't have a second playmaker like Lealiifano, or even a third playmaker in, say, Kurtley Beale.

The jury is still out on the All Blacks. They unconvincingly put away a tired French side 3-0 in the June internationals, but their last decent opposition, England, torched them 38-21 last December. McKenzie fancies his chances. And Deans has left him a battle-hardened crew. Just a few tweaks here and there – Cooper back in and maybe Liam Gill to start – could work wonders. White's hard-nosed approach would have stopped short of the biff against the All Blacks, but McKenzie will almost certainly bring back the bluff.