Ian Foster’s dig at the Springboks for ‘deliberate’ tactics during ‘unacceptable’ World Cup final

Former All Blacks head coach Ian Foster hopes that World Rugby will speed up the game after stating the Rugby World Cup final took an ‘unacceptable’ amount of time.

The 58-year-old made his remarks in response to World Rugby disclosing its strategies for drawing in the upcoming generation of players. The majority of the suggestions focused on accelerating the game’s progression.

Reiterating referees’ “use it” calls is one suggestion; taking away the scrum option from a free-kick to cut down on dead time is another.

After criticizing the South Africans during the World Cup, Foster adds that the “proof will be in the pudding” and makes another subtle jab at the Springboks.

‘Unacceptable’ final

During the pool stages of the tournament, the then-All Blacks boss believed that his side’s 96-17 victory over Italy was more entertaining than the epic clash between South Africa and Ireland due to the difference in ball-in-play time.

“If you look at the South Africa-Ireland game, it was a different game of rugby. The ball was in play for 27 minutes throughout the whole game,” Foster said.

“It was a very stop-start game, very physical, very combative. You saw a different spectacle tonight and at some point the world has got to decide which game it would rather watch.”

Many onlookers took exception to Foster’s comments after the brutal clash between the Boks and Ireland, and the ex-head coach has now doubled down on his criticism.

The All Blacks went on to lose to their fierce rivals in the World Cup final, losing 12–11 to the Springboks, who he felt had slowed down the game on purpose.

Foster told The Post, “The time that the final took is unacceptable.” “The game is aware that it needs to be altered.

It is now up to us to commit to carrying it out. On the other hand, I believe that we must all accept responsibility for that.

“Players and coaches alike must assume responsibility for that as well.

“We can’t let players get to the point where they think they can purposefully slow down the game; this happened far too often during the World Cup.”

New challenge

Foster was speaking following the news that he would be joining fellow former All Blacks boss Sir Steve Hansen in Japan with Toyota Verblitz.

It’s Foster’s first coaching job since the World Cup and, looking ahead to the challenge, he added: “It’s going be interesting for me to go over there and learn about what the gap is and where we feel we need to grow.

“I think there’s some positive signs with Toyota about how they’ve been working hard in that development space.

“I think a lot is made of recruitment of overseas players, and I think that’s all exciting, but the key really is the quality of your Japanese players over there.”