New Zealand press gunning for Hart

New Zealand's news media was yesterday unanimous in calling for the dismissal of All Black coach John Hart and captain Taine Randell as well as questioning the multi-million dollar corporatisation of New Zealand's once proud amateur rugby team.

France's World Cup semi-final defeat of New Zealand was the lead story in every newspaper. Wellington's Evening Post lead it with the headline "Buggeur!" while the Christchurch Press said "Le Bugger". Wellington's Do- minion had "Why Hart must go" and the New Zealand Herald "Au revoir Monsieur Hart".

According to the Christchurch Press, the All Blacks were pathetic "and that's being kind."

"Yesterday they were bullied and roughed up by the French and meekly submitted. They are soft and that is the ultimate in degradation.

"On all counts Hart must shoulder the blame. He set himself up to reap the rewards had the All Blacks won the World Cup, so should accept the consequences of their dismal demise."

The Press called for Welsh coach Graham Henry to be lured back to New Zealand.

The New Zealand Herald said the New Zealand rugby union had to look at the whole way professional rugby had been introduced.

"For some reason, it really hasn't worked at the highest level," the newspaper said.

The new All Blacks do not have rounded lives.

"There is not enough of a cerebral challenge to their days - playing golf and watching videos is not giving them a complete life."

The media coverage praised the French brilliance.

"They harnessed their passion to their natural skills, they played with calmness and brought a beastly forward fire to Twickenham which the All Blacks could neither resist nor compose themselves against," said the Herald.

The All Blacks, other than Jonah Lomu, have been strongly condemned for not coming out onto the Twickenham pitch after the match to say thanks to their fans.

The Herald said the whole game was a slow-motion accident.

"By the time the custom-built, hugely expensive, massively hyped All Black machine came to a horrible halt there was only one question: is it a write-off?"

The Dominion said the balance between the business of rugby and the game of rugby appeared to have swung too far one way.

"These All Blacks play in a climate of manufactured super-stardom," it claimed, criticising an over-emphasis on empty commercial ventures.

The Press editorial made a brave attempt at humour.

"Ah, the French," it said. "Wouldn't it make you spit? They never could be trusted and now they have blown us up again."

The French, it said, sabotaged the All Blacks by pampering them on the French Riviera, "plying them with wonderful cooking, praising their great skills and pouring on sun and sea. They completed their deception with a nuclear attack at Twickenham, breaching a defence as fragile as the Mururoa Atoll. . . The French gameplan was unexpectedly dastardly - they sought to score tries and did so."

Instead of holidaying on the Riviera after the round robin section of the World Cup, the team should have gone to the Orkneys and wrestled highland cattle said the newspaper.

The result would have a serious blow on the Kiwi psyche the editorial continued.

"A young, muscular country without a deep intellectual tradition defines itself by its sporting successes. We might have scant success at the Olympics these days, or even at the Commonwealth Games, but by God were champions at rugby. Not like the effeminate English who always promise so much and deliver so little. Now we know how it feels."