The All Blacks have been described as chokers. The reason for this is that they have been either the favourites, or among the favorites, for each of the five Rugby World Cup tournaments - but have only made the final twice.

The first was in the inaugural tournament in New Zealand in 1987, which the All Blacks won comfortably, and the second in 1995, when they narrowly lost to a South African side playing at home in front of Nelson Mandela, shortly after the end of apartheid.

On the three occasions the All Blacks have failed to make the RWC final, they have lost in the semis, firstly to Australia 16-6 in England in 1991, then to France 43-31 in Paris in 1999, and finally 24-12 to hosts Australia in 2003.

'Are the All Blacks simply victims of their own success? Are the players, and indeed the management and coaches, prone to believing the team's own hype at the RWC?'


Australia defeated England in the 1991 final, having snatched a 19-18 victory from the jaws of defeat against Ireland in the quarters. The wallabies then put the lacklustre All Blacks away with a stunning David Campese try within minutes of full-time. The All Blacks didn't fire a shot.

Poisoning accusations aside, the Laurie Mains-coached All Blacks played very well at the 1995 RWC in South Africa, and might have won had Andrew Mehrtens been successful with one of his drop-goal attempts and  Joel Stransky not succeeded with his single effort.

Roll on 1999. France were very lucky to even make the semi, and wouldn't have if Kiwi referee Paddy O’Brien hadn't awarded France a penalty try late in the game. Nevertheless, coach John Hart's All Blacks simply didn't turn-up mentally. Earlier in the year, the French had toured New Zealand and suffered heavy defeats,  the All Blacks racking up 50 points in each Test .

No one, not even the French themselves, openly anyway, appeared to believe France had any chance of toppling the All Blacks in the semi-final in Paris in 1999. But on the day, besides two powerful and spirited tries by Jonah Lomu, the rest of the team appeared as if they believed they only needed to turn up to win the game.

What happened in 2003 to John Mitchell’s all-conquering All Blacks could have, and was, seen coming by most. Apart, that is, from the English fans who expected their side to face the seemingly invincible New Zealanders in the final, rather than what had been a poorly-performing Australian team leading up to the tournament

The All Blacks attacked from the outset in the semi-final against Australia that were once again favoured to win.  They looked seconds away from scoring the first try when All Black first-five Carlos Spencer threw a speculative pass that Wallabies centre Stirling Mortlock intercepted and then ran the length of the field to touch down.

Like the French in 1999, the All Blacks had crushed Australia earlier in 2003. Unlike the French, however, New Zealand's 56-6 victory had been on Australian soil. How could the Wallabies have come back from such a demoralising demolition to stun the All Blacks 24-12 in the semi-final of the RWC only a matter of months later?

Is there is a pattern that has emerged from the semi-final defeats in 1991, 1999 and 2003? In all three games the All Blacks were expected to win. It could be hypothesised that a lack of preparedness accounted for all three defeats. Each team simply appeared to turn up to the World Cup semi-final as if it were just another Test match, with the exception of Lomu in 1999 and Reuben Thorne’s captain's try in 2003. And once stunned by a moment of individual brilliance by the opposition, there was little sign  of a Plan B, or even desperation.

Some have argued that one of the problems may be that the All Blacks cannot count on meeting much if any opposition until  the semi-finals. Wales, however, provided the All Blacks with the Wallabies.

All Black teams have been accused of arrogance over the years. Is that the problem? Are they simply victims of their own success? Are the players, and indeed the management and coaches, prone to believing the team's own hype at the RWC?

Certainly, the 1999 team may have produced the biggest media circus thus far, with huge billboards of Lomu adorning buildings in London, and likenesses of the All Black front-row painted on the fuselage of the plane the team travelled in. Possibly!

Good old Kiwi male staunchness may also play a part. In the semi-finals of the RWC, the best team will not win without, at the very least, an equal amount of desire, determination and desperation as other teams. If the All Blacks believe they are above outwardly showing those three 'Ds', preferring instead to remain poker-faced throughout the game as if unaffected like Olympian gods, they will surely lose.

The All Blacks may be trapped by expectations born of their own history and mystique, that they are somehow above battling in the trenches for every inch that it takes to win, when the opposition is throwing everything at you.

To put it simply, either the All Blacks aren’t as dominant as their record outside the RWC suggests, which is as much as saying that they aren't as good as they think they are; or alternatively, perhaps successive All Black teams simply haven’t accounted for the step-up needed to win an RWC semi-final, as opposed to a normal Test match.

Sometimes it seems the All Blacks are more afraid of losing and having given it everything, than they are relieved or satisfied to have won.