Todd likely to miss out on English clash

All Blacks coach Steve Hansen, still enjoying a special performance from his team and also one of his horses yesterday, says Matt Todd dislocated his shoulder before the World Cup and that after receiving a knock on the same joint during his team’s big quarter-final victory over Ireland, the flanker is in doubt for the semifinal against England.

Todd was absent from the All Blacks’ first pool game against the Springboks a month ago due to a sore shoulder but the full extent of his injury hasn’t been revealed until now.

Todd scored a try in the second half of the 46-14 win at Tokyo Stadium after replacing Brodie Retallick as well as copping a yellow card.

Assuming he is not available, the door will be open for Shannon Frizell to be the loose forward cover for Saturday’s sudden-death match at Yokohama Stadium.

“He’s hurt that shoulder again,” said Hansen, who confirmed that Sam Cane’s withdrawal for Scott Barrett at halftime was a tactical, rather than injury-related, decision. “We’ll have to see how he goes but it’s probably unlikely that he’ll be available. Everyone else is 100 per cent. He dislocated it a wee while ago and got a bang on it again [on Saturday].”

The clean bill of health for the rest of the squad, including first-five Richie Mo’unga, who received attention late in the second half, bodes well for the All Blacks as they seek to find a similar level of performance against the English, who demolished Australia 40-16 in their quarter-final in Oita earlier on Saturday night.

The All Blacks are fully aware they need to maintain — or better — the seven-try level they got to against the Irish.

“That’s one of the key things about sport, isn’t it; being able to repeat and repeat and repeat,” Hansen said. “One of the hardest things we’ve striven to do as a group is to be better than we were the day before. We don’t always achieve that but if you strive to do it, you give yourself an opportunity.

“We know that if we aren’t better, we aren’t going to get what we want, so it’s pretty simple.

“They’re playing good footy, so they’ll be confident, as we will be. We’re playing well ourselves and we just have to make sure as a coaching group and management group where the players can express themselves on Saturday.”

Hansen thought England’s first-half defensive effort demoralised the Wallabies, who had to chase the game and became increasingly reckless as a result.

“I watched the first half of it and Australia hammered and hammered and got no success. When you get no success, you get frustrated. Obviously we can’t afford to get frustrated against them. If we’re not having success, we’ve just got to keep building the momentum and pressure until we do. Both sides are defending really well. It is going to be a big clash.”

At the end of a big weekend for Hansen and his team as they chase their third consecutive World Cup victory, the All Blacks head coach was happy to reflect on the run by his horse Nature Strip, who ran fourth in The Everest at Randwick in Sydney, five hours before kickoff in Tokyo.

Hansen part-owns the five-yearold gelding, who was a joint outsider in the $15 million race, but very much in the running on the final bend. He had to borrow assistant Ian Foster’s headphones and watched the race on a quiet team bus. Maintaining a calm facade was not easy.

“I got a little bit excited there,” Hansen said. “He kicked actually and I thought, ‘ooh, we’ve got a show here’ but they all came at him. I’m really proud of him. Then I had a look at how much I got paid for running fourth [$880,000] and I was reasonably happy.”