Winning French tests priority, says Mr Lochore

Press, 15 October 1986, Page 50

Winning French tests priority, says Mr Lochore

PA Auckland The All Black coach, Brian Lochore, believes his team has one essential priority on its tour of France — to win both tests. "The main aim is the tests and that is the way it has become these days,” he said.

“Who remembers, for instance, that the Aussies got beaten this year out here a couple of times?” Mr Lochore emphasised that he was not downplaying the six other matches on the French tour. But his comments on their relevance reflected the way the French customarily load their selection sides and the consequent impossibility of doing much homework on their likely strength.

While the team for the first match at Strasbourg was stacked with inter-

nationals, there was a chance the other four selections could be regionally based. “But there is no guarantee that is a fact,” Mr Lochore said. He had no shadow test line-up nor had he sorted out a side for Tuesday’s match in Strasbourg. This probably would be done on the plane to Paris. < However, he said it was part of his plan to give all 26 players in the squad a run in either of the first two matches. As the All Blacks prepared at Auckland for their eight-match tour, Mr Lochore was careful to put the emphasis on lowkey, informal training, “We are trying to get the players to relax and to get to know each other,” he said. In keeping with this policy, yesterday’s train-

ing run was conducted by the former All White soccer international, Sam Malcolmson. “Sam’s a representative for Adidas (one of the All Black sponsors) and I got to know him this year,” Mr Lochore said. “We thought it would be a good idea to crosspollinate sometime with games and warm-ups.’ “It’s nice to see what other people do in their sports.” The All Blacks spent Monday mainly in outfitting and were subjected to an exhaustive examination by the New Zealand Rugby Union doctors. All passed. Three of the backs who had been affected by injuries over the latter stages of the domestic season, Frano Botica, Joe Stanley and Marty Berry, all trained freely.