All Blacks head coach Ian Foster has finally been backed by the New Zealand Rugby (NZR) board to continue in his current role.

Foster’s job has been under intense scrutiny this year after losing their July Test series to Ireland and then going down to the Springboks off the back of that, resulting in a slump to fifth in the world – their lowest ranking in history.

Brilliant performance at Ellis Park

However, last weekend the All Blacks produced a stunning performance. They beat South Africa 35-23 at Ellis Park, allowing faith to be restored in Foster, who by then had lost duo John Plumtree and Brad Mooar from his coaching team but gained Jason Ryan as forwards coach.

NZR chair Stewart Mitchell and chief executive Mark Robinson joined Foster at a press conference to underline the board’s backing of the coach.

“[The board] have unanimously agreed they have absolute confidence that Ian and this coaching group are the right people to lead the All Blacks through until the World Cup. This has been privately and publicly validated by our players and various conversation with our high performance team,” Mitchell said at the press conference.

Whilst Foster did receive backing, NZR decided that Joe Schmidt would join the team as attack coach, having already filled in for Foster when the coach contracted Covid before the first Test against Ireland.

Schmidt joins the coaching team

Foster said Schmidt had been someone he wanted to work with for years, and the transition has been made easy as the former Ireland coach had already joined the selectors as an independent.

“Joe Schmidt has been on my radar, probably for a couple of years,” said Foster.

“We flagged at the start of this year that his role was to join us after the Irish series as an independent selector to replace Grant Fox and in addition he was going to do some opposition analysis work and work alongside myself in the strategy area.

“We started that after the Irish series and delighted with how that’s going. I have a great relationship with Joe.”

The All Blacks welcome a flying Argentina side for a two-Test tour to New Zealand. Los Pumas come off a record win against the Wallabies, but the All Blacks will be looking to add two more wins to their turnaround.