{"id":23281,"date":"2026-02-04T08:27:17","date_gmt":"2026-02-04T06:27:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/jhb-webdevelopers\/channelafrica\/news\/former-all-blacks-hooker-joins-panel-to-pick-new-head-coach\/"},"modified":"2026-02-27T16:34:06","modified_gmt":"2026-02-27T14:34:06","slug":"former-all-blacks-hooker-joins-panel-to-pick-new-head-coach","status":"publish","type":"news","link":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/news\/former-all-blacks-hooker-joins-panel-to-pick-new-head-coach\/","title":{"rendered":"Former All Blacks\u2019 hooker joins panel to pick new head coach"},"content":{"rendered":"<div>Former New Zealand hooker Dane Coles has been added to the panel selecting the All Blacks\u2019 new head coach, bringing a recent player\u2019s voice to the process.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Coles, who played the last of his 90 tests at the 2023 World Cup in France under Ian Foster, joins New Zealand Rugby (NZR) chair David Kirk, board member and former All Black Keven Mealamu, high performance expert Don Tricker and interim Chief Executive Officer Steve Lancaster on the panel, NZR said on Wednesday.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>Jamie Joseph and Dave Rennie are seen as clear frontrunners to succeed former All Blacks coach Scott Robertson, who was sacked last month after an internal review of the 2025 season, which included poor feedback from some players.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>NZR have confirmed the window for applications has closed, but have not set a timeframe on naming Robertson\u2019s replacement.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>The governing body said it would not take applications from non-New Zealanders or coaches without international experience.<\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div><\/div>\n<div>&#8211;Reuters&#8211;<\/div>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":14928,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false},"news-type":[20],"class_list":["post-23281","news","type-news","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","news-type-sport","entry"],"acf":{"short_description":"NZR have confirmed the window for applications has closed.","published_date":null,"news_description":"NZR have confirmed the window for applications has closed.","form_embed":"","author":"","image_caption":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/23281","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/news"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/23281\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26298,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news\/23281\/revisions\/26298"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14928"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23281"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"news-type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.channelafrica.co.za\/channelafrica\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/news-type?post=23281"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}