Kiwi fans name team of the year

Friday 18 December 2009
Published By: Ben Welch
International Rugby > New Zealand

As the end of another calendar year draws in, making reflections is inevitable and people the world over are compiling 'X of the year' lists. It's awards season in many quarters and few can resist the lure of selecting the best and worst of 2009.

Of course, no-one likes to pass judgement on the achievements of others more than sports fans so it falls to us in the rugby world to decide who the greatest performers of the last 12 months have been.

Any such effort will always be riddled with bias and this certainly seems to be the case over at TheSilverFern.com, where Kiwi fans have been selecting their team of the year.

They've been doing it since 2005 and just two northern hemisphere players were selected in each of the first three years, while in 2008 Shane Williams was the only non-Tri Nations star to make it in.

But in what may be a sign that the gap in class is beginning to narrow, four Six Nations men have made the grade this time around. The British and Irish Lions tour certainly seems to have made the New Zealanders sit up and take note, since two of its biggest stars - Ireland's Rob Kearney and Jamie Roberts of Wales - were included.

Prop Martin Castrogiovanni gets a nod, becoming the first ever Italian to make the team - most likely due to the problems he caused for the All Black scrum in the autumn - while French flanker Thierry Dusautoir is the other northern hemisphere player to be selected, so Rocky Elsom misses out.

In fact not a single Wallaby was named, but the fans appear to have maintained some sort of impartiality by including five Springboks alongside their six Kiwi stars.