March 18, 2025 • 11 mins
An apparent u-turn from the All Blacks head coach.
Last year, Scott 'Razor' Robertson was talking about wanting the ability to select All Blacks who are playing in overseas competitions.
But now, he's told the Rugby Direct podcast that he's actually fine with the way things currently work.
So what's changed? NZ Herald rugby writer Gregor Paul spoke to D'Arcy Waldegrave on Sportstalk.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sports Talk podcast with Darcy Wildegrave
from News Talk ZEDB.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Greg Paul Took and listen to that interview. He is
the New Zealand Heild rugby writer, one of a couple
of them. He joins us now to take a look
at what he heard. Good evening, Grigor.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Good evening, Darcy.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Interesting news today. But it looks like the two Robbos,
or the Robert and the Robbo. It's Mark and of
course Raizor Ray have They're on the same page now
around what happens with extracting players out of overseas contracts
and having them play back here in the All Blacks.
This is something that Razor was absolutely hot on. Looks
(00:45):
like they've mended their ways.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Yeah, it looks like it.
Speaker 4 (00:48):
I'm not buying it to be Frank, I just don't
believe that you have a coach in Raizer who spent five, six,
seven years in super rugby looking at player trends, trying
to pull onto his players at a Crusaders level. He
then had what did he have you at about six
month's noticed that he was going to be the Oldlecks coach.
(01:09):
So you know he was appointed early he had six
months building up to that where he gave a lot
of thought about what the right eligibility model might look like,
where market trends were going, you know, what players were
looking at from the contract, and he was absolutely adamant
that the current eligibility laws were not fit for purpose.
And this was in November December last year. That he
(01:29):
was still even more certain after coaching the Oblecks per
year that they.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Were not right.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
Now did the Rugby Union like the fact that their
coach was publicly not aligned with their eligibility policy. Of
course they didn't like that. So I suspect that what's
happened to you is that Razor hasn't changed his mind
at all. He's still very much of the view that
the eligibility rules aren't quite right. But he has also
realized that as the all black coach, he can't publicly
(01:57):
fight with his employer. He needs to be publicly aligned
support their policy. He can badger them, he can advocate
behind the scenes as much as he likes. He can
tell them I don't believe it. But when they ask
him and they say, well, we need you to be
publicly aligned and tell the media that you are, then
he's going to have to do that because that is
how you know, that's how employment works start. So we
(02:19):
all have to accept that your employer has a hold
on you to some degree.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Well, I've had that situation myself. You've got to understand. See. Look,
I'll agree with you because in my boss, but don't
tell me how to think and I'll behind. And that's understandable.
So could you say stage managed? These guys both put
up front, both put up in a couple of good
Rugby journalists for a Rugby direct to I suppose draw
(02:43):
a line in the sands we are aligned, even though
maybe they're not.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
Yeah, a necessary PR function because because given what reason
has said at the end of last year, given that
the New Zealand Rugby board has changed in its entirety
in early February, this issue would become If nothing was said,
it would continue to fester, wouldn't The media like you
(03:07):
and I would continue to puking prode and ask questions
about what's HRAs we're thinking now? So I think a
smart PR move by New Zealand Rugby to get Raiser
to publicly align, try and kill the issue as a
media topic, try and just put it to bed.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
So as you know, France have come in in July.
Speaker 4 (03:24):
They don't want any kind of discussion around peripheral topics,
around eligibility, so that's why they've done this.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
But this is leaked to the longer this has gone on,
it's like the boy with the finger and the dike,
and it's going to swallow them whole. But they also
don't want to open a Pandora's box. So it's a
very delicate balance they have. And if you think for
a second the media are going to go away, well
that's not going to happen, isn't it, Because we can
not necessarily see the future. But things change, and they
(03:54):
change in a hurry, and you've got to be cognizant
of that.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
Well, I guess people could argue that the player market
trends haven't necessarily changed overly dramatic on the broad picture
basis that there are there are more there is more
money and more opportunity overseas for New Zealand's best players.
The money they can earn overseas continues to be greater
than the money they can earn here. That's never really
(04:20):
changed from the first days of professionalism.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
But I think it's become a.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
Little bit more nuanced than that now because you know,
Japan is the game changer in my view, because these
guys are are offering at times quite significant amounts of money.
We're talking sort of one million, two million dollar contracts.
They're building a level of credibility in Japan in terms
(04:44):
of the quality of the rugby. It's backed by massive corporations,
so it's got a sustainable financial model. Toyota are going
to continue to fund a rugby team forever because that's
part of their corporate culture and their and their kind
of code of conduct almost or their charter. Is what
I'm trying to say is to pump money back into sport,
to produce better people and to engage with the community.
(05:07):
So it's all viable and there's a lot of people
gravi as heating to Japan, and the power of that
in three to four years time will be significantly more
than it is not to your point, and the ability
of Japanese clubs to lure New Zealand's best players over there,
with the lifestyle, with the quality of rugby and the
money on offer, it will be very difficult for New
(05:29):
Zealand to stop more and more players from going there.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
But that's one New Zealand rugby. I suppose cozying art
Worth Japanese rugby and how that actually works because it
is going to happen, but their style of rugby, and
I suppose the players when they come back the state
they're in, it's not like they've been hammered by French
Fords and anger irishmen when they're over there. It actually
sits quite nicely within the remit of New Zealand rugby.
(05:54):
This is the first hole, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah, it does, and timing aligns as well.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
So that's the other really important factor here is that
the season, the Japanese season can currently with Super Rugby,
which means that you're not asking guys to play round
the clock the way that the South Africans currently are
because they are a Southern Hemisphere country locked into Southern
Hemisphere international program, but they are effectively a Northern Hemisphere
(06:25):
nation in terms of the club competitions that they play in,
which means their players are going round and round and round,
they never get a break and they're going to blow
up at some point. Japan is different because you can
allow guys in New Zealand to go and play in
Japan the season runs Dezember. To me, they can come home,
they can rest and recover for a few weeks and
they're good to go, match hard and match fit, ready
(06:47):
to play in July. The question, and this is really
at the heart of the whole issue, is does New
Zealand Rugby feel that if you let a handful of
guys go and play in Japan and keep them eligible
for the Olblecks, will the Japanese system have kept them
at a level in terms of their skills, their sharpness,
you know, the game, understanding, the readiness to develop and improve.
(07:10):
Will it be strong enough to do that or will
it be too much of a step down? A lot
of this is about control in that sense, a see,
because New Zealand don't trust necessarily other countries to develop
and look after their players in the same way that
New Zealand thinks it can do well.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
That's why they've got to have that alignment. And as
you talk to me off air about this, they've got
coaches in Japan that do align with what New Zealand
Rugby want and can hopefully lift those levels. So like see,
you're Steve Hansen your Robbie Deans and so on and
so forth. So they've got that connection or is that
too much?
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Now?
Speaker 4 (07:46):
Look, these guys have all coached at international level. They've
all got relationships with New Zealand rugby and the people
within New Zealand Rugby, Like Razor and Steve Hanson have
known each other forever, so and Raiser and Todd Blackadder
have known each other forever.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
He's another coature up there in Japan.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
So managing these relationships, you know, having Razor, if he's
the All Blacks coach, go up to Japan, meet with
these guys, watch a few games, talk to them, you know,
get a sense of how players are tracking, trending. This
is what happens everywhere else in the world. Yeah, this
is what Razbie Rasmus has to do on a permanent
basis because his players are all over the place. This
(08:26):
is what Scotland have to do because their players are
all over the place. You know. So it's not that
difficult or uncommon for an international coach to be asked
to monitor international club programs to see how his players
are trending and tracking, you know. So theF we go
down that quite easily. So I don't think it would
be that difficult for New Zealand, and given the KEYWI
(08:47):
influence in Japan, and the quality of coaching in Japan
is actually probably in my view, perhaps higher at some
clubs than it is at super rugby level in New Zealand.
Then the arguments about oh, well, we're worried about the quality,
We're worried about the exposure you know to you know,
poorer training, poorer medical staff, or the kind of peripheral
(09:11):
elements that go into high performance package. My understanding is
that Japan is world class in many of those facets,
so some of these fears are not real anymore.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
What happens with the stretch the rubber band, if you will,
around the seventy test cap mark. That looks like that's
a standard for players when they can negotiate that time off,
if you will, with a four year contract with the
Japanese that stretch further as have come down to sixty,
(09:43):
they have different laws, different rules maybe dealing with Japanese
clubs as opposed to overseas clubs in the Northern Hemisphere
and Europe, in order to keep that control.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Yeah, it's a good question.
Speaker 4 (09:54):
I mean, I'd answer it like this and say that
New Zealand Rugby argues, well, let me answer your questions first.
I'm not a fan of that seventy test match scenario
because quite often it leads to special circumstances coming up
because they haven't rigidly stuck to that. Jorddy Barrett doesn't
have seventy test caps, by the way, from memory, and
(10:17):
he's in Ireland. Patrick Tupeloso didn't have any when he
signed and got sabbatical deal to go to Japan. Richie Muwanga,
for example, if they could have got to him and said, hey,
mat what about you do two years in Japan, we'll
call you know, will allow you to be eligible in
between seasons and then eligible when you come back home,
(10:37):
they would have access to him right now, and you
can say, well, that's not part of their eligibility policy.
But they've always been willing to make exemptions and exceptions
depending on circumstance. Which is why I don't really like
about the rule is because it ultimately feels that they
will override it on any given occasion if they feel
a player is worth it, and that's sets I feel
(10:59):
a really bad precedent and a bad example because The
whole reason they don't want you guys to be eligible
full time from over sees is they're talking about the
integrity of Pathway. They want to encourage people to stay.
They want they want that to be authentic. The way
that they set the whole program up. Everybody kind of
knows that if you you know, if you make a
strong enough argument, and if circumstances favor you, like there's
(11:22):
no other number turning around, and you start saying, hey,
I might disappear and go offshore as well as a
bit of leverage, they will probably bend and buckle and
give you what you want.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
For more from sports Talk, listen live to News Talks.
It'd be from seven pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio.
You're listening to the Sports Talk podcast with Darcy Wildegrave
from News Talk ZEDB.
Speaker 2 (00:13):
Greg Paul Took and listen to that interview. He is
the New Zealand Heild rugby writer, one of a couple
of them. He joins us now to take a look
at what he heard. Good evening, Grigor.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
Good evening, Darcy.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Interesting news today. But it looks like the two Robbos,
or the Robert and the Robbo. It's Mark and of
course Raizor Ray have They're on the same page now
around what happens with extracting players out of overseas contracts
and having them play back here in the All Blacks.
This is something that Razor was absolutely hot on. Looks
(00:45):
like they've mended their ways.
Speaker 3 (00:47):
Yeah, it looks like it.
Speaker 4 (00:48):
I'm not buying it to be Frank, I just don't
believe that you have a coach in Raizer who spent five, six,
seven years in super rugby looking at player trends, trying
to pull onto his players at a Crusaders level. He
then had what did he have you at about six
month's noticed that he was going to be the Oldlecks coach.
(01:09):
So you know he was appointed early he had six
months building up to that where he gave a lot
of thought about what the right eligibility model might look like,
where market trends were going, you know, what players were
looking at from the contract, and he was absolutely adamant
that the current eligibility laws were not fit for purpose.
And this was in November December last year. That he
(01:29):
was still even more certain after coaching the Oblecks per
year that they.
Speaker 3 (01:33):
Were not right.
Speaker 4 (01:34):
Now did the Rugby Union like the fact that their
coach was publicly not aligned with their eligibility policy. Of
course they didn't like that. So I suspect that what's
happened to you is that Razor hasn't changed his mind
at all. He's still very much of the view that
the eligibility rules aren't quite right. But he has also
realized that as the all black coach, he can't publicly
(01:57):
fight with his employer. He needs to be publicly aligned
support their policy. He can badger them, he can advocate
behind the scenes as much as he likes. He can
tell them I don't believe it. But when they ask
him and they say, well, we need you to be
publicly aligned and tell the media that you are, then
he's going to have to do that because that is
how you know, that's how employment works start. So we
(02:19):
all have to accept that your employer has a hold
on you to some degree.
Speaker 2 (02:23):
Well, I've had that situation myself. You've got to understand. See. Look,
I'll agree with you because in my boss, but don't
tell me how to think and I'll behind. And that's understandable.
So could you say stage managed? These guys both put
up front, both put up in a couple of good
Rugby journalists for a Rugby direct to I suppose draw
(02:43):
a line in the sands we are aligned, even though
maybe they're not.
Speaker 4 (02:47):
Yeah, a necessary PR function because because given what reason
has said at the end of last year, given that
the New Zealand Rugby board has changed in its entirety
in early February, this issue would become If nothing was said,
it would continue to fester, wouldn't The media like you
(03:07):
and I would continue to puking prode and ask questions
about what's HRAs we're thinking now? So I think a
smart PR move by New Zealand Rugby to get Raiser
to publicly align, try and kill the issue as a
media topic, try and just put it to bed.
Speaker 3 (03:21):
So as you know, France have come in in July.
Speaker 4 (03:24):
They don't want any kind of discussion around peripheral topics,
around eligibility, so that's why they've done this.
Speaker 2 (03:31):
But this is leaked to the longer this has gone on,
it's like the boy with the finger and the dike,
and it's going to swallow them whole. But they also
don't want to open a Pandora's box. So it's a
very delicate balance they have. And if you think for
a second the media are going to go away, well
that's not going to happen, isn't it, Because we can
not necessarily see the future. But things change, and they
(03:54):
change in a hurry, and you've got to be cognizant
of that.
Speaker 3 (03:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
Well, I guess people could argue that the player market
trends haven't necessarily changed overly dramatic on the broad picture
basis that there are there are more there is more
money and more opportunity overseas for New Zealand's best players.
The money they can earn overseas continues to be greater
than the money they can earn here. That's never really
(04:20):
changed from the first days of professionalism.
Speaker 3 (04:22):
But I think it's become a.
Speaker 4 (04:23):
Little bit more nuanced than that now because you know,
Japan is the game changer in my view, because these
guys are are offering at times quite significant amounts of money.
We're talking sort of one million, two million dollar contracts.
They're building a level of credibility in Japan in terms
(04:44):
of the quality of the rugby. It's backed by massive corporations,
so it's got a sustainable financial model. Toyota are going
to continue to fund a rugby team forever because that's
part of their corporate culture and their and their kind
of code of conduct almost or their charter. Is what
I'm trying to say is to pump money back into sport,
to produce better people and to engage with the community.
(05:07):
So it's all viable and there's a lot of people
gravi as heating to Japan, and the power of that
in three to four years time will be significantly more
than it is not to your point, and the ability
of Japanese clubs to lure New Zealand's best players over there,
with the lifestyle, with the quality of rugby and the
money on offer, it will be very difficult for New
(05:29):
Zealand to stop more and more players from going there.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
But that's one New Zealand rugby. I suppose cozying art
Worth Japanese rugby and how that actually works because it
is going to happen, but their style of rugby, and
I suppose the players when they come back the state
they're in, it's not like they've been hammered by French
Fords and anger irishmen when they're over there. It actually
sits quite nicely within the remit of New Zealand rugby.
(05:54):
This is the first hole, isn't it.
Speaker 3 (05:56):
Yeah, it does, and timing aligns as well.
Speaker 4 (06:00):
So that's the other really important factor here is that
the season, the Japanese season can currently with Super Rugby,
which means that you're not asking guys to play round
the clock the way that the South Africans currently are
because they are a Southern Hemisphere country locked into Southern
Hemisphere international program, but they are effectively a Northern Hemisphere
(06:25):
nation in terms of the club competitions that they play in,
which means their players are going round and round and round,
they never get a break and they're going to blow
up at some point. Japan is different because you can
allow guys in New Zealand to go and play in
Japan the season runs Dezember. To me, they can come home,
they can rest and recover for a few weeks and
they're good to go, match hard and match fit, ready
(06:47):
to play in July. The question, and this is really
at the heart of the whole issue, is does New
Zealand Rugby feel that if you let a handful of
guys go and play in Japan and keep them eligible
for the Olblecks, will the Japanese system have kept them
at a level in terms of their skills, their sharpness,
you know, the game, understanding, the readiness to develop and improve.
(07:10):
Will it be strong enough to do that or will
it be too much of a step down? A lot
of this is about control in that sense, a see,
because New Zealand don't trust necessarily other countries to develop
and look after their players in the same way that
New Zealand thinks it can do well.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
That's why they've got to have that alignment. And as
you talk to me off air about this, they've got
coaches in Japan that do align with what New Zealand
Rugby want and can hopefully lift those levels. So like see,
you're Steve Hansen your Robbie Deans and so on and
so forth. So they've got that connection or is that
too much?
Speaker 3 (07:45):
Now?
Speaker 4 (07:46):
Look, these guys have all coached at international level. They've
all got relationships with New Zealand rugby and the people
within New Zealand Rugby, Like Razor and Steve Hanson have
known each other forever, so and Raiser and Todd Blackadder
have known each other forever.
Speaker 3 (08:01):
He's another coature up there in Japan.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
So managing these relationships, you know, having Razor, if he's
the All Blacks coach, go up to Japan, meet with
these guys, watch a few games, talk to them, you know,
get a sense of how players are tracking, trending. This
is what happens everywhere else in the world. Yeah, this
is what Razbie Rasmus has to do on a permanent
basis because his players are all over the place. This
(08:26):
is what Scotland have to do because their players are
all over the place. You know. So it's not that
difficult or uncommon for an international coach to be asked
to monitor international club programs to see how his players
are trending and tracking, you know. So theF we go
down that quite easily. So I don't think it would
be that difficult for New Zealand, and given the KEYWI
(08:47):
influence in Japan, and the quality of coaching in Japan
is actually probably in my view, perhaps higher at some
clubs than it is at super rugby level in New Zealand.
Then the arguments about oh, well, we're worried about the quality,
We're worried about the exposure you know to you know,
poorer training, poorer medical staff, or the kind of peripheral
(09:11):
elements that go into high performance package. My understanding is
that Japan is world class in many of those facets,
so some of these fears are not real anymore.
Speaker 2 (09:22):
What happens with the stretch the rubber band, if you will,
around the seventy test cap mark. That looks like that's
a standard for players when they can negotiate that time off,
if you will, with a four year contract with the
Japanese that stretch further as have come down to sixty,
(09:43):
they have different laws, different rules maybe dealing with Japanese
clubs as opposed to overseas clubs in the Northern Hemisphere
and Europe, in order to keep that control.
Speaker 3 (09:52):
Yeah, it's a good question.
Speaker 4 (09:54):
I mean, I'd answer it like this and say that
New Zealand Rugby argues, well, let me answer your questions first.
I'm not a fan of that seventy test match scenario
because quite often it leads to special circumstances coming up
because they haven't rigidly stuck to that. Jorddy Barrett doesn't
have seventy test caps, by the way, from memory, and
(10:17):
he's in Ireland. Patrick Tupeloso didn't have any when he
signed and got sabbatical deal to go to Japan. Richie Muwanga,
for example, if they could have got to him and said, hey,
mat what about you do two years in Japan, we'll
call you know, will allow you to be eligible in
between seasons and then eligible when you come back home,
(10:37):
they would have access to him right now, and you
can say, well, that's not part of their eligibility policy.
But they've always been willing to make exemptions and exceptions
depending on circumstance. Which is why I don't really like
about the rule is because it ultimately feels that they
will override it on any given occasion if they feel
a player is worth it, and that's sets I feel
(10:59):
a really bad precedent and a bad example because The
whole reason they don't want you guys to be eligible
full time from over sees is they're talking about the
integrity of Pathway. They want to encourage people to stay.
They want they want that to be authentic. The way
that they set the whole program up. Everybody kind of
knows that if you you know, if you make a
strong enough argument, and if circumstances favor you, like there's
(11:22):
no other number turning around, and you start saying, hey,
I might disappear and go offshore as well as a
bit of leverage, they will probably bend and buckle and
give you what you want.
Speaker 1 (11:32):
For more from sports Talk, listen live to News Talks.
It'd be from seven pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio.
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