Josh Jacomb: Taranaki First-Five player ahead of the quarter final match against Waikato

Taranaki are three wins away from securing the Ranfurly Shield and the National Provincial Championship title for the year. 

They host Waikato in New Plymouth in tonight's quarterfinal, following last week's Shield win over Tasman in Nelson. 

Adam Cooper catches up with Taranaki first-five Josh Jacomb ahead of their Quarter Final.  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the All Sport Breakfast podcast with Darcy
Waldegrave from News Talks.

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Edb A past seven and Yes. MPC quarter finals are underway.
After an incredibly tight round robin top quarterfiers Wellington, the
first team through to next week's semi finals, are comfortable
twenty nine to fourteen win over Count's Monaco last night
at Sky Stadium. So who's joining the Lions in the
final for the action continues today the Battle of the

(00:31):
Bays Bay of plenty in Hawks Bay meeting at Totong
of five past two second place getters Tartanuki are hosting
White Cup though in New Plymouth at seven five tonight,
mean tomorrow it's Tasman hosting Canterbury at Blenham. Well let's
hit into the Tartanucki camp though and preparing for that
game tonight. Of course, they're on the back of that
thrilling ran Philly Shields win over Tasman last week which
locked away the logger Wood for the summer First five.

(00:54):
Josh Jacob is with us. Josh, morning to you mate,
thanks for your time and well, firstly, congratulations on the
win last week. I'm sure plenty of celebrations we had.
So how did you and the team make sure you
enjoyed that win while also getting set for the crunch
point of a season with playoffs underway.

Speaker 3 (01:11):
Yeah, it was like you said, it was an awesome,
awesome day on Sunday, not only for our group but
for our province as well. The celebrations were a bit funny.
We got stuck in Wellington overnight, so we didn't get
that home till Monday, AVO. But yeah, we enjoyed each

(01:31):
other's company and come Tuesday or Monday alvough, once we'd landed,
we quickly turned our attention to our quarterfinal against Wikido.

Speaker 2 (01:40):
Yeah, and the matches and repeats of the home game
you had against d Waikato at round five, a twenty
five to nineteen win for Tatanaki. Thens have you looked
back on that game in particular at all to see
what works then to get the W?

Speaker 3 (01:53):
I wouldn't say we've necessarily necessarily looked back at that
game in particular, but I think we just we're real
happy with the shifts we made on both sides of
the ball again, tegment in that round fully shield game
and just almost putting that expectation on us to keep

(02:13):
our standards to that level or us not go even better.
So we probably won't necessarily to all that happy to
be honest, in that game when we played them, But no,
it's no disrespect to how playing that they having their team,

(02:34):
but just knowing that where we could we could have
been better. And yes, like I said, we're pleased with
the shifts we've made and we're just going to keep
ourselves accountable really going into this this weekend and hopefully
the next three weeks.

Speaker 2 (02:49):
And in terms of catering for those shifts you talk
about and making sure yet you have them contained. How
much expectation do you individually put on yourself running the
carter to make sure the team's doing what it needs
to win the game.

Speaker 3 (03:00):
Yeah, yeah, there's a there is a certain amount of
expectation for me, I suppose and my role, and I
wouldn't Yeah, I don't think that's anything. I don't put
extra pressure on myself. All I can do is all

(03:20):
I can do is just focus on how I prepare,
and if I'm going into a game with a clear
mind and knowing how we want to play as a
as a group, as a team, hopefully that will reflect
and how we play.

Speaker 2 (03:34):
Yeah, and tad Naki And why can't I tell us
about the rivalry your Chiefs neighbors in you being a
Chiefs player, you'd know players on both teams pretty well.

Speaker 3 (03:43):
Yeah, I guess it's always a game ever since I've
been down and the neckew that you trying to look
forward to, probably purely because of that, like you say,
that chief Chief neighbor, Chiefs being chief Chiefs neighbors, and
like you say, also knowing a lot of a lot

(04:06):
of boys in that team. So definitely a game we
look forward to. And to play them in a quarter
final and a game that has a lot more at
stakes is even even better. So hopefully that brings the
best out of us and we can really rip into
them on tonight.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
And you've had four wins at a road since you
defeat the Bay of Clean C a few weeks back,
confident the team is now peaking at the right time
for the playoffs here.

Speaker 3 (04:33):
Yeah, I definitely think we've we are peaking at the
right time. Then along that sort of the last few months,
there's been a few games that have been a bit
tight and probably haven't been as happy as with some performances,
but at the same time, like those games where we

(04:53):
have grinded out and one, I think it says a
lot about our group to be able to win games
that could have gone either way. So yeah, I'm real
happy with the spot where at at the minute, and
I think we're in a really good place going into
knockout footy.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
And Josh wanted to ask about your own rugby year.
What a great one it has been for yourself. You
started and the Chiefs development team and Super Rugby. You're
in the call up to the Chief's main team for
a few games. You've now had a great season for
Taranaki as well. Named in the All Blacks fifteen squad
this week for the Europe trip too for the second
string AB's team. So how do you reflect on twenty
twenty four been a bit of a will wind?

Speaker 3 (05:31):
Yeah, it has, and I guess it's been I guess
the last what are we nine ten months since pre seasons?
Things have started to move a bit quicker, But in
terms of reflecting, I probably haven't had too much time

(05:51):
to reflect yet. It's I'm still fully focused on what
we're doing down here in the neck end. Like I
said earlier, hopefully we've got three more weeks to go,
but nothing's guaranteed. But when the opportunity does come to
sit down and reflect, Yeah, it'll be nice to see

(06:13):
how the years played out. I suppose you could.

Speaker 2 (06:16):
Say, yeah, exactly. Well, it all gets into gear tonight
for the playoffs. Yeah, congrats on that call up to
Josh Reward for a great rugby year. And yeah, all
the best for tonight's game and the rest of the
NPC season before you hit to Europe. Thanks for chatting.

Speaker 3 (06:30):
Yeah, awesome, mate, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (06:32):
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