Full Show Podcast: 12 April 2025

Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Weekend Sport podcast with Jason Vine
from News Talks EDB. It's the only place to discuss
the biggest sports issues on and after fields. It's all
on Wi James Ford with Jason Vane on your home
of Sport News Talk SEDBN.

Speaker 2 (00:27):
Hello youot to good afternoon and welcome into Weekend Sport
on News Talks EDB for Saturday, April twelve. Nice day
where the wyse up and down the country. I hope
it is where you are. I'm Jason Pine Bevan Duwa
show producer. Today we're here talking sport until three. Not
quite sure where to look. There is so much going on,
including of course the Masters at Augusta. Justin Rose with

(00:47):
a one shot lead at the halfway point eight under
after a one under second round. Bryson de Chambeau outright
second on seven under. Rory McElroy round of the day
are blistering six under sixty six, including an eagle at
the par five thirteenth. He's an a tie for third
at six under, alongside Courtry Connors who shot two under today.

(01:08):
Then a group of four golfers on five under, including
defending champions Scottie Cheflers so much in terms of possibility
for rounds three and four after one o'clock. What does
it take to win at Augusta? Steve Williams should know.
He caddied for Tiger Woods and Aaron Scott when they
won the Masters. He talks about the prestige of the

(01:30):
green jacket and what it takes to conquer Augusta. First
up today, though Cricket. For the first time ever, New
Zealand Cricket is considering splitting its black Caps coaching responsibility
between its red and white ball sides. Gary Stead this
week decided to step down from his white ball duties

(01:51):
his contract expires in journey. He says, look, I don't
want to be white ball coach anymore, but I'm contemplating
whether I would still like to put my name forward
to remain as Test coach.

Speaker 3 (02:01):
Now.

Speaker 2 (02:02):
New Zealand Cricket haven't decided yet one way or the
other whether they would consider splitting the rolls. What are
the pros and cons of it? Will England have done it?
Brendan McCallum for a while was just red ball coach.
Now he's coach across red and white ball. So has
it worked for England pros and cons. As a say
English cricket writer Alie Martin on this soon begin to

(02:23):
get your views as well. Are you in favor of
this or not? Should we split our coaches between red
and white ball? And if we do, should Gary Stead
get the red ball gag? He's got a pretty good
record in the Test arena. It'd be a fairly strong candidate.
If we don't split, then Gary Stead falls out of
the reckoning who are the candidates to take over cricket?

(02:45):
Leading us off shortly including plenty of your thoughts other
matters around today. The Crusaders, The Crusaders, you're back, You
are back top of the Super Rugby table thirty one
twenty four when over the Hurricanes last night. Then the
Chiefs going down remarkably to the Warratars, who have been
terrible the last two weeks, well not terrible, but certainly
have been beaten by big margins the last two weeks.

(03:09):
They turn into a different team in Sydney, don't though,
the Warriors as they beat the Chiefs twenty one to
fourteen last night. Crusaders head coach Rob Penny with us
after two as his side sits proudly at the top
of the table Super Rugby Opicky final tonight at Eden Park,
defending champion Blues against the twenty twenty three winners Much
two five past seven. Kendra Cox edg's going to preview

(03:29):
that one for us and around about the same time,
Auckland FC look to extend their lead at the top
of the A League means for fall out of back
to six points. They play Sydney FC in Sydney seven
o'clock kick off. Head coach Steve Corriker is on the
show after two as well. Adam Peacock, speaking of Australia
Out of Australia in his regular slot Live Sport while
we're on the air, will keep an eye on the

(03:50):
supercars in Topoor. The Kiwis continue to fly after andre
Heimgartner and Ryan Woods at the fastest pace in the
opening practice sessions yesterday, Matt Payne topping the time sheets
and qualifying for the first race of the weekend. It
goes at ten to one this afternoon, so about forty
minutes away. Matt Payne's hot lap of one minute twenty

(04:12):
five point seven zero seconds has him on the front
of the grid, alongside or ahead of rather Ozzie's Brody
Kostecki and Cam Waters Ryan Wood will start in firsth
and Kostecki has claimed pole for today's second race, so
they don't qualifying for the first race and the second
race before the first race even goes. That's the way
it goes. So Kostecki on pole for the second one.

(04:32):
Chaz Mosterd is there paints the best of the locals
and seventh for the second race. National League football up
and down the country today as well, to keep an
eye on. We'd invite you along to the show. We
absolutely extend that invitation to you. Our lines are open
all afternoon oh eight hundred and eighty ten eighty if
you'd like to send a text nine two nine two
or emails off to Jason at Newstalk SB dot co

(04:54):
dot NZE. Eleven past midday.

Speaker 1 (04:57):
One, crutch Hold Engage Weekend Sport with Jason Pain and
GJ gun Homes, New Zealand's lost trusted home builder.

Speaker 2 (05:05):
News Talk said, and so to cricket. As mentioned for
the first time in eight years, New Zealand Cricket is
seeking a new black Caps coach, but just which teams
newcomer will take control of is yet to be determined.
Incumbent Gary Stead has stepped down from his white ball duties.
His contract expires in June, but he is still contemplating

(05:27):
whether he wants to put his name forward to remain
as Test coach. Now whether or not that's even an
option remains to be seen. New Zealand Cricket haven't yet
committed to staying with an all format coach or splitting
the roles between red and white ball for the first
time ever. New Zealand Cricket's Head of High Performance, Brian
Stronik said this week the ultimate goal was to get

(05:49):
the best coach or coaches for New Zealand's players. England
had split coaches between twenty twelve and twenty fourteen. Andy
Flower looked after the Test side and Ashley Giles the
white ball side. They did it again between twenty twenty
two and twenty twenty four with, of course our own
Brendan McCullum looking after the tar side and Matthew Mott

(06:11):
the white ball teams, and from the start of this
year Brendan McCullum took charge across all formats. Pakistan and
South Africa also make use of split coaches for their
different setups. So what are the pros and cons? Is
it the right thing for the black Caps to do?
Let's bring in leading English cricket writer from The Guardian,

(06:31):
Elie Martin. Ellie, thanks for joining us. Let's start with
some generic pros and cons, shall we. So let's start
with the pros the benefits. What are the benefits of
splitting the coaches between red and white ball.

Speaker 4 (06:44):
Yeah?

Speaker 5 (06:44):
Sure, hi, Jason, thanks for having me.

Speaker 6 (06:46):
I think in England's experience, what they found, but particularly
in the most recent era that you'd spoke about with
Martin McCullum, was that just this sheer fixture overload meant
that splitting the coaches allowed those coaches to manage their
workloads much better. They weren't completely strung out, they could
hit each series with fresh energy. You'd have to say,
I think in other advantages you can bring in specialism

(07:08):
by way of format. It might be that a particular
coach has their strengths in one format and that that
actually lends itself to having a specialist for one of
the others or for the other two. If it's only
eyes and T twenty and I think a big thing
at the moment we're finding in the modern era, particularly
with the rise of franchise T twenty cricket, is that

(07:28):
coaches can pick up really lucrative gigs for pretty much
an annual salary for about two months work. And that
being the case, is that by splitting the coaches you
can actually bring in.

Speaker 5 (07:40):
More of the talent pool around the world and be.

Speaker 6 (07:42):
A slightly more attractive proposition, so that that particular coach
may be able to marry up working with the national
team and still having the opportunities in franchise cricket as well.

Speaker 5 (07:52):
So that was certainly.

Speaker 6 (07:53):
England's thinking when they split it with McCullum and Mott.
But as you mentioned, we've gone back to the single
coach now here in England.

Speaker 2 (08:01):
All right, So those are the pros. Let's talk about
the cons conversely, what are the downsides, Ellie of split coaches.

Speaker 6 (08:09):
Well, the cons are that, well, yeah, with with split
coaches is that you can have you can get into
a situation where the two teams, or maybe that the
test team and the white ball team are at very
different stages of their development, and that the one medicine
for one team is not necessarily the medicine that the
other team requires. So in that instance you can find
that with two coaches that sometimes the messaging can become

(08:31):
a bit mixed and for it to work well, I
believe you have to have a real alignment in terms
of the overall vision between the two coaches.

Speaker 5 (08:40):
And extremely good communication.

Speaker 6 (08:43):
Another pitfall what we saw and a good example was
during that Flower Gild split that England had ten ten
twelve years ago, was that one team can feel like
it's getting the others getting priority in terms of resource.
I mean the way England and their schedule is mapped
out is it's There have been times when you know,
the selectors have had to decide who is going into

(09:04):
what format and who's being rested, and quite often one
format and one coach will feel like they are the
sort of the second class citizen in that instance.

Speaker 5 (09:13):
So that that is.

Speaker 6 (09:15):
An issue and that does require good communication and a
good alignment of the overall goal for all teams as
to work.

Speaker 4 (09:22):
I believe.

Speaker 2 (09:23):
So England have gone to split coaches twice and come
back twice. So is that an admission of sorts that
it doesn't work or or as the current scenario with
a've broader all back under Brandon McCallum just based around
Brandon McCallum.

Speaker 6 (09:39):
Yeah, I mean, particularly in that instance of the Mott
McCullum one. I mean, there was a huge lag in
terms of fixtures after the pandemic and actually England found themselves.

Speaker 5 (09:49):
You know, a Test match would finish on.

Speaker 6 (09:50):
Day five and quite literally the following day a white
ball series would start in another part of the world,
so that coach cannot be in two places at one time.
So it really was a kind of pragmatic view that
was taken in that instance. And you know, England did
enjoy some early success in when they had the split
coaching there. England did win that T twenty World Cup
at the end of twenty two, and at the same

(10:11):
time the Test team enjoyed a really strong revival under
McCullum and Stokes.

Speaker 5 (10:18):
So we saw in that instance that it did work initially.

Speaker 6 (10:20):
I think what's happened subsequently is that the fixture congestion
has eased.

Speaker 4 (10:26):
A little bit.

Speaker 6 (10:27):
We're actually seeing it might only be a week or
two weeks, but there are gaps actually starting to develop
in the schedule between series, so a coach can visibly
get from one to the next.

Speaker 5 (10:37):
And I think with England.

Speaker 6 (10:38):
Not going that well under mottn and Butler in the
end they gave up both their world titles at a
very poor champions Trophy, which was McCullum's first assignment and
led to Josh Butler being being sacked as captain or
stepping down as captain.

Speaker 5 (10:49):
But it was kind of inevitable. I think looking at
that is that McCullum has seen it.

Speaker 6 (10:54):
I think he's he believes he can make it work,
and England are quite fortunate they have a coach of
his caliber and kind of status who believes he can
commit to a year round, single job with the national
team when as I mentioned earlier, there is a huge
appeal there to surely pick up a couple of gigs
on the side in T twenty, which, as I say,
a pretty lucrative.

Speaker 2 (11:14):
Just for reference, Ellie, how much crossover is there currently
between England's red and white ball sides in terms of
players who play just read ball just white ball in
players who play both, Yeah, good question.

Speaker 6 (11:27):
It's certainly during that sort of post pandemic era they
really did split off into two separate groups because of
the logistics I mentioned and what you had in that instance,
was guys like Ben Stokes and Joe would kind of
come back just for the major tournaments and.

Speaker 5 (11:42):
That does create issues.

Speaker 7 (11:43):
You know, you kind of.

Speaker 6 (11:44):
Build one team in bilateral cricket, but then some big
stars come back for the main event that can knock
people out of position, that can change the strategy, so
that can create an issue.

Speaker 5 (11:54):
What we're finding with McCullum now with.

Speaker 6 (11:56):
The fixtures having eased a bit for England, and this
probably reflects his background with New Zealand as well, is
that he is looking to foster probably a more tight
knit group and I think he's trying to bring the
two sets of players into one and have a smaller
pool so that he can get consistent messaging into a
smaller pool of players who can carry it across formats.
One of the big sort of takeaways England had from

(12:17):
their very poor Champions trophies they really believe now that
that Test and ODI cricket are the two formats that
really marry up closest and that.

Speaker 5 (12:26):
T twenty is now the outliers.

Speaker 6 (12:27):
So it might be that, you know, we've just got
Harry Brooker as an all format players, just been made
head a captain of the White ball teams, but it
might be that his T twenty side probably contains more
specialists going down the line, and that we see the
ODI teams and Test teams marry up a bit more,
certainly with the batting and also potentially with the fast
ballers as well.

Speaker 2 (12:47):
That is so interesting that T twenty is now becoming
the one which is which is different, rather than teas
cricket being the one that is different. Ellie, do you
think the players who play just white ball or just
red ball cricket would prefer a coach just for them.

Speaker 6 (13:03):
Yeah, but potentially I think, I mean again, it will
come down to the individual's strengths as a coach and
whether they do have a good sort of cross format caliber.
Another thing we're finding at the moment is that players
are really looking for coaches who've been there and done that,
and that is you know, they really kind of respect
the caps and the achievements of players of coaches in

(13:23):
their playing days.

Speaker 5 (13:24):
So that's another factor there. I think it really does
come back down to the individuals.

Speaker 6 (13:30):
It comes down to the individual selected, It comes down
to alignment of vision, and it comes down to excellent
communication if you can get those right. I do think
it can work, but it really does sort of depend
on resources, whether equally financial resources, whether New Zealand can
attract that one big name coach and get them on
a year round salary, or whether they're actually splitting. It

(13:52):
does help them find the best candidate for each format
because it allows that coach to also go off and
either either take their well earned breaks or maybe pick
up a gig in one of those champions in one
of those franchise leagues. As actually I was crunching the
numbers for New Zealand and England in the up to
the end of April and twenty seven, which is the

(14:12):
end of the world. The current Future Tours program, New
Zealand have about one hundred and fifty one days of
cricket outside of global tournaments, England one hundred and sixty six.
So actually news end have got quite a bit of
test cricket coming up, so I can see why they
are mulling this over. But it is still less than
England with that one coach, So you think in theory
it should be possible to have a single coach overseeing

(14:34):
the whole thing. They might miss the odd series to
have a break, you know, it's bit of family time.
That probably comes down to how the strength of their
assistant coaches and whether they're able to step up, but
that also provides opportunities for the coach development as well.

Speaker 2 (14:46):
Indeed, I just began to get your view on something
that high performance manager Brian Stronach here at New Zealand
Cricket said this week. He said, at the moment, we
haven't any strong preference for either a split coaching role
or a sol appointment who covers all three formats, and
we're unlikely, he said, to be clearer on that until
we see who's putting their name forward. I found that interesting.

(15:09):
Does it seem like the right approach to you? Or
should they decide first of all if they're going to
split them or not, and then take their replications accordingly.

Speaker 6 (15:19):
Yeah, I think it probably is the right approach. I
think you do have to kind of survey the field
and see what the options out there are out there,
and I think that will come down so the individuals
will come in they have those discussions you may find
I mean England certainly found this. I think with McCullum,
the initial suspicion was that he was kind of geared
up towards the white ball side, and when they had

(15:41):
those initial conversations, from his point of view, he saw
the greater remedial work needing to be done with the
Test team and that's what really appealed to him. At
the time, they thought England was, you know, the white
ball team was a pretty well oiled machine. They did
have two world titles, so they kind of that did
stack up in some respects. But what we've subsequently seen
is that white ball team has fallen off and the
McCullum now wants to get the whole thing together. The

(16:04):
question I have seen this point where by Mike Capton,
former England captain himself, is the whether the kind of
magic of McCullum and that messaging that he brings will
that be spread too thinly across three.

Speaker 5 (16:15):
Teams year round.

Speaker 6 (16:17):
Will it lose some of its luster because players will
be consistently hearing the same voice over again, and that
might maybe shorten his.

Speaker 5 (16:25):
Shelf life long term. I don't know, We'll have to
see how that one plays out.

Speaker 6 (16:29):
It hasn't been a great start for him in the
white ball formats, but you know, this is now a
fresh start with a new captain and with the schedule easing,
you know he will hope that he can he can
get that message across in all three formats and the
results taken up to Neil Well.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
I think we'd love to have Bringha McCullum judge our teams,
but clearly that's not going to happen. Ellie, You've given
us heaps to think about and know our listeners are
going to want too. I have the essay on this
just before you go, though, Just want to flick across
the football because you are a Nottingham Forest fan. Hidy
times for you, third in the Premier League with seven
games to go, semi finals of the FA Cup and
of course our man Chris what at the heart of

(17:04):
it all, although as you'll also no, he got injured
when he was back here playing for New Zealand and
those feef for World Cup qualifiers. But how much have
you enjoyed watching Forest and watching our man Chris Ward
being them in for you this season?

Speaker 5 (17:16):
Oh man, it's been manner from heaven.

Speaker 6 (17:18):
I cannot think of a He's the best striker we've
had probably since Collin Moore about twenty five years ago.
Just that incredible low heart rate, the way that he's
able to pick himself up even after a miss and
still put the next one away.

Speaker 5 (17:32):
He's a real leader on the field up front for us.
I did actually tune in to watch that World Cup qualifying. Finally,
I think it's sort of over breakfast time.

Speaker 6 (17:39):
My wife thought I was mad and I was remacing
when Chris Wood went off.

Speaker 5 (17:45):
With that injury. But yeah, it's an incredible time at
the club.

Speaker 6 (17:50):
I'm just waiting to find out if I got my
FA Cup semi final tickets through. I hope I should
find out in the next twenty four hours, and hoping
that Chris is back on the park for them, because
we do need him. We played without a striker on
the weekend because of injuries, so we need him back.

Speaker 2 (18:03):
Asp all right, we'll keep our fingers crossed for that,
for you and also for our national team as well.
I hope you get your FA Cup semi final tickets
as well, Eli, I think you probably deserve them. Thanks
so much for joining us to talk some cricket.

Speaker 4 (18:14):
Mate.

Speaker 2 (18:14):
We'll do it again soon. Lovely cheers, Jason, No, thank you, Ellie.
Ali Martin. There are from The Guardian in England with
some really interesting thoughts one way or the other. Your
chance to react now to what you heard from Allie Martin,
And on this topic, oh, eight hundred and eighty ten eighty,
should we split our coaches one coach of a red
ball cricket, one coach for white ball cricket. It is

(18:39):
a yes from me, Maybe not permanently, but at this
moment in time, where there's a chance to give it
a crack, let's give it a crack. You keep a
steady hand on the red ball wheel with Gary Stead
and some fresh blood into the white ball side in
terms of coaching. Look, the two sides have different captains,

(19:00):
don't they. Mitchell Satner for the white ball, Tom Latham
and Test matches, So each of those captains can establish
our relationship with their coach. And more and more now,
and particularly in the T twenty game, fresh ideas are needed.
The T twenty game is evolving so quickly. There are
so many specialists emerging in T twenty cricket in particular,

(19:24):
that it feels to me as though a specialist white
ball coach is the way to go, particularly with T twenty.
Interesting to hear Alie Martin say that T twenty is
now becoming the outlier and there's actually more similarity between
Test matches and fifty over cricket. Look, I think you know,
there's still a lot of work to be done around
bilateral series and the relevance of them outside of ICC

(19:45):
events for fifty over cricket. But if we can, if
we can compare Test cricket and T twenty they are
so different now in terms of the skill sets. I
reckon give Gary Stead the red ball side through until
the end of the Australian tour, that is at the
start of twenty twenty seven. We go to Australia for
a four Test series back end of time twenty twenty

(20:06):
six into January twenty twenty seven, and sectually quite busy
between now and then test wise as well. A couple
of Tests Againstimbabwe in August, three match home series against
the West Indies in December, three Tests in England and
June of next year. Then India come a year in
November of next year for a couple of Tests and
some white ball games, and then that Test series in Australia.

(20:27):
Give it to Gary Stead until then. That's a two
year extension. A two year extension and find your man
for the white ball side. Oh, eight hundred and eighty
ten eighty nine, two ninety two. Should we split them
yay or nay? And if we do, who are the
candidates for the white ball role? Can to hear you've

(20:48):
used on that and on Gary Stead as well?

Speaker 8 (20:50):
Arthur, Hello, Hi there, I'm going to Gary Stead. Now.
I quite don't think he's He's done some marvelous things,
but there's a couple of things have let me down
far as I'm concerned. He won the Test thing and
then the next year we kind of slid down. We
were at the top and we slid down, and then

(21:11):
we have good achievement over India and we expected to
do pretty well against the English which we didn't do
too well. And if he's going to take the test team,
I think, you know, pay four tests, what would be satisfied?
You know, four tests as long as we get the
good weather. I would say probably two, when two out

(21:31):
of four, definitely one. It'd be very disappointed if he
lost a lot. If we went to Australia and we've
beat to Australia when last time we had a test
here we lost three. Now and I feel though Stead
blamed the hot weather. Well, he's just got to cope
with that. He blamed the hot weather when we lost
the three tests. That's when Ferguson went over there. Oh

(21:51):
we wanted herm and the Test team and he boke
down with the calf injury.

Speaker 2 (21:55):
So yeah, I can't remember. I can't remember Gary Steed
blaming the weather over there. I think the main problem,
and I don't know whether Gary Stead brought it up
or not, was that we didn't have any warm up
games over there. I mean, that's the liar really. That
Test series was so disappointing, Arthur. When we went off
to Australia off the back of I think England had
come here back end of twenty nineteen would play well

(22:15):
against them, and there was this huge anticipation around a
boxing day test. You know, we hadn't had one for
ages and the team was in a pretty good space.
And you're right. We went over there and got beaten
soundly by over two hundred runs and all three test matches.
It was an extremely disappointing Test series and probably I
don't know, I wonder whether Gary Stead still has that

(22:38):
as an itch that he wants to scratch, you know,
and it may may be he doesn't get the opportunity
because if they don't split the coaches, then he's gone
right and he doesn't want to do the white ball
stuff anymore. And I think that's probably the right decision.
The only way Gary Stead stays is if New Zealand
Cricket decided to split the coaching roles.

Speaker 8 (22:58):
Yeah, yeah, that's right.

Speaker 2 (22:59):
Yeah, So I guess wait and see whether they do, Arthur,
I guess we wait and see what they decide. Thanks
for your call, mate, eight hundred eighty ten eighty So yeah,
double barrel question, really should we split them pros and cons?
It might be that you think, actually, we keep it
the way it is. It's it's you know, it's the
exception rather than the rule around the world and even England,

(23:20):
who have tried it a couple of times have come back.
Imagine if Brnda McCullum was available, we'd take them in
a hartbey, wouldn't we. Twelve thirty News Talks head Beat Dallas.
Please hold with you after this speeline if you want
to jump aboard. Oh eight hundred and eighty ten eighty
nine two ninety two one text We're back in a moment.
On Newstalk's head.

Speaker 1 (23:37):
Bet it's more than just a game. Weekend sport It
with Jason Pine and GJ. Garnomes, New Zealand's most trusted
home builder, News Talks.

Speaker 2 (23:47):
AB News Talks a B twenty seven to one talking
cricket splitting the white and Red ball coaching jobs. Should
we do it? And if we do? Who are the candidates?

Speaker 9 (23:56):
Hello, Dallas, Hi Blanny. It's a good discussion. I think
I just agree with you. I think the the codes
the Whiteboorn and Red Bull are merging. I don't think
that differition under Brendon McCullum, his influence, especially like he
would coach test cricket batsman the same as whiteboard batsman.

(24:21):
In other words, every boar It's trinity scored four.

Speaker 2 (24:25):
So I think he'd say six. He'd say six, Dallas,
But no, but you're right. And when he was appointed
as Red Bull coach, I think most of us said, well,
if they were going to give him either the either
the red or the white, the white seems more appropriate
for Bears, didn't it.

Speaker 9 (24:41):
Yeah, but testh cricket is merging, like we're getting three
day four day results now in teth Crickett, right, Yep,
it's merging the whole thing is emerging into I think
in the future there will just be good cricketers and
bad cricketers in a play in all formats.

Speaker 2 (24:59):
Such an interesting thought. Yeah, well but so okay, So
you'd be in favor of of sticking with the status
quo in terms of a one person in charge of
all of our teams. So that's not going to be
Gary Stead because he said I'm not interested in the
in the white ball stuff anymore so so so, I
mean Rob Walter is the one who's been talked about.
He coached Otago and CD, he's been white ball coach

(25:22):
with South Africa for a little while. He stood down
from that. He is, I guess the guy they're talking
about the most.

Speaker 10 (25:30):
Who else is there?

Speaker 2 (25:31):
Well, that's that's the question I'm throwing out. Look, there's
any number of names that you can say, right, okay,
here's a name, Stephen Fleming. But would Stephen Fleming want
the job? I doubt he would?

Speaker 4 (25:43):
Right?

Speaker 11 (25:44):
What about the Tory at least.

Speaker 2 (25:46):
Tied up with Australia, isn't it. But again, I mean
there's no bad idea here. Look, Daniel Vittry would be
a terrific coach of both white and red ball. You know, well,
we know what he did in the in the Test arena,
he was our best ever spinner white ball. He's had,
he's had, you know, some success there. I think he
might have even been in an IPL team for a while.
Daniel Forry would be a great a great candidate if

(26:09):
he was interested. And that's that's Dallas is whether they're
interested or not.

Speaker 9 (26:14):
Yeah, Piney, what about left field? Bringing Waggers and Wagner.
I reckon he'd be a good future coach.

Speaker 12 (26:21):
You know.

Speaker 2 (26:22):
Look, I mean, well, you'd certainly want to run through
a brick wall for the guy, wouldn't you. You wouldn't
want to disappoint Neil Wagner. Whether it's whether it's something
that he's interested in or not. I mean, he might,
I'm not sure he's got the I'm not sure he's
got the got the the Badgers or whatever it is
that you need to coach a team. But maybe that's
not important. If he just if he just rucked his
team up every time they went out to bowl or bat,

(26:44):
maybe he's.

Speaker 9 (26:45):
Your man, ok, Bunny, Yeah, good on.

Speaker 2 (26:49):
Good on your Dallas, appreciate your call. Eight hundred and
eighty ten eighty is our number, Mark High here are
you good? Thanks? Make good?

Speaker 13 (26:57):
The question I've got about splitting the coaches is there
enough test match cricket for coach to earn enough money
to do the job.

Speaker 2 (27:07):
The money is an interesting part in itself as well. Mark,
I'll answer you a question in a minute with some
with what we've got coming up. But the money is interesting.
Let's say I don't know, this is just an arbitrary figure.
I don't know what Garry Steed's getting paid. But let's
say he's getting paid four hundred grand. Let's just say
I don't know that's true or not. Let's say it's
four hundred. So do you give what kind of caliber
are you going to get for someone who just does
test and just does whiteball A four hundred your budget?

(27:30):
Are you going to get two half as good coaches
for two hundred each?

Speaker 13 (27:34):
Yes, exactly. Well that's at one point and the other
part of it, as far as test matches go, und
Cricket's going to decide whether they're going to actually be
serious about test matches. And you're hit on it before
with the previous caller sending a team to Australia to
play the boxing Day test with no warmap games. They're
obviously not taking it seriously.

Speaker 2 (27:52):
Very good point in terms of what they've got coming
up there is, actually there are a few test matches
coming up over the next two years. Three are sorry,
two in Zimbabwe, three at home in December against the
West Indiast, three in England next June, then into your
hair for two and then four in Australia. So over
the next two years there are actually quite a few
test matches to negotiate, and some and some hot tickets

(28:14):
as well. You know, four tests in Australia. Maybe we
can right the wrongs of twenty nineteen twenty twenty mark
and actually have some warm up games for starters.

Speaker 13 (28:23):
Well, then that's the key. They've got to take it serious.
They've got to send it a worthwhile team. And that's
one of the problems with that is you've got to
have all your players available, not screaming in India and
the IPL and such light. But they'll also send them prepared.
Give them the tools, they will perform. But if you
don't give them the tools, they won't.

Speaker 4 (28:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (28:42):
No, it's a very good rule of thumb. Mark a
very good rule of thumb for god bl is not
going to stop these guys playing. But what is is
participation in the likes of the South African Tea twenty
competition which has kept Came Williamson and Devin Conway away
from Central contracts. Of course this year and again next summer,
there is no test cricket after Christmas. I really missed

(29:04):
it this year, you know, January, February, March into April.
We're so used to seeing the white clothing and the
red ball, aren't we? Not any of it this year
and none of it next year either. The West Indies
are here before Christmas, nothing after Christmas. It's not until
we get to that four Test series in Australia back
end of twenty six into twenty seven that we're going

(29:26):
to see New Zealand play test cricket after Christmas. Twenty
twenty seven is going to be the next opportunity and
it's not even going to be here, It's going to
be in Australia anyway. Oh, eight hundred and eighty ten
eighty is our number. Talking splitting the coaches spear line.
If you want to jump aboard, Hello.

Speaker 14 (29:40):
Craig good A, Jason, how are you very good?

Speaker 2 (29:43):
Craig very good.

Speaker 15 (29:45):
Good.

Speaker 14 (29:46):
I've got a couple of points. One of them just
made money that that will be the deciding factor. I
think I'm splitting the coaches. I think money is the
big the big thing once you know the budget and
then whether it's going to be financially viable for someone
to only do one or two of the formats. But

(30:06):
what I did want to say, particularly on the guy
you interviewed previously, one hundred percent agree with what he
said about the the T twenty is the outlier. Yeah,
I totally agree. If you look at let's take batting
for example, if you look at I'll give you four names.

(30:26):
If you look at Tom Latham, Kane Williamson, William perhaps
Devin Conway. I wouldn't have any of those four of
my T twenty team. I'd definitely have all four of
them in the one day team and in the in
the Test team. So I definitely think that the T
twenty is the outlier. And then you can get a
bowling and I also think someone like East T twenty

(30:47):
Buller probably wouldn't have him in the in the test test,
all the one day team, perhaps even the express of
someone like an Adam Milne and Lackey Ferguson four overs
of express places in T twenty can deal with that,
probably wouldn't have them in the with the with the
calor of bowling we've got. So I do think that
that is the T twenty game or you know, one

(31:08):
hundred percent agree with that guy, Craig.

Speaker 2 (31:10):
That's it's such a good point. And even as you
say the names, it's got me thinking, yeah, that is
there a bigger crossover between test and fifty over or
between fifty over and T twenty And you've know that, mate,
there's a bigger crossover between test and fifty over cricket.

Speaker 14 (31:25):
Yeah, it's the games to play, you know, you've just
got more time to say, if you look at batting,
you've got more time to build in and dinner in
a fifty game. You look at the last series, you know,
someone like you know, Darryl Mitchell was miles behind to
run a ball in one of those games and then
picked the pace up in in a fifty over game,
you just don't have the time to do that in
T twenty. So that's that's where the whole strategy of

(31:47):
one day cricket is. I think closer to to a
test Test match. Yeah, I guess yeah, I thought he
I thought he hit that on the head.

Speaker 2 (31:56):
Do we should we should we do something very you know,
quite radical. I don't think it's radical and have a
T twenty coach and then say you split it T
twenty only because there is a lot of it being played,
and then your other coach does fifty over in test matches.

Speaker 8 (32:11):
Good.

Speaker 2 (32:11):
That would if we were.

Speaker 14 (32:13):
Going to split it, That's the split I would make
because there's not a huge we don't play a huge
amount of Test match or we don't have a shit
don't seem to have a huge side of one day cricket.
That's the split I would if we were going to
split the coaches, That's where I would do it. But
I'd just step further and this will never happen. But
my dream would be that there wouldn't be one international

(32:33):
T twenty tournament every four years, which would be a
T twenty World Cup once every four years, and there'd
be no other international T twenty games played. They won't
ever do it. I think T twenty should stick to
particularly franchise cricket, except for once every four years, have
a T twenty World Cup where the best of your
country come together and the rest of the time just
play test matches and one day one day matches. That's

(32:55):
that's what I would like, personally like to see with
cricket and keep T twenty two to franchise cricket.

Speaker 2 (33:01):
Yeah, there's a lot to like about that. I know
the bean counters in New zeally cricket and the other places,
I'm sure, but have their say on that, Craig, as
you know, you know when a team comes to New Zealand. Yes, Ed,
you're the T twenties because people come in and pay
their money, et cetera, et cetera. But no, you've given
us plenty of food for thought, mate. I like that
idea actually, just a T twenty coach only because you

(33:23):
look at the team that played the T twenty matches
against Pakistan in the most recent series. How many of
these are going to be in the Test team? Tim
Seifert no, Fin Allen no, Tim Robinson no, Mark Chapman
probably not. Daryl Mitchell yes, Jimmy Nisham no, Mitch Ay
probably at some stage, Michael Bracewell yes, Kyle Jamison, yes,
we hope each Sody probably not. Jacob Duffy, Yes, Ben Sears, Yes,

(33:49):
Zach Folks, who knows. But not a big crossover, right,
Not a big crossover at all. Just on seventeen to one,
George with you right after this spearline. We're talking cricket
till one golf after one rugby a bit later on.
Don't worry, we haven't got him at the rugby. I
knew I'd be accused of ignoring the rugby because the
Hurricanes lost to the Crusaders. That is not happening. I'm

(34:10):
not going to ignore that. Rob Penny is with us
after two to talk about his team's mighty victory over
the Hurricanes, but cricket for the meantime. Back in a
moment with more of your course.

Speaker 1 (34:20):
The Tough Questions after Turf Weekend Sport with Jason Hine
and GJ. Gunner Holmes, New Zealand's most trusted home builder.

Speaker 2 (34:30):
News Talks thirteen away from one. Quite a few on text.
I'll get to in a moment, but still a few
minutes to jump on board and talk about splitting white
and red ball coaches for New Zealand cricket. They haven't
decided one way or the other yet. Hello, George, would
you do it.

Speaker 16 (34:44):
I don't know if I would actually at the State's timing.
I think we've got I think when we're out our beast,
we've still got enough players like Raven Drag Glenn Phillips said,
met Henry Willow Raw Mitchell who do go across most.
I think you might start getting quite early on in
the pixer a tension point where there's two separate coaches

(35:05):
for White and they'll they'll obviously be you know, coaching
for their futures as well, and they might want that
unfited access to the respective players. But you've got to
be cognizant of the player with the clothes and they
need to rest and rotate. I think the more important
piece comes in their assistant coaches and sort of having
the director of cricket role that sits right over the top,

(35:28):
and there's the head coach of all forms, but there's
real distinct specialist skill sets that are recruited and under
the assistant roles, how can you get access to someone
like Ricky Ponting in the twenty twenty or Dan Vatry
or those types of players. So potentially it'll be the
caliber of the personnel that are actually interested in the

(35:50):
role may well dictate the path they want to go down.

Speaker 2 (35:53):
Yeah, and I think Brian Stronik said exactly that, didn't
he And I thought it was an odd one when
he said that that, Hey, we're going to see who
applies and then decide whether we split the roles. I
wondered whether they might perhaps make the decision first. And
you know, because there'll be there'll be people who obviously
aren't interested in just doing what just doing it all,

(36:14):
and there'll be others who are interested in doing it all.
But yeah, you're right, Maybe maybe a director of cricket
is the way we need to go. Maybe that person
sits over the top and rather than say, okay, there's
a head coach of the white ball or a head
coach of the Test team, you just have coaches of
those teams, everybody reporting up to your director of cricket.

Speaker 16 (36:35):
Yeah, and I missed the interview at the start, so
I'm coming talk a bit late. But I like what
they did when they were playing in the subcontinent. When
they draft and I think it's his name, so it's
the shrill link and spin ball. I think Paslanga or
that comes on board for three months and knows the
subconstent conditions and you actually getting specialist skill sets and

(36:58):
the net coaching team. I think you had a really
good point finally around you know, he's in cricket, have
an ultimate budget four hundred k, you know the number
that you put on it, and if you split it
in half, you're going to need to be able to
treat the safeful of hope. Tellon that are actually keep
to take it for because you need to have the

(37:19):
beast of the beast of coaching and leaving the culture
of the team for it to be successful in this
new era.

Speaker 2 (37:25):
Yeah, that's right. And the other part of the money
side as well, George is as you know, you know,
a coach can earn, you know, a lot of money
coaching enfranchise cricket. In fact, if they're just a coach
of an IPL team like Stephen Fleming, I mean, it's
not just two months work but two months commitment and
you're basically set up if you want to be for

(37:45):
the whole year. So the splitting of the coaches also works,
I guess in that way, and that if a guy
has only got white ball commitments with New Zealand's you know,
he might then also be able to do a bit
of franchise coaching in t twenty to improve his craft
but also to top up his his his salary. Look,
it's a it's fascinating. I think rang ganaher Arth was
the guy who who came into help the black Caps

(38:07):
out when they were up in Asia. And yeah from
Shri Lanka, I think he should both. But your specialist
coaches just seem I mean, you're right, Ricky Ponting. Someone
before said Neil Wagner, just get him in there, you know,
just to rack the boys up.

Speaker 9 (38:20):
You know.

Speaker 16 (38:22):
Well, I think I listened to Ricky Ponting to a
podcast with Mark how the How He Gains only about
two months ago. I think it was one of the
best listeners I've ever Just the getting inside the mindset
of him in particular just made me think, man, if
he could there was a way new Zealing cricket could
acquire someone like him to be a part of the

(38:44):
culture of the team moving forward, because it was just,
you know, I really recommend that podcast. It was just
such a good listen and to what makes Ricky Ponting
teck And I know it's a long shot trying to
convince those guys out of six week lucrative IPL or
twelve week ones. But but how can you bring them
on board and a way that can sort of push
those these sorts of skills and philosophies onto the younger players.

(39:09):
So important.

Speaker 2 (39:10):
Good on you, George, Good to chat to you, mate,
Nice to hear your voice. Eight hundred and eighty, ten
to eighty A couple of minutes if you want to
have the final sale on this's got a few one
text has to be split for me, says mus because
they're away from home so much, very hard on their families. Yeah,
that's and I think that's what Gary Stead has probably
discovered too. I know that they have at times, and
I think they've done this pretty well. New Zealand Cricket

(39:31):
have at times given Gary Stead and some of the
other coaches as well, periods of leave where they don't
go on every tour. And what that also does is
it helps to develop the you know, the coaches who
are under the head coach. The likes of Jacob Orram
and Luke Ronkey and others have been developed as they've
been given greater responsibility on a couple of these tours
that Gary Stead hasn't gone on. But as far as

(39:54):
cricket is concerned, I feel like you sign it. You
know what you're getting into when you sign up. Cricket,
more than any other sport certainly that has played widely
here in New Zealand, is the one where you spend
more time away from home. You are away a lot,
and much as you go and yeah much as you

(40:15):
you know you might say, well need I need time
on my family? You know it going in You know that.
I mean Mike Hessen, what I mean by some crazy
number of days in a calendar year, he was on
the road. And look, there have been coaches, I'm sure
who the burden on the family has been too much.
In fact, there have been. There are a number of examples.
So to say, yeah, you're away from your family a lot, say,

(40:38):
I don't think that's a reason to split them, because
you know, you go into that with your eyes wide open.
That might sound a bit harsh, but look, if being
at home with your family for three hundred and fifty
out of the three hundred and sixty five days of
the year is what you're into, full credit to you.
But you can't be coach of the black Caps seven

(40:58):
to one, u s Talk said.

Speaker 1 (40:59):
Be analyzing every view from every angle in the sporting
world Weekends for It with Jason Vine call.

Speaker 2 (41:08):
Us Talk said be four to one says Piney. Stephen
Fleming might need a new job soon off his IPL
team keeps under delivering. Macker. It's a great point. I
saw that this morning the Chennai super Kings in charge.
Stephen Fleming's in charge of them. Five straight losses for
the first time in the IPL, first time they've lost
three in a row at home and their margin of defeat,
which was an eight wicket loss to the Kolcata night

(41:30):
Riders with fifty nine balls remaining their largest ever. Look
God back Stephen Fleming to turn things around. He's a
pretty astute bloke. But yeah, I want to do it quickly.
After one? What does it take to win the Masters?
Steve Williams After one.

Speaker 17 (41:46):
The only place for the big names, the big issues,
the big controversies and the big conversations heads all on
Weekend Sport with Jason Vain on your home of Sport
News Talks ed b.

Speaker 2 (42:03):
Hello down, Welcome in one O seven. I'm Jason Pine,
Bevan Dura's show producer. Today this is Weekend Sport until
three in an hour or so, Rob Penny on the show,
Top of the top of the table, Top of the table,
so say, top of the league. That's more of a
football term, isn't it. Top of the Super Rugby table?
The Crusaders sitting there proudly after there went over the
Hurricanes last night, following which the Chiefs lost to the Warratars.

(42:27):
Did you see that coming? I did not see that coming.
After the Warratars went down in consecutive weeks to the
Hurricanes heavily and Mowana pacificate not quite as heavily, but
certainly alarmingly given their second half performance, it's as though
they're a different team in Sydney, the Warrets us. I
think they're four a hour at home now. I guess
the chief Side there was top of the pile up

(42:49):
until last night anyway, Rob Penny. After two, I'm going
to chat Super Rugby O Pickie final and Auckland FC
head coach Steve Coricker with us as well. After two.
Before we get to any of that, this hour is
going to be largely focused on the Masters at Augusta. Now,
Carl Johnson, you know Carl Johnson, He looks after the
turf at Seddon Park in Hamilton and also at FMG Stadium.

(43:11):
He is one of the best turf managers going around,
not just New Zealand but around the world. He's at Augusta.
Can you imagine Carl Johnson at Augusta. He wouldn't watch
any of the golf. We might watch a little bit.
He'd be looking at the grass. He'd been looking at
the perfectly manicured fairways and greens and how they do
the rough and what sort of composition the grasses. That's

(43:34):
what kJ be doing. Anyway, I'm gonna get him on
the phone because he's over there, as I say, watching
the golf presumably, but also learning a bit about the
grass as well. So yeah, kJ, This Steve Williams very shortly,
who knows all about Augusta, having been on the bag
of Tiger Woods, and Aaron Scott during wins there. Adam
Peacock out of Australia too. In this regular slot, just

(43:55):
updating you from Toporp first race of the Supercars weekend.
There's two racists today, one tomorrow and they're through eleven
of thirty seven laps. Now in terms of qualifying, Matt
Paine qualified top ahead of Brodie Kostecki and Cam Waters.
Pain is leading through eleven of thirty seven laps. Kostecki

(44:18):
and Waters have dropped down to fifth and sixth at
the moment, So Matt Pain looking good the Kiwi as
we keep eyes on topor But speaking of Kiwi's here
is another one the greatest golf caddy in history Kiwe.
Steve Williams has a third book out. It's called Together

(44:40):
We Roared, documenting his twelve years on the Bag of
Tiger Woods, during which time they won thirteen majors. Together
Steve Williams is with us. Congratulations on the book. Steve,
It's a terrific read with some really superb in sight
and with the Masters on at the moment, I really
wanted to get some augusta insight from you today. So,

(45:01):
first of all, among the world's elite golfers, how coveted
is the Masters? How coveted is winning that green jacket?

Speaker 4 (45:10):
Yeah? Look, I mean the four major championships, the one
that all the professional golfers.

Speaker 2 (45:15):
You know, I want to win.

Speaker 4 (45:16):
Those are the talents that have placed the most importance
in that. But yeah, the Masters is unique obviously, it's
at the same venue every year, and and it's one
course you play every year if you're if you're lucky
enough to be exempted into the talents, so you can
gain more and more familiarity with the course and get
more comfortable playing the course. So each player views all
the different major championships as far as important. You know

(45:39):
that they're all major champions I want ones. You want
to win some, you know, some like the Open Championship,
more some like the Masters, so forth. But yeah, Augusta
is unique, and everyone wants to win a tournament at
a Gusta at some point.

Speaker 2 (45:52):
What are the keys to playing Augusta?

Speaker 4 (45:55):
Well, yeah, well obviously you've got to be a very
very very good quick green pudder. The greens are very
very quick with a lot of undulation, a lot of
slope there, so you you you've got to be a
very good green putter of adding green reader there you
face you know, over the period of the wink there.
It's because the greens are so quick there. It's very

(46:16):
hard to you know, all the parts from you know,
the long distance parts are hard to lag to. The
close lag very very close to the whole, so you know,
you face a lot of four to six foot is
there with a lot of break, and you've got to
be very competent at that range, just the way they've
lengthened the course over the over the you know, over
the period of time, and that realistically you've got to

(46:39):
be a long ball hit. You know, a short hitter
is going to find it very, very difficult to compete there.
There are a number four part number of part fours
over five hundred yards there now, so I mean it
makes them possible if you're a short hitter to do
well there. So, but you know you've got to you've
got to have the biggest component of playing well there
is to have a great understanding of where you can't

(47:02):
miss the ball and where you can miss the ball.
So a lot of courses you and get away with
a few shots what we call low siding yourself missing
on the or short siding yourself, but you just can't
do that there. So it really examines your whole game, Augusta.
You know, you've got to be able to hit some
right to left shots. You've got to be able to
hit some left to right shots. You've got to have
a lot of high shots coming into these greens. And

(47:24):
ultimately I believe it's the greatest test between a player
and a caddy because there's no course to my knowledge,
that puts such an emphasis on club selection. So it's
well documented that there's more caddies get fired after the
week of Augusta than any other tournament because it puts
a extreme amount of pressure on a player in a

(47:45):
caddy there because there's so many holes there. You come
up short, you can't long, you can't get up and
down you can make a high score, and you know
you come to those part five that you know, aim
and corner. You know you look at aim and corner.
Twelfth hole, you go over the green hard to make
four short. You're in the water thirteen. You know, if
you come up short you're in raised creek fifteen obviously
with the water short of the green, and you can't

(48:06):
go along club selection there. I think of all the
torments that you play, is the most important, and it
puts put a lot of stress on the player on
a caddy there, So caddy plays a big role there.

Speaker 2 (48:19):
Yeah. Well, I mean, one thing that's obvious from this
book and everything I've read and heard about you is
your meticulous planning, regardless So did Augusta need even more
than that? Did it need extra extra care and attention
from you? Given what you've just outlined.

Speaker 4 (48:35):
Yeah, but one thing, like I said, you're fortunate Jason's
you know, ik there for thirty straight years, so you know,
you keep all your notes and every time you go
there you're learning something different, so that you know, you
look at for a number of years here, the same
guys are on the leaderboard all the time. Fred Couples,
Ernie Ols, Tiger Woods, you know, these guys, Phil Micholson.

(48:57):
The same guys get on that leaderboard because they get
so comfortable with the course that they know where to
hit it, they know where not to hit it. They've
they faced so many of the parts before, so they
get so familiar with of course. So the more times,
the more opportunities you have to play there, the better
off you're going to be. And it's one of the
one of them. You know, if you look at how

(49:18):
many players have won that the first time they ever
played there, I think there's only two or three of them,
one on their first visit to Augusta. So a lot
of knowledge there that you can accumulate, and that knowledge
is very, very helpful.

Speaker 2 (49:30):
It's the twenty year anniversary this year of Tiger Woods
win with you there in two thousand and five, and
of course we land on that iconic chippin On sixteen,
which keeps on coming up on social media feeds even
more and more this time of the year. I just
want to take you back to that maybe one of
the greatest holes ever seen in golf. The t shot,

(49:50):
though didn't quite go the way it was planned, ended
up in a place on the course that I've heard
you say you'd never been to.

Speaker 4 (49:56):
Look, it's interesting, you know, it's the sixteenth time and
a Gusta at Sunday. The pin placements always in the
same place. It's on the left hand side there, close
to the bunker. Obviously you've got to hit the shot,
you know, forty feet right of the hole and just
let it come down the hill. So when Tiger hits
the shot, immediately I'm thinking, wow, that's left, and then
you're thinking it's in the bunker. And then you think, well, no,

(50:18):
that's not in the bunk, it's in the water. And
then I'm thinking, no, actually, that's that's over the water.
I don't know what's over there. So as we're walking up,
you know, I'm walking quite quickly, and Tiger's behind me
and he keeps yelling me, you know, asking me where
is it? Steve was right, where is it? And I
managed to get Ian Baker Finch's attention. He was up
on the camera tower behind the fifteenth Grand and I

(50:39):
just managed to get his attention and said is that okay?
And just put his thumbs up. So I didn't know
where it was. I've never been over there, you know.
It's just I'd not seen a player play from over
there before because obviously, when the pin is down there
where it is on Sunday, you're aiming, you know, you're
aimed to the right, and if there's any tendency, generally
the players will hit it too far right. But yeah,

(51:01):
he goes up there, survey's the shot and so forth,
and what he's trying to do is not get the
ball go too far up the hill so that it
doesn't gather too much freeod when it comes back down.
He said, he went up there after some you know,
he quite spent quite a bit of time looking at
that shot, and he picked out a ballmark on the green.
He said, Steve, do you think if I landed on
that ballmark, I won't go up the hill too far

(51:21):
and amazingly, which is just an incredible part of the shot,
as he actually landed on that ballmark. Now I could
give him a thousand balls and he wouldn't do that again.
So yeah, it's an iconic golf shot. And yeah, it's
twenty year anniversary, and you know we cover a bit
of the book and that, so it was a very

(51:41):
special moment in the book. You know. Not only that's
an iconic tiger moment in the book, we look at
quite a few iconic moments.

Speaker 2 (51:49):
Yeah, there are plenty lots just on Augusta though, Greg Norman,
you're on his bag of course in the eighties, his
collapse at Augusta in nineteen ninety six. You went on
his bag at that time. As I say, but what
did you see from him that day?

Speaker 4 (52:07):
Yeah, look, I mean it was you know, as a
great friend of Greg's. It was a tragedy to watch.
I watched the last I can't remember how the holes
I was catting for Ray Floyd in the same timent
went back to the house I was staying at and
was watching it on TV as it unfolded. But Ultimately
he changed his way that he played. Greg plays incredibly aggressive,

(52:32):
and on Sunday, instead of playing aggressive, he went to
conservative and just tried to protect his lead. And as
it was completely against his nature, he wanted that talent
so badly. That was you know, some players want to
win the Open Tampionship, some want to win the US Open,
someone to win the masses. He wanted to be That
was the time that he wanted to win the most,

(52:53):
and it meant the most of him, and he let
it slip through his hands, you know, until three times
he had the Larry Mice chipping and he had the
you know, the shot up the eighteenth there, he fled
it way up to the right there. But yeah, so
I actually ended up going back to Florida with Greg
that night, and I spent that night on the beach

(53:14):
with Greg, and we went over that whole round while
we're sitting on the beach and having some beers and
some tears and a lot of tears, and yeah, for
some unknown reason, he got out of his comfort zone,
which he doesn't normally do. He's a very very confident
player and very very confident and vidiling, and he got
outside his comfort zone. And instead of playing aggressive he

(53:38):
played conservative on Sunday. So what he had done through
rounds one, two, three, he changed on Sunday and he
you know, he for some unknown reason, he never sort
of put his hand on why he did that. It
should have just been a walk in the park in
the formality as well as his playing.

Speaker 2 (53:54):
Adam Scott, You're on his bag when he won the
Masters twenty thirteen. How different a thrill was that for you?

Speaker 4 (54:00):
Yeah, look, I mean to be on the bag of
the first Australian to win at Agusa, the only one
since incredibly, Like if you think about the amount of
great players in Australia has produced, you know, go back
to the Ron Night to Call Nagle, Peter Thompson, Bruce
Devl and David Graham, all these great players you know,
to the modern day Jason Day, Adam and Cameron Smith,

(54:23):
a whole host of great players Australia's had over the years.
To think that only one guy has put that green
jacket on, and you know it was it was an
incredible moment. Ironically, Greg played a part in that. You know,
Adam idolized Greg as a junior growing up, and you know,
I met Adam a couple of times when he's just
a little teenager. When I was getting with Greg and

(54:44):
he idolized Greg is a very good av A player.
And idolized Greg on that playoff hole, you know, when
Adam asked me to read the put there, and he
read the put one way and I said, that's not
even closest. You know, he read a cup out and
I said, that's not even close. It's like two and
a half cups out. I had a note in my book,

(55:05):
my yardage book. It was from I believe it was
from nineteen eighty eight, you know. I had a note
that had the pin placement there and it had an
arrow that said, if you're putting from this direction, it
breaks more than it looks. And that came from when
I was scating with Greg and when he off that putt,
and Greg read my lips because I said that when Tiger,

(55:27):
when Adam asked me, I said, that's not even close.
This is how far it was. And Greg read my lips.
And Greg was actually the first person I spoke to.
He wasn't the first person that called me. But when
I got in the car and I was driving back
to the house where I was staying. The phone rang
and it was Greg and he read my lips and
I said, well, you're not going to believe this. Greg,

(55:48):
I had documented in my yardage book when you had
that part that and so he felt pretty special that
he had some tie to that victory. So it was
an absolute incredible moment, you know, like on the eighteenth
Greene Adam, when you know, when he hold that part
thinking he had won the tan. Come on, he was,
come on, come on, and he was gone berserk and

(56:10):
it's like, hold on a minute, Tiger, sorry, hold on
to that, it's not over. I had to quickly bring
him back to the moment so that you know, Cabrera's
still got a hold of go. He might burdie and
he might tie. And that's exactly what happened. So he
you know, you've got to quickly. He had to quickly
come back to earth there for a minute and get
back out there for the playoffs. So, you know, an

(56:31):
incredible moments.

Speaker 2 (56:32):
Just for I ask you a couple more questions about this.
One final question about Augusta. The boiler suits they make
you wear as caddies. Do you like those look?

Speaker 4 (56:41):
Jason? I think that's archaic you know, I just like
if I said to you, you know, you're going to
walk ten k's today on one of the hilliest golf
was ever and it might be eighty five degrees in
human here's what I want you to wear, you'd go,
You're kidding me, aren't you. I think that's archaic. I
honestly do. I see why they do it. I understand,

(57:03):
but I think in today, in today's I think that
should be something that's not required by the caddies. I
understand they could wear the green hats and so forth,
but like, even if they got a master's T shirt.
Everybody had a Master's T shirt and they were all, yeah,
even if they provided the same color shorts and a

(57:24):
T shirt with a player's name and the logo of
it ovals no.

Speaker 2 (57:29):
All right. The process of this book, the genesis of it,
I know, came from a podcast series you did during
COVID when you sort of went through major by major
and then there was the you know, the opportunity to
make it into into a book. How did you find
the process of writing this did you? Was it an
enjoyable process? Going back over you know, in quite a
lot of detail, the time that you had together with Tiger.

Speaker 4 (57:51):
Yeah, it was. It was like a memory a road
down memory lane Jayson to get out all my notes,
all my book, all my statistics and spend some time.
We were very fortunate that we the publisher allowed us
a couple the extra month than what would normally be
given or granted to write a book, so they gave
us a bit of extra time. I found it absolutely

(58:13):
enthrilling to go to our memory lane and pull out
all the stuff that I had and all the note
I kept an amazing amount of notes, not just on statistics,
but on moods and feelings and observations I'd made, and
to put all those out and all those great moments
and so forth, and then you know, do some actual
study on it. So Evan and I were trying to

(58:35):
give the viewer, the reader sort of a backstage pass
to arguably one of the greatest stretches of golf ever
played by the greatest players that have played the game.
Give them a sort of backstage pass to what actually
goes on. You know, what is it like to travel
in a private jet? Is what are the celebrations like
after these majors, What are the practice sessions like it?
And so forth give the reader a backstage pass to something.

(58:57):
And you know, we're really pleased the way it turned out.
And we were pretty confident that the reader, you know,
when they read a lot of these iconic moments and
what they all meant, how came about, what went into it,
we think the reader will love the story.

Speaker 2 (59:10):
Yeah, I found myself. I paired the book with YouTube.
Basically every time something was mentioned in here, I'd go
and look at it so I could see see it
playing out. Do you reckon? You could tell on the
morning of a round whether Tiger was going to have
a good round or not by his mood.

Speaker 4 (59:27):
Yeah. Look, as I alluded to, I kept so many
notes and so many things, and you know, I tried
to visualize myself standing in Tiger's shoes every day, so
when he came to the golf course every day, and
quite often i'd be driving him, i'd pick him up,
or I might be staying at the same hotel, or
we could be sharing a house together. But I would
observe how he was walking, what his mannerisms were like,

(59:50):
what the eye contact was like. And then you know,
the very first two, three, four swings of the day
on the range I would intensely watch those to see
whether there was any kind of hesitancy, any you know,
it was there, some joy was you know, smiles that okay,
just feeling good today, or you know, I'd watch those,
and I'd watch the practice session, and a lot of

(01:00:14):
times the practice session would dictate how you would start
the day. Would we start off conservatively or aggressively, based
on the fact that how the practice session went. So,
you know, I and at the end of the day,
I'd go away and I'd write all these things down. Okay,
this is you know, this is what happened today. This
was eventuated at the end of the day. So yes,
by the end of it, not by the end of
the time, but after probably eighteen months to two years

(01:00:35):
of caring to Tiger, and I'd accumulated enough notes, had
enough round with him in all the different situations that
could unfold and so forth, that that you know, I'd
have a very very strong indication of what was going
to unfold before it unfolded.

Speaker 2 (01:00:49):
If you, like I've heard you describe caddying as being
very much like an en course psychologist, how did Tiger
compare to your other no wrong compatience, but how did
he compare to others you cadded for in that regard.

Speaker 4 (01:01:04):
Block, I mean, there's no question, and he's the most
intense player you've ever come across, the guy that's more focused,
more dedicated, and you know, he plays to win. Some
guys at the end of a week, A good week
for Tiger is a win and nothing else counts. Some
guys are happy to have a top ten, top twenty,
or some guys just happy to make the cut, make
a check. But his only, you know, signal of a

(01:01:28):
good week is a victory, and that brings a lot
of pressure when you're getting for a guy like that.
But yeah, look, that's just the way it was with Sayer.
He was incredibly intense and that's just, you know, that's
the nature of it.

Speaker 2 (01:01:44):
So I mean, like I say, the book's terrific. I
know people are going to love reading it. Just to
final question on your golf watching habits these days, I
heard you don't watch a lot. Are you going to
watch the Masters?

Speaker 4 (01:01:55):
You look, I don't really know why, but I've never
really watched much golf. I used to when I was catting.
I'd like to watch the Open Championship because the BBC
has that going all days. So let's say you were
off in the afternoon, you could watch all eighteen holes
in the morning. You see where the wind is, what
the players tendencies were on those holes, and so forth.
But look, yeah, I just don't watch golf. I find it,

(01:02:18):
be honest, I find it quite boring to watch golf. Yeah,
I guess when you're involved in something in that. But
you know, I did watch in twenty nineteen, you know,
when Tiger won the Masters Championship. I did tune into that.
But no, I won't find myself glued to the TV.
I just I don't watch golf period. I mean, I
love watching my rugby and my mother sport.

Speaker 2 (01:02:41):
As we all do. Hey, Steve again, congrats on the
book Together We Roared alongside Tiger for his epic twelve
year thirteen Majors run. Hope you sell heaps. Thanks for
having a chat to us.

Speaker 4 (01:02:50):
Yeah, have a good weekend, you have a good.

Speaker 2 (01:02:51):
Weekeet into Steve. Thanks indeed, Steve William's there. Together We
Roared as the name of the book, It's terrific. If
you're into golf, you'll absolutely love it. The detail that
he goes into I didn't know this about Steve Williams,
but and he mentioned it there ye, the sheer volume
of notes that he kept, it's quite rare among caddies

(01:03:14):
to I mean, I think they all have their own processes.
But from what I can gather, the sheer volume of
notes and observations and stats that Steve Williams kept about
golfers and golf courses was far and away more than
most caddies did. And maybe that's it. Maybe that's the

(01:03:35):
secret to his success. The current Masters, Justin Rose leads
at the halfway point. He shot a one under par
round today to go to eight under the card. He
has a one shot lead from Bryson d Chambeau. D
Chambeau shot a four under sixty eight in his second
round to move up to outright second, and then Rory

(01:03:57):
McElroy with the round of the day, a six under
sixty six for Rory McElroy, including an eagle on the
par five thirteenth. He also had birdies on two, ten, eleven,
and fifteen. Terrific round from Rory McElroy to move up
to six under, just two shots off the lead and
in a share of third place alongside the Canadian Cory

(01:04:20):
Conners who had a two under round today. He was
a bit up and down. Actually four birdies two bogies
for Corey Connors, but still there in a share of
third place. And then you go down to a bunch
of four golfers who were at five under the card,
and in amongst them you find the defending champion, Scotty Scheffler,
who had again another very up and down. How's this

(01:04:41):
for a round for Scotty Scheffler. Pa Bertie, pa, pa,
pa Birdie. It's going right so far? Then bogie birdie
par bogeie bogeye Bertie, Pa Bertie par bogey birdie bogie.
So what's that? One two, three, five bogies one two three,

(01:05:04):
four five six birdies for a one under. He saw
all parts of the course by the sounds of things,
Scotty Scheffler, But still there as in a tie for
fifth at five under. It's going to be a sensational
last couple of days of the Masters at Augusta tomorrow
on the show, we'll get you there to get some
insight into how the third round has gone. With Grahame

(01:05:25):
a Gas of course, who has seen I guess probably
more Masters than anybody. When we come back, though, we're
going to go to Augusta and talk to a man
who knows all about grass, but usually grass of the
rugby and cricket type. Carl Johnson, turf manager for FMG
Stadium in Hamilton, and said, in park in Hamilton is
over at Augusta. What's he seen? What's it like there?

(01:05:46):
What canon can't you do? Has he got any merch?
And all of these other very very very posing questions
that I'll pose to Carl Johnson when we come back.
Just a quick word on topor where there are twenty
two laps through the thirty seven lap first race of
the day and Matt Paine continues to lead and now
he's got his lead up to almost a week and

(01:06:06):
from cam Waters. So Matt Payne looking good as he
looks to win the first race of the of the
day in Topoor. Back in a moment though with Carl
Johnson at Augusta.

Speaker 1 (01:06:18):
The biggest things in sports are on Weekend Sports with
Jason Pain and GJ. Junnerholmes, New Zealand's most trusted home
builder News talks 'b one.

Speaker 2 (01:06:28):
Point thirty four On News Talks, there'd be from Jared
top interview with Steve Williams. He would have to be
the best caddie ever period. I read his first book,
A true pro with his craft. Looking forward to reading
his new book, Thanks Jared, and Lindsay says a fascinating
interview with Steve Williams. And I'm not even a golfer.
It amazes and impresses me how many top sports people
like him and Richie mccaugh kept detailed notebooks. No wonder

(01:06:51):
they got to the top bang on. Lindsay gets that
attention to detail. I think that that sets sets some
of the really really top professionals in their field apart
leaving absolutely nothing to chance. Twenty five to two. Speaking
of people at the top of their craft, turf manager
at FMG Stadium in Hamilton and said in part two,

(01:07:11):
Carl Johnson is in Augusta at the moment. Often we
get you on to talk about the grass at one
of your venues back in the tron kJ, how's the
grass at Augusta.

Speaker 18 (01:07:22):
Mate, I have died and gone to heaven.

Speaker 3 (01:07:24):
It is amazing.

Speaker 18 (01:07:26):
I was with a good friend of mine, Bert Smith,
and when we walked in the gate, I had to
apologize because I was just looking down the whole time.
But he's looking up around the golf course and I
was just their places place is amazing, brilliant.

Speaker 2 (01:07:41):
Well, let's talk about the Augusta experience. I want to
talk to you more about the ins and outs of
the of the turf in a moment. But once you're
in the gates, kJ, what can you do and what
can't you do?

Speaker 3 (01:07:54):
The rules are pretty tight.

Speaker 18 (01:07:56):
They told me what color shirt I wasn't allowed to
wear and all sort of suing.

Speaker 3 (01:08:00):
Now the rules are pretty stract. But one of the
traditions that you had to do is to buy a seat.
And I wanted to buy my own seat.

Speaker 18 (01:08:07):
My mate ed one forman Nope, I'm going to buy it,
and you buy a seat. We got there newly because
we wanted to get We wanted to get beside the
thirteenth or the other thirteenth green was a short part five.

Speaker 3 (01:08:18):
So we got our seat.

Speaker 18 (01:08:19):
And you take your seat, and you put it there,
and you leave it and no one sits in it
the whole day and just come back to you said, which,
try and do that anywhere else in the world where
you leave a seat.

Speaker 3 (01:08:29):
Someone will steal the seat or they'll be sitting on it.

Speaker 18 (01:08:32):
So those are the things that were like and just
I don't know, the buzz around the place and the
people are just like just so incredibly friendly and so
privileged to be able to be at the Masters. It
is a mate.

Speaker 3 (01:08:46):
It is.

Speaker 18 (01:08:47):
Words can't describe what an awesome place it is.

Speaker 2 (01:08:50):
Yeah, I've heard that tradition about the seat and often
you see, you know, a bunch of seats empty on
the eighteenth green whatever it is, But that's because somebody's
put them there and they're not there for that particular
group of players. Have you been moving around? Can you
move around freely? Can you follow pretty much any group
that you want to if you wanted.

Speaker 3 (01:09:08):
To, Yes, you can.

Speaker 18 (01:09:10):
We actually ended up by walking the entire golf course.
So we got straight over the thirteen cs and we
went straight to the first green. Now, the first player
I saw was Bubba Watson, and I'm just going stopper,
you know this is then he's the first golfer I
seen it at eight o'clock in the morning and it's
Bubba Watson. Amazing, And so we we stayed and watched

(01:09:31):
a few groups go through saw Dustin Johnson, all these
all these names. Then we walked the entire golf course,
caught up the one I really wanted to see my
oldest son, whose name is Zach Johnson, so wanted to
obviously see Zak Johnson. I also have a really good
connection with John Here. Zack Johnson the golfer is actually

(01:09:53):
sponsored by John Here.

Speaker 3 (01:09:54):
So so that was quite a nice little connection. We
then caught up.

Speaker 18 (01:09:59):
With a greenkeeper from Zeland who's been going over there
for the last ten years named Sam Lambro, and I
actually played golf.

Speaker 3 (01:10:08):
His golf end cricket was his father.

Speaker 18 (01:10:10):
And ekrole when I was a hit dreenkeeper over there
in nineteen ninety, so I pre organized it. One of
the things finally that blew me away has no cell phones, right,
so no cell phones, no cameras, so for once in
your life you're not looking at your phone or by
talking to people.

Speaker 3 (01:10:30):
Just met lots of people and soenters. I opened my
mouth obviously the accent. People wanted to know where we're from.

Speaker 18 (01:10:36):
How come I go to how can I go to
the Masters?

Speaker 3 (01:10:39):
How am I finding it?

Speaker 18 (01:10:40):
Just acredible?

Speaker 4 (01:10:41):
Mate?

Speaker 2 (01:10:42):
Well, tell us about what you saw when you looked down,
I mean on television it just looks perfectly manicured obviously,
the grass on a golf course very different. You know,
there's there's the greens, there's the fairway, there's the rough.
What is the grass, geek in you scene?

Speaker 3 (01:10:56):
Oh mate, it's pure right grass everywhere.

Speaker 18 (01:10:59):
The water war but what had happened overnight that had
half into rain. So they have what they call a
subbi air drainage system, so you can hear there's these
fans working away, they're sucking the moisture through the whole profile.
They were out testing fays and just the amount of
staff they had their first in the morning. You know,
they'll blowbacking pine needles off voas and just incredible detail

(01:11:22):
and one of the things that you probably hear about
a lot for people who have played or have been there,
and you can't appreciate it on TV. It's just how
steep the slopes are. You know, a lot of the
eighteenth and the front fourteen green. They just severe undulations
and the sweetness. And I actually had a knee operation

(01:11:45):
a year ago, so your needs a bit saw today, mate,
But I'm putting up with that pain.

Speaker 2 (01:11:49):
Oh absolutely, I'm sure that it'll be masked by the
experience that Jevin, what about the what about the merchandise
here that anything that you can put a logo on
they sell.

Speaker 18 (01:11:58):
Is that right, that's one hundred percent creed. When we
first got there, the queues to get into the the
pro shop, but we didn't even bother it all.

Speaker 3 (01:12:08):
We'll come back later. We're back later. In this place.

Speaker 18 (01:12:10):
You can spend hours in there in the credit card
concertainly get worn out of a lot.

Speaker 3 (01:12:15):
I did buy a few items.

Speaker 18 (01:12:17):
I kind of had to come home with something again,
little things too pintly that you can't take cameras. So
they do offer in front of the clubhouse is the garden.

Speaker 10 (01:12:28):
With the.

Speaker 18 (01:12:30):
Map of of America with a flag and we're Augusta
and so you give you a traditional photo there and
you skin up later on when you get home. So
that's my one little evidence that I made it. Made
a little gast, but yeah, I have got I have
got a bag full of goodies, just a few things
just to say I didn't make it and get recruit
for sure.

Speaker 2 (01:12:49):
Amazing. All right, So two rounds and you are presumably
staying for round three and four?

Speaker 3 (01:12:53):
Are you staying for round three?

Speaker 9 (01:12:56):
Then?

Speaker 18 (01:12:57):
Actually were golfing taking I don't even know we were
golfing on Sunday. Then on Monday, I'm actually flying to
Florida and.

Speaker 3 (01:13:06):
I'm staying with Crow.

Speaker 18 (01:13:09):
And I've got a few rounds of golf with Chopper
and Florida and a few nights then I'm sure he'll
fire up the barbecue and I'm sure Popper a cork
out of a bottle. I'm sure, and he's fly home
on Tuesday.

Speaker 2 (01:13:22):
Wonderful experience for you, kJ Thanks for painting a picture
for us, mate. Awesome that you've got the chance to go.
I'm just so stoked for you, mate. We'll catch up
when you get back.

Speaker 18 (01:13:31):
Look forward to it.

Speaker 3 (01:13:31):
Thanks, funny, and you have.

Speaker 2 (01:13:33):
You have a great day too, mate. Sounds like you
have been to the evening that you can have a
glass of red wine now, mate, I know you enjoy
that as Carl Johnson over in Augusta. So just repeating.
In terms of the leaderboard at Augusta, after two rounds
and a halfway point, justin Rose Lee's by a shot
from Bryson, d Chambeau, Rory McElroy and Corey Connors are

(01:13:53):
in a tie for third, and a group of four
golfers a shot further back at five under including Scottie Sheffler.
What a final couple of rounds. It promises to be
eighteen away from two. I'm gonna update you on the
supercars when they put the graphic back up. But Matt
Pain was leading last time they had that graphic up

(01:14:13):
and it extended that lead. This is the first race
of the afternoon in Topor. Had extended that lead up
to what looked like a couple of seconds from from
his closest challenger, who was Cam Waters, and Anton deep
Asqual had got himself up into third place, with Ryan
Wood in fourth. That was the last time they had

(01:14:34):
the graphic up. With nine laps to go. Ok, they've
put it back up again, which is handy. Just as
I about to go to the break, so yes, So
Matt Pain leads by one point seven seconds from Cam
Waters in second, Anton deep As Squally is it Pasquali Pesqual?
I think you know who I'm talking about. He's a
further second and a half back, and then Ryan Wood
is outright fourth at the moment, with quite a big

(01:14:54):
lead back to the driver in fifth place. So it's
looking as though Matt Pain is going to win the
first race of the day in Topol. That will be
a very popular win for the Kiwi. He topped the
t timeshets and qualifying and has left pretty much the
whole way. So we'll bring you a result of that
probably during our two o'clock Sports News. But when we
come back across the Tasman we go. Adam Peacock going

(01:15:17):
to join us right after this.

Speaker 1 (01:15:19):
The Voice of Sport on your home of Sport Weekend
Sport with Jason GJ. Gunn homes New Zealand's most trusted
own builder.

Speaker 2 (01:15:27):
News Talk fourteen away from two Saturday afternoon means a
bunch of stuff, including a trip across the Tasma to
catch up with Adam Peacock.

Speaker 11 (01:15:35):
Hello mate, how are you good?

Speaker 2 (01:15:38):
Did you did you channel your your inner justin Rose
out there on your golf this morning? No doubt you
would have got inspiration from watching the Masters in the
few hours before you took to the course.

Speaker 11 (01:15:49):
Yeah, Moore can Davis nine over? So yeah, anyway I
got out there, that's the main thing.

Speaker 2 (01:15:56):
So good.

Speaker 11 (01:15:59):
It was beautiful out there today, but yeah it is
like that this time of year. You watched that for
a bit, they'd make it look so easy and then
about too old. Did you realize, Oh yeah, this is
why I'm here and there there? So anyway that good?

Speaker 2 (01:16:12):
Have you had the chance to visit AUGUSTA.

Speaker 11 (01:16:16):
Fun story. I was going for Fox Sports in twenty
twenty and then someone out at bat in China and
that was the end of that. I since left Fox,
so I was on guard. But that's mine.

Speaker 4 (01:16:25):
It was.

Speaker 11 (01:16:26):
I'm happy to watch. It's such a beautiful, beautiful TV.
And then, isn't it? So yeah, one day I'll get
there one day yourself?

Speaker 2 (01:16:33):
No, no, no, but I mean just talking. We just
had Steve Williams on the show Tiger Woods, longtime caddy,
and just listening to him regardless with stories about it,
and yeah, I mean it looks like Disneyland on television,
doesn't it. Yeah. So maybe one day the two of
us could go together and do a radio show over
there or something. I don't know.

Speaker 11 (01:16:48):
I mean, I mean, let me know, all right, let's talk.

Speaker 2 (01:16:52):
Let's talk. What's happening in You're Nick of the Woods
at the moment. I'm not sure how you pick NRL
results at the moment. I see last night the Roosters
beat the Broncos, Penrith have lost. Goodness only knows how
many matches in a row. Now, what's going on?

Speaker 11 (01:17:04):
Yeah, that Rooster's Bruce's Broncos won with a bit of
an outlier. And our listen to Michael Maguire, the Broncos
coach after its saying that I'm asking about Simmins and
the confusion. He said, look, we like I'm going to
take that away. I'm not even going to get into
that conversation. We didn't do what we were meant to do,
and he was pretty annoyed by it. But you get
that early in the season with a new coach, I guess,

(01:17:26):
and that gives the coach an opportunity to set a
benchmark which they didn't reach in that game, so they
concerned it all around it. Yeah, you're right, I'm not
in zipping conference. Thank god, I'm not, because I have
in the last head than I do, because it is
so confusing at the moment about who's who and the
zoo and what's happening. But good comp very good comp.

Speaker 2 (01:17:43):
And we spoke about Penrith. I think last week, it
might have been the week before, but I saw the
stat overnight about the number of points conceded by Penrith
in their first six matches. So twenty twenty one thirty four,
they're ninety two, seventy nine and seventy eight. That's in
the first six matches of the last four seasons, one
hundred and seventy points in their first six matches this season.

(01:18:04):
So from five and a half points match in twenty
twenty one to nearly twenty nine points a match this year.
It's actually becoming quite concerning, isn't it. For Penrith.

Speaker 11 (01:18:14):
Yeah, and the other night was weird because it wasn't
as if the Dolphins were camped in their area and
then they capitalized on a couple of opportunities they had.
It was like, at one stage, I think there was
thirty tackles in the opposition, twenty for Penrith and only
like six or seven for the Dolphins, but they'd scored
three times. So it is weird, and it's systems that
I don't quite comprehend when I'm watching the game that

(01:18:35):
obviously Ivan Cleary is seeing things in his coaching staff
that needs to be fixed drastically. I mean, overall, I
do feel that Penrith they put so much effort into
their first three tackles after they kick defensively and at
the moment, they're just not getting the ball back where
they ordinarily do to hurt the opposition, So it's and

(01:18:55):
then they're getting behind on the scoreboard. And then you
see what you saw the other night with decisions by
over Nathan Cleary where he chuck on over the sideline.
So it's all it's all in a whirlpool, and there's
a lot of factors to it, but at the moment
they can't get out of that whirlpool and it's going
to take come quite extraordinary for them to even make
the top four, even top eight at this day is

(01:19:17):
the way they're going.

Speaker 2 (01:19:19):
It's crazy, isn't that. Let's go to rugby where Rugby
Australia has confirmed the renewal of its broadcast partnership with
Channel nineers through to twenty thirty, an uptick in the
amount of money that they get from broadcast rights. I'm
not quite sure what it means for free to wear though.
Is this a good deal?

Speaker 18 (01:19:38):
Yeah?

Speaker 11 (01:19:39):
I mean a full disclaimer. I work for and sand
I've got the right so over here, I did the
Champions League before. It has meant that it's filled the
pockets more than what you would if you just went
with a free Toware deal, Wallabus tests and Wallaro's tests
and everything will still be available on freeware, and that
that should.

Speaker 3 (01:19:58):
Be the case.

Speaker 11 (01:19:58):
But Super Rugby I think now goes to stand but there.
That's how you get your financial premium and at the
moment rugby needs because they've got themselves into a horrible
debt position over here, and thankfully they did go to
private equity how to look at it and turned away
from it because that then would have meant that you're
just kicking the problem down the road. And I don't

(01:20:18):
know what the situation is over there in New Zealand
and how it's looking over there, but here, at least
they don't have that hanging over their head in five
six years time. So they're banking on the fact that
the Lions two is going to be awesome and the
World Cup's going to be awesome, and then after those
three years after the World Cup, they're in a financially
strong position, which they need to be for the future
because the threat of having all their best young players

(01:20:41):
been taken by a rugby league is very real over here.

Speaker 2 (01:20:43):
Yeah, look, I think all those things will be exciting.
The other thing, I think they've probably been negotiating at
quite a good time around super rugby because you look
at the table and all four of your teams are
in the top six, including the Waratahs who beat the
previously table topping Chiefs and suddenly last night and.

Speaker 11 (01:21:00):
Scored one of the best tries you.

Speaker 2 (01:21:01):
Like, I know, oh, I know, yeah.

Speaker 11 (01:21:05):
I don't know who. I've only seen it on my
phone this morning, but that tap on back on the
inside is one of the great players up there. With
the Campo against Island in the ninety one World Cup.

Speaker 3 (01:21:12):
It's just I.

Speaker 11 (01:21:13):
Don't know how he saw and how he thought he'd.

Speaker 10 (01:21:16):
It was just magical.

Speaker 11 (01:21:17):
So you had moments like that, and you've got sway Lee,
who's who've definitely had some cut through with your non
rugby types over here. It's hard to put them. Is
the valuation right on what you're paying him. It's really
hard to line that up, but it's definitely kind of
if you're looking at it, if it's a curve, it's
going upwards, it's not going downwards.

Speaker 10 (01:21:38):
At the moment.

Speaker 11 (01:21:39):
Rugby in and over here and yeah, the line till
is going to pop off, no doubt, and it's going
to help the Sport.

Speaker 2 (01:21:45):
Yep, love to see it. Excellent the chat as always mate,
you're back to it. Sounds like you're in the nineteenth
at the moment. Have you moved on?

Speaker 11 (01:21:52):
No, I've come in for I'll just look good now.
I'll just start a coffee and I'm going to go.
I'm going to go and watch some football this afternoon,
as you know, finding my son's playing again, so yeah,
it's interesting to sad though my son plays the West
and didn't hit it the MPL side and they're playing
against the team that I'm on the board of. So yeah,
hitting in the corner with a half half scarf, I think.

Speaker 2 (01:22:15):
I love it, mate. Always good to ten Adam. We'll
do it again next Saturday. Can't lose good on your mates, yeah,
Adam Peacock. They're out of Australia, our regular Australian correspondent
here on Weekend Sports seven to two.

Speaker 1 (01:22:27):
When it's down to the line, you made a call
on eighty Weekend Sport with Jason Payne, News Talk ZMP
four to two.

Speaker 2 (01:22:36):
The check at flag is waved in Race one of
Supercars this afternoon in top or Matt Payne, the Kiwi
first across the line Ryan Wood also on the podium,
finishing third, so a Kiwi won three with Cam Waters
the Australian breaking it all up, so pain Waters would
in race one in top or fantastic stuff for the
Kiwi's nice day there in Topul as well by the

(01:22:57):
looks of things. After two o'clock we'll get to Crusaders
Country your top of the table and Super Rugby. How's
your coach feeling pretty good? I imagine Rob Penny is
our gear after two.

Speaker 1 (01:23:07):
O'clock the only place to discuss the biggest sports issues
on and after fields. It's all on Wi Jons forward
with Jason Jade on your Home of Sport.

Speaker 15 (01:23:20):
US Talk.

Speaker 2 (01:23:22):
Two Sex. Welcome in all, Welcome back as the case
may be. This is Weekend Sport until three. I'm Jason
pine Bevan, DWAT show producer today We're here till three
and then Tim Peeterbridge will take over with the weekend
Collective Saturday edition Beautiful Dame Wellington where I am hope
it is where you are too looking at the weather
in Topa or where they're just handing out the h

(01:23:42):
the accolades after race won up there and as you
heard on our sports news or just before to Matt
Payne top of the podium, Cam Waters second, Ryan would third,
so KEEWI one and three. There excellent stuff. Another race
coming up but later on this afternoon and then one
tomorrow as well. Tomorrow at a round about this time. Actually,
Mark scaife is going to be on the show from

(01:24:04):
topor to talk a bit about what he saw today
and what he expects to see in the big sixty
seven lapper. I think the final race tomorrow Mark's cape
out of Taupo tomorrow this hour. Rob Penny along shortly
from Crusader's Country top of the table after a hard
foughtward over the Hurricanes last night Super Rugby opicky final
tonight too Blues v Mutter two Eden part Kendrack Cox

(01:24:27):
Sedge is going to preview that one for us and
Steve Coriker out of Auckland FC. They take on Sydney FC,
his former team for three points tonight, four games to go.
They lead by just three points now Auckland FC from
Melbourne City who won last night, So as a getting
getting a bit tense, getting a bit tight for Auckland

(01:24:48):
f C fans. I doubt the coaches too, concern all
he can do is his look at what's in front
of them. But I wonder whether Auckland f C fans
are starting to get just a little bit nervous about
what's going on in the A League at the moment.

Speaker 12 (01:25:00):
Now.

Speaker 2 (01:25:00):
Wellington Phoenix played this afternoon too, by the way, against
Melbourn Victory Sky Stadium at five o'clock. Your causing correspondents
can two you to be welcome on oh eight hundred
eighty ten eighty nine two nine to two on text
or Emailster Jason at Newstalk SEDV dot Co dot nz
Rodpenny shortly, But as we always do at a round
about this time on weekend Sport, it's time to get
you up today with the things you may have missed,

(01:25:22):
some of the stuff that might have escaped your attention
in case you missed it as the name of the feature,
and we start with motorsport and the bar Rain Grand Prix,
where the McLarens have once again set the pace in
practice too.

Speaker 19 (01:25:34):
Coscar Piastri with the fastest time overall from his teammate
Lando Norris tenth and a half. Between the two McLaren
drivers three tenths faster than George Russell.

Speaker 2 (01:25:46):
There were signs though, of improvement from Liam Lawson. He
was twelfth fastest in practice, two one point two seconds
behind Pastree. He was six places behind his racing balls
teammate Isaac Hadjar though Bart six places ahead of Yuki Sonoda,
the driver, who of course replaced him at Red Bull
In Super Rugby. The Cruse have gone to the top

(01:26:07):
of the table, beating the Hurricanes and Wellington impressive hooker
Yo Wannie more than Nune who's scoring a couple of tries.
Scotty Barrett.

Speaker 4 (01:26:13):
Here come the Crusaders.

Speaker 20 (01:26:15):
They're rolling, they are rolling, they are rolling.

Speaker 4 (01:26:17):
There was the line, They're over the line. Don't won't
get to the position and puts the arm up. They
have scored the Crusaders.

Speaker 18 (01:26:24):
They have done it again from the line out drive.

Speaker 5 (01:26:26):
We'll pick up with us.

Speaker 4 (01:26:27):
I think it might be the hooker again at the
bat boh and Ant who swings rolls around.

Speaker 5 (01:26:32):
The Hooker's got two for the night.

Speaker 2 (01:26:34):
And following that the war Tars beat the table topping
Chiefs twenty one to fourteen in Sydney and scored a
try of the season contender in the process. And the
Warranties have got it looking to run it out from
inside their own goal line. Challaway's got it up.

Speaker 14 (01:26:48):
To the twenty two.

Speaker 2 (01:26:49):
Call Away up to the ten leter line.

Speaker 13 (01:26:52):
Find Simili over the half way line.

Speaker 14 (01:26:54):
Oh, the inside pass.

Speaker 6 (01:26:56):
It goes to the first time Credent Cryton gives.

Speaker 16 (01:26:59):
It to call Away and they're gonna score, and they're
gonna go one hundred laters.

Speaker 2 (01:27:06):
Oh that's outrageous, outrageous, indeed, great call. Malcolm Jordan to
the NRL. With the topsy turvy nature of this year's
competition reaffirmed the Rooster's earning just their second win of
the season. What Chris White puta yes, put us in.

Speaker 19 (01:27:23):
Roosters are over a massive step closer to a second
I'm likely win this year.

Speaker 2 (01:27:31):
Here twenty six to sixteen takedown of the third place
at Broncos and Brisbane. The Dragons meantime thrashing the Gold
Coast Titans and Woolen Gold. Nelius gol Hagen's over.

Speaker 19 (01:27:42):
It's what for Jerry Gong thes are on the house.

Speaker 7 (01:27:46):
That's for Credit's Club.

Speaker 2 (01:27:48):
If I got license to say that, lets you check
that Dylan Agan.

Speaker 4 (01:27:52):
Has scored a Jerry Gong Lions scoring for Sir Georgeivia Warren.

Speaker 8 (01:27:57):
Ye boy want a performance from Jyllan Eagan.

Speaker 2 (01:28:00):
Year thirty eight sixteen the final score there and to
the A League. Melbourne City have moved to within three
points of orpland DEPC with a late winner against Brisbane.

Speaker 16 (01:28:10):
Joan's falling the head and it is THEREDDA and the
archer time defender not only has a first assist.

Speaker 5 (01:28:18):
He has a first goal.

Speaker 2 (01:28:20):
It's a decent fall into the new area. Goes unchecked
that acting can get an into it but ain't commit
into his own nets.

Speaker 1 (01:28:28):
A Voice of Sport on your Home of Sport weekends
forth with Jason kan News talks in me what are we?

Speaker 2 (01:28:35):
Eleven past two The Crusaders are top of the Super
Rugby table.

Speaker 4 (01:28:40):
Full time at Sky Stadium and the Crusaders have hung
on with thirte eight men back to firft eight men
with a minute to go on the clock.

Speaker 7 (01:28:49):
The Hurricanes were camped down in the corner.

Speaker 4 (01:28:51):
They couldn't get there. The Crusaders led by twenty fourteen
at halftime. They have won this game. Aphole Sootic Super
Rugby Pacific game here at Sky Stadium. The Crusaders take
the points they would buy thirty one points.

Speaker 2 (01:29:05):
To twenty four. Indeed they did, and that was followed
by the Chiefs going down twenty one to fourteen to
the Warratas in Sydney. So the Crusaders, our top head coach,
Rob Penny is with us having flown back to christ Jitch, Rob,
thanks for joining us. Can we start at the end perhaps?
How are the nerves in the box at thirty one,
twenty four ahead, two men in the bin, five minutes

(01:29:26):
to go.

Speaker 10 (01:29:28):
Yeah, good afternoon, Jason. Personally, not too bad. There was
a bit of anxiousness amongst some others, but that's all good.

Speaker 4 (01:29:36):
You know.

Speaker 10 (01:29:36):
It was pretty tense, but just really satisfied. I guess
that the players found a way, which is a great
tribute to them.

Speaker 2 (01:29:45):
I was going to ask that, how proud were you
of the thirteen who were out there for the most
part in that last ten minutes to keep the Hurricanes
at bay as they pretty much camped in your territory.

Speaker 10 (01:29:56):
I was kind of a whole group, you know, right across.
We had a lot of disruption, you know, losing Davy
early in a couple of hias through the middle of
the first half, which having to be a bit of
a juggling act and then yeah, so you know, we
had a lot of disruption and then losing the two
boys late for yellow cards. Just proud of the whole group,

(01:30:20):
the resilience they showed and the desperation and the desire
I had for each other to get the outcome we did.

Speaker 2 (01:30:26):
Do you have an update on David Harvilly for us?

Speaker 10 (01:30:31):
The latest one is that he woke up quite good
this morning and that's a positive sign. But knowing what
you know, just the history of little issues around the
lower calf Achilles area that you know, it's probably going
to be a week or two. But we haven't given
up vote yet.

Speaker 2 (01:30:51):
All right, we'll keep eyes on that. The first half
and in fact, the first fifty two minutes when you
were ahead thirty one to ten, I mean, terrific. How
does that compare to other performances you've seen from your
side this season?

Speaker 10 (01:31:05):
Right up there, Matt Todd, our defense coach, who's you know,
getting some really good shifts in the lads, and I
was talking about that that's by far the most intense
contact area that that he's witnessed. The scare from the
from them either group. You know, both teams were hitting

(01:31:28):
them pretty hard. And so that you know that takes
its toll, and you know, I think there was some
superb pooty played from both sides. It was very challenging conditions.
That dusty swirthy win that you can get in Willington
was at its best and so the spect Guy I
think was was pretty good value given some of those
peripheral conditions.

Speaker 2 (01:31:47):
Really good value. And you landed on the loose forward
battle there, you know, for yourselves Coling gray Sheath and Blackadder,
Christian Leo Willy for the Hurricanes, Y'll see Larkeye Kalifi.
I mean, I guess there's a former Lucy yourself. You
must have enjoyed the battle even though you're obviously wanting
your blokes to win it.

Speaker 10 (01:32:05):
Oh yeah, of course.

Speaker 4 (01:32:08):
You know.

Speaker 10 (01:32:08):
I rate the loose portrayer that we've got very very highly,
and we've got some you know, in the bank that
we're going to be able to introduce over the next
few weeks that have added value at times. But I
also really admire what Wellington have got and the youthful
athleticism is, you know, something to be really respected, and

(01:32:30):
you know they'll go on to produce some great rugby
for that frenchise over the years. I've got no doubt
but a.

Speaker 2 (01:32:37):
Noise around this week about Scott Barrett. Do you think
he I'm not sure he needed to, but do you
think he proved a few people wrong last night?

Speaker 10 (01:32:46):
He certainly didn't need to. I think people are searching
for greatness, aren't they, and the realization that like Scott Bout,
like all the boys out there, are human and they're
susceptible to fluctuations in form. But he certainly, I think

(01:33:09):
quite any detractors. He was outstanding. He got an internal
Player of the Day award and got an ovation from
the boys who love him dearly and respect him immensely
and honored him appropriately with a great performance that he had.
And he's such a humble guy. He doesn't embrace that

(01:33:32):
sort of accolade at all, but it was nice for
him on the back of that, I guess week to
get such a rousing reception from his from his peers.

Speaker 2 (01:33:43):
One of your less experienced players I want to ask
you about is Yoanni Mwana, who he's probably getting more
rugby than he probably thought he would being at a
franchise with a couple of all blacks hookers. What have
you made of his development.

Speaker 10 (01:33:58):
Exceptional and a lot of credit goes to Dan Perrin
and the work he's done with him over the last
couple of years to set him up. A lot of
credit to himself for getting himself into physical shape to
be able to perform and do what he's done. He's
always had the ability, but often hasn't turned up in
the either the greatest shape or with a few niggles,
and it's taken him a bit of time to get right.

(01:34:21):
But the yeare you know, even though there's to establish
or nearly establish all blacks in our environment at Hokker,
you know, it's just a great example of even though
you tucked him behind, it doesn't mean you're not going
to get opportunity. And we're so pleased with Yoani, not

(01:34:42):
onlybody's bringing to us on the footy field, but him
as a bloat and around the environment.

Speaker 11 (01:34:47):
He's just a joy to have.

Speaker 10 (01:34:48):
And yeah, as I say, between himself working really hard
and wanting to prove that he's up to this level
and he's proven that beyond doubt, and the work that
DP Dan Perrin does with him, it's just a joy
to watch the outcome.

Speaker 2 (01:35:04):
Now the last part I just wanted to ask about
specifically as Will Jordan, who has played every game for
you at Fallback, he just seems to be I mean,
we know how good he is, but how good is
he for you?

Speaker 7 (01:35:20):
Oh?

Speaker 10 (01:35:20):
He's very special. You know, he's at that age now
where he's been I guess allocated a really serious role
in tournament in terms of his leadership with David Harvilly
as one of the vice captains, and he's given a
you know, a portfolio there which he's owned. There's aspects

(01:35:43):
of his game which you know, in some regards there
might be the odd credit around some of the breakdown
works and his ability to get in there knuckle down
at some of the tough moments. But he's really led
that for us this year, proving to everybody that you know,
he can take that forward now with a lot of
confidence and really back himself. And as his rugby brain

(01:36:08):
is exceptional, is wonderful to listen to. He's got the
ability to think outside the box and he's also one
that will have the confidence to challenge.

Speaker 3 (01:36:23):
So we love him.

Speaker 10 (01:36:24):
You know, he's a crusader through and through and we
just love having him in our environment. And he's as
I said that the maturity and his leadership is has
been something that's been a wonderful thing to watch.

Speaker 2 (01:36:38):
Well said, it's a very different story, rob from this
time last year. What a difference a year makes. Is
it relevant at all to compare the season to last season?

Speaker 10 (01:36:49):
Oh, you can compare. The reality is we're miss thirteen
of our frontline players last year for large blocks. That's
that's in a nutshell. Of course, there's some bits and
pieces we've done behind the scenes to alter the way
we did. A few things. Jane Marshall's changed our attack
quite substantially and just just probably given it a really

(01:37:11):
nice change up flavor, which are the boys have really
embraced and that's always a challenge because it takes time
to get that better than Toddy had his first year
leading our defense last year. And you know, that consistency
of voice and message is starting to bear fruit because
that again takes time. So yeah, I've got no issues

(01:37:32):
with the comparisons by chalk and cheese, and there's you know,
as I've pighlighted, there's a few reasons, but the main
one is the unavailability of the world class players, you know,
an irregular context to be able to get the performances
you need.

Speaker 2 (01:37:50):
Did you get back to the hotel and time to
watch the Wartar's Chiefs game or even the.

Speaker 17 (01:37:54):
End of it?

Speaker 10 (01:37:56):
We did, Actually, yeah, we watched it with a lot
of interest because we've got the Chiefs in about three
weeks and then we're over to the Wartars.

Speaker 9 (01:38:05):
Not long after to that.

Speaker 10 (01:38:06):
So yeah, that was a you know, that was an
interesting match. It didn't look like the Chiefs were firing
on all their cylinders, and the Tars are tough at home,
as we found out a couple of times last year.
So yeah, credit to them.

Speaker 2 (01:38:21):
I look at it because I sort of think, now, okay,
you can relax a little bit, but you can't, can you.
You've got the Blues at home on Good Friday, then
you're down to play the Highlanders in Dunedin. Plenty of
work today, rob, isn't there?

Speaker 10 (01:38:33):
Oh yeah, lots. No, You're never comfortable in this competition.

Speaker 18 (01:38:37):
You know, the.

Speaker 10 (01:38:39):
Maana Pacifica has taught us a lesson, you know, only
a few weeks ago at home and you know, that
wasn't an acceptable performance and the boys were so disappointed,
and you know, we've got I guess we've got an
opportunity now against a really good Blues team who were
desperate to turn up at home on Friday night, as
to say, on good Friday, and and just hopefully prove

(01:39:03):
that that was an aberration as opposed to you know,
the fluctuation and our performances, which we had had a
bit early on. But we've we've put three back to
back or consistent performance and hopefully we've got a rhythm now.

Speaker 2 (01:39:16):
Good man, rob congrats on last night. Thanks for taking
our call this afternoon. Enjoy the rest of your.

Speaker 10 (01:39:20):
Week, in mate, Yeah, pleasure, no problem, Thanks, thanks.

Speaker 2 (01:39:24):
Mate, Rob. Any that out of cross Church they've landed
back in the Garden City with top of the table status.
Interesting to hear about about Scott Barrett getting the internal
Player of the Day last night Man of the Match.
I mean, yeah, he was. Wasn't he very very good
last night? And I think by his own admission, even
when he did media during the week and it was

(01:39:44):
put to him that you know that he hadn't perhaps
reached the heights that he, you know, was was known for,
and he even agreed, he said, yeah, look, you know,
there's probably a little bit of validity to that. He's
such a deep thinker, isn't he Scott Barret, A guy
doesn't give away a lot, but clearly hugely respected inside

(01:40:06):
that Crusader's environment and the All Blacks environment too. And
last night, yeh, I thought he was certainly in the
first half best player out there. So what have we
got this afternoon in terms of Super Rugby's continuation. Quite
a bit, actually quite a bit of interest in what
happens at four point thirty five at Eden Park. Blues
Mowana PACIFICA cannot wait to see what happens in this game.

(01:40:28):
Maaana Pacific are looking for three wins in a row.
They beat the Waratars last weekend. Let's not forget that
forty five twenty eight. The Warritars went out last night
and beat the Chiefs. The Blues, well, they're not exactly stumbling.
I don't think that would be fair. They beat the
Hurricanes by a point last time out, but they had
the buye before that, and the game before that was

(01:40:50):
that horror up at Eden Park when the Crusaders absolutely
dealt to them and one of the worst Blues performances
in recent memory forty two nineteen. So I've got that
this afternoon. My onea Pacific against the Blues. Then the
Highlanders who badly need a win, a desperately seeking a
win and should get it. You'd have to think against

(01:41:10):
the Fijian Drewer and Dunedin tonight just after seven o'clock
in the last they lost the Force last week. Brumby's
before that, reads before that, Hurricans before that. So the Highlanders,
you know, four straight losses, need to win and then
reads Brumbies later on tonight. See there's intrigue around that too.
The Reds are third, the Brumbies are sixth, but the

(01:41:31):
Brumbies could feasibly jump over the top of the Reds
if they get a winm with the bonus point. Lots
of intrigue around Super Rugby at the moment, heaps of
intrigue and rightly so two twenty five it is, let's
take a break. When we come back, we'll we'll stay
with rugby and preview tonight's Super Rugby Opicky final for you.
It is the Blues, the defending champions, up against Matatu

(01:41:52):
who won it in twenty twenty three. So who's going
to be the first team to win two Super Rugby
Opicky titles? One of our best ever female players. Kendrick
cox Edge going to preview the game for us when
we come back.

Speaker 17 (01:42:04):
You be the TMO.

Speaker 7 (01:42:05):
Have you say?

Speaker 1 (01:42:06):
On eight hundred and eighty ten eighty Weekends Sport with
Jason Hin and GJ. Gardnerholmes, New Zealand's most trusted home builder,
News Talks THEB.

Speaker 2 (01:42:16):
News Talks THEB. It is two twenty eight double Heaterliden
Park this afternoon following the Blues Mona Pacific as Super
Rugby Pacific match at four thirty five. It is the
Super Rugby OPA Key Final tonight, the defending champion Blues
against the twenty twenty three champions Mata to five past
seven kickoff at Eden Park. Let's bring in black Fern's

(01:42:36):
legend New Zealand Rugby Women's High Performance Pathways Manager and
member of the New Zealand Order of Merit for services
to Rugby Kendra Coxedge to preview this one for us. Kendrick,
Can we start with the Blues firm favorites? She'd have
to say, five wins from six in the regular season
home advantage. What have been the main reasons for the
Blues success up to this point this season?

Speaker 15 (01:42:59):
Yeah, I mean the Blues thorough classic side. You know,
they've got really tell us as sleeps across the across
the board for A one probably to thirty in terms
of their whole squad, the type of footy that they're playing,
their attacking style in terms of playing on top, and
teams probably allowing them to do that, and then just
ability to be able to have someone might push a

(01:43:19):
women out white and bracktion Chionthon mcgah, who's a young
girl coming through to be able to finish those opportunities off.

Speaker 2 (01:43:26):
A bit further on how integral to their success has
Hate Dumont thing.

Speaker 15 (01:43:32):
We know what she brains, right like, her leadership and
her experience is outstanding, and you know, we've seen what
she can do in The Black Jersey two and you
know when she's playing and she's on the top of
her game and she controls it, but it's women hard
to stop. So I think she's in plays an integral part.
And I think you know, someone like her tonight has
an outstanding game. Must or two will struggle to probably

(01:43:53):
get into the game.

Speaker 2 (01:43:54):
MUTA two do know though, don't they that they can
and have beaten the Blues, which they did in funk
at a just a couple of weeks ago. So how
much confidence first of all will they take from that?

Speaker 15 (01:44:05):
Yeah, I think we need when you do get a
one is are's an element of belief. So I think
they'll have a bit of belief now that they can
they can beat the Blues and think they can win
the competition. And you know, when it gets the final footy,
it becomes a whole different, different beast. Yet the Blues
are at home, but the must must to a sitting
in a position where the underdog, and it's the best
the best place that you want to be. And I

(01:44:27):
think you know that Cardinal've progressed throughout the season. I've
probably got a team, a team of like rather than
the team of individuals, a team of good quality players
and it's each each week in week out. It's been
really hard to choose our standing player because they're all
playing as as a group of players and as a team.

Speaker 2 (01:44:43):
I guess when you run your right down the teamless though,
and as you say, they are a true team, but
you naturally land on the lights of black ferns. Alana Bremner, Amy,
do please do you feel as though they will be
particularly important tonight for the Matatu.

Speaker 15 (01:44:57):
Yeah, and yeah, you know your leaders in the team
and your Black fans, they do become important. You know,
you need your big players to make big plays and
you know, someone like Amy to especially said outstanding season,
so I know that she'll want to kind of want
to continue to carry that and a line of prom
anund the way she kind of leads in the grand
she puts in you do kind of you know, probably
lean on that a little bit, so you know, and

(01:45:18):
there's a lot of them across both teams. So that's
why I think it's going to be an exciting match
because it's just the number of Black firms and quality
young players that are coming through across both teams is
really exciting.

Speaker 2 (01:45:29):
And the winner, of course will play Australia's Super do
W champion their finals this afternoon in North Sydney. Reds
wart Z. How much of an extra carrot will that
be for these two teams.

Speaker 15 (01:45:39):
Yeah, I think it's a cooler age to caret Obviously,
it's it's new, it's the first time being done and
it's going to be great to be able to see
that crossover match get get played. And I think, you know,
like it's going to be a pretty short turnaround from
Sunday to Thursday in terms of the kickoff, but I
think there'll be a little bit of a carrot there
to want. So one, you know when when you know
when you're in competition and country and then go and

(01:46:00):
hopefully top of a team from a different country.

Speaker 2 (01:46:03):
So this game takes seem to stage at Eaton Park tonight,
the Blues against Miner Pacifica in the early game and
Super Rugby Pacific. What are you hoping for in terms
of a crowd and those who will maybe come along
to watch the Blues Minor Pacifica and hang around for
the for the five past seven game.

Speaker 15 (01:46:20):
Yeah, I mean, what an exciting opportunity right to be
on the main stage and then after what is going
to be an epic match, help them with Minor and
the Blues. And I think, you know, having the prime
time is you know, we're usually kind of stuck in
that afternoon at the moment and people have club rugby
that's all started now, so that's kind of people having
to make decisions and you have to go play club
footy and missing the action of Opeki. So I think

(01:46:41):
having it on the primetime gives them an opportunity for
people to get along and watch it, and I think
they know both both the games will be spectacles.

Speaker 2 (01:46:48):
What do you see, Kendra as the evolution the natural
next bit of evolution for super rugby? Opicky, What have
we had? We've had six rounds, so the four teams
each play each other three times. What would you like
to see in terms of expansion the longest season? What's
the ideal in the next few years.

Speaker 15 (01:47:05):
Yeah, I think in the next you'd want to have
been an expansion and then hopefully as an opportunity for
it to be a bit for full time as well
for the players, so they're getting more time together and
we're seeing it across this year with certain teams. The
teams to spend a bit more time to get it
tend to yell a bit more so as an expense
expanding the competition as well as going full time. I

(01:47:25):
would up to see that down and down the track.
I think that'd be a great opportunity for these players
to continue to be able to play more rugby at at.

Speaker 3 (01:47:31):
A high level.

Speaker 2 (01:47:32):
One hundred percent and huge year for the Black Ferns.
Of course, the World Cup in August and September. How
confident should we be that this team can emulate what
what your team did three years ago?

Speaker 15 (01:47:44):
Yeah, I mean I'm back in there, you know, because
I've been part of a team that's done that. But
after watching this OPK, we've definitely got the players to
be able to win a World Cup on the world stage.

Speaker 2 (01:47:54):
And also just this week you launched New Zealand Rugby
Next Ferns nationwide search for new rugby talent in a
bid to uncover some future players for the fifteens and
sevens programs. How confident are you can uncover a few
gems through through this program?

Speaker 15 (01:48:10):
Yeah, I'm really excited about this program, and it's such
a great opportunity to, you know, to put the feelers
out there for athletes, and you know they're not already
I guess in our part play and we know the
power of it. We don't want it's already done with
the lights of a Kada blade. Kayla mckels, who came
through poor shortsman. I think even Gail Bortter was kind
of ordered in the system in terms of a little
bit of ra played in the league and other sports too,
so for her, you know, so it has worked in

(01:48:32):
the past, so you know, we wanted to give it
a credit span and wanted over a decade since we've
We've done it, and I think it's just yeah, it's
course want people to come in and give it a go.
If you want to be an ex bleacer and you've
got a bit of height, you've got some speed, or
you offer some real serious power, you know, we want
to see that.

Speaker 2 (01:48:48):
Yeah, looking forward to seeing the fruits of it. All right,
are you willing to call it tonight Blues or matter too.

Speaker 15 (01:48:53):
I've actually I've been I've been becking my probably my
head the last few weeks, and I'm going to back
my heart this week and I'm going to go with
the Buster two twelve and under.

Speaker 2 (01:49:03):
Wonderful. Thanks Kendor, really appreciate your time this auftern to
look forward to a crack game tonight at Eden Park.
All right, thank you, No, thank you, Kendrack, Kendrick cox Edge.
There so Blues Women Mutter too. Tonight seven five four
thirty five is Blues Minor PACIFICA and Super Rugby Pacific,
followed by the Super Rugby Opicky Final. The Blues Women
are firm favorites at the tab a dollar thirty Master
two outside is at three dollars twenty But as mentioned

(01:49:25):
a couple of weeks ago, they became and were the
only team in around robin to beat the Blues. Did
that and fun Ad a couple of weeks ago, so
they'll take confidence out of that. Twenty five to three
when we come back, we'll talk some football. The Wellington
Phoenix and Auckland FC, both in A League men's action
in the next few hours are Wellington Phoenix Melbourne victory

(01:49:47):
five o'clock at Sky Stadium, then Auckland FC against Sydney
FC at Elli and Stadium and Sydney that's a seven
o'clock kickoff, so back to back matches for our two
men's teams in the A League. We'll get inside both
camps here from both coaches before three o'clock here on NEWSTALKSB.

Speaker 7 (01:50:03):
It's more than just a game.

Speaker 1 (01:50:05):
Weekend sport with Jason Hine and GJ. Garnnerholmes, new Zealand's
most trusted home builder.

Speaker 2 (01:50:11):
News Talks there B, News Talks there be and weekends
Bore twenty one away from three. Auckland FC back in
A League men's action tonight, having extended their unbeaten streak
to eleven games a week ago at the end of
the scowling game of Fort Folk taps eighty on both

(01:50:33):
sites on the FC once Western Sydney Wanderers one. Yeah,
so that was last weekend. Tonight, Auckland FC face Sydney
FC in Sydney seven o'clock kickoff, New Zealand time. Auckland
f C coach is Steve Coricker, who joins us now
Steve first time back in Sydney at Sydney FC as
an opposition coach. Of course, you won premierships and championships

(01:50:57):
at Sydney FC as a player and as a coach,
so how do you expect the emotions to be when
you arrive at the ground in a few hours time.

Speaker 20 (01:51:05):
It is definitely strange game for me to this weekend,
obviously going back to Sydney after a long time. So
the main thing obviously it's a big thing for me.
But the main thing is that the players remain focused
and just get the job done. It's no different for them.
It's we know how difficult the season is going to be.
The running four games are all difficult, so we treat

(01:51:28):
them as a as a final. Each game, and the
songs of the players are focused on that. That's the
main thing.

Speaker 2 (01:51:33):
So you're eleven games unbeaten, five points clear at the top,
with four games to go, but four draws in your
last five matches. How do you assess, Steve? Where you
are with four games to go before the finals.

Speaker 20 (01:51:47):
Five points clear? I think if I would have said
that at the start of the year, I think we
would have taken it. So I think the last last
few games, obviously, the draws, there's a couple of things
in that. I think it shows that we're hard to beat,
but we just haven't had the cutting edge of late,
I think to finish teams off when we've had opportunities.

(01:52:07):
That's the other side of things. So there's obviously two
different sides of it. Like you said, eleven unbeaten, I
think that's that's pretty pretty good for a team that's
just coming to the league and showing what we can do.

Speaker 2 (01:52:20):
And apart from the cutting edge, there's also the concession
of goals. Are the recent draws in any way frustrating, Steve,
especially given the fact that you held leads but gave
up leads in three of those.

Speaker 20 (01:52:33):
For matches, Yeah, I think that's probably for me, it
is anyway, because I think if you see at the
start of the year we were doing the opposite, you know,
would go up and we would keep a clean sheet
or you know, we would get the job done. And
I think the last few games obviously Adelaide's Central Coast
Wanderers even last week, you know, obviously tough teams to

(01:52:57):
play against. But yeah, I think, you know, that's probably
the difference from the start of the season. But you know,
towards the end of the season, everyone is, you know,
desperate for points and it shows, you know. That's probably
the real positive for me is that you know, we
haven't been beaten, and that's that's a real positive for
you know, we've we've lost two games all season. I

(01:53:18):
know draws obviously not the best thing for us right now,
but it's a real positive to going into the finals
with that mentality.

Speaker 2 (01:53:28):
Formation wise, are you all in on the front two
Max mart Gizuomo Mai you've played those two together for
the last well quite a few games, or might you
consider going back to the slightly different formation you used
earlier in the season when you had just Gizmomi and
two wingers. A winger either side off from up front.

Speaker 20 (01:53:49):
Well, we've still got the wingers with the two up front.
But you know, like I said to someone the other day,
it looks like is two strikers. But if you look
how deep Gemo is dropping, it's more like a ten anyway.
He's playing as a ten. So you know, obviously with
Max playing it gives us another dimension because of his height,
his strength. That's probably the only difference. When Max plays that,

(01:54:13):
he obviously gives us another route a little bit more direct.
You know, we can play balls into him that he
can hold up. But if you look at Gaugemo, he's
playing more deeper and you could plug class him as
a as a ten if you really wanted to. But
he's also in the box to score goals. Right now,
it's working well. You know, we've changed the system a

(01:54:34):
couple of times. You know, we've gone with the back
three as well to to try and bring us home
towards laden games as well, either to keep a clean
clean sheet or to go a little bit more attacking
with that system as well.

Speaker 2 (01:54:47):
You can do. Can you just give us an availability
update on a couple of players who've been missing recently
through injury, that you're Colombian important aati I know, and
also Liam Gillian who's been out for a bit longer.

Speaker 20 (01:54:59):
Yeah, they're both both trained. Liam trained fully this week obviously,
you know, he's been out longer than Nada. He's been
out for probably six to eight weeks. I think maybe
a little bit longer. I'm not too sure exactly how long.
It's been quite a while with him, but he was
very good at training this week. So's he'll be traveling

(01:55:21):
and Nada also will be traveling. He's he's done less
training this week, but he's sticked all the boxes. You know,
he's only been out a couple of weeks, so it's
you know, his fitness and fitness levels is probably a
little bit better than Liam's at the moment.

Speaker 2 (01:55:36):
Sydney FC, your opposition tonight. They're in a battle for
finals places. It's very very tight in of around sort
of five, six, seven on the table, which is where
they are. Do you think that'll make them more desperate,
perhaps even more dangerous for you tonight.

Speaker 20 (01:55:52):
I think all teams are dangerous at this time of year,
especially teams that are around the six and trying to
get into the six. You know, it's yeah, they definitely
will be. They played in the champ League and they've
got to play again on next Wednesday, I think after
our game in the Champions League games, so they've got

(01:56:14):
a lot of games coming up, probably a lot of
travelers well because they've played away on Wednesday. So we'll
just try and make the most of what we're trying
to achieve and obviously we want to get a win.
So our next challenge is obviously sitting at their ground
and it would be a great challenge for us all
to go there and get three points.

Speaker 2 (01:56:34):
And if you look at the threats that they post, Steve,
they've got a number of attacking threats. Patrick Klimala ten goals,
Adrian Sigacich ten goals, Joe Lollie's got nine, Douglas Costa
starting to show what he can do. Do you expect
them to come at you at home tonight?

Speaker 20 (01:56:51):
I think that's their style of football. They will, I
think one. Yeah, So obviously we're prepared for that. We
you know, we we know how they play and the
areas that we want to try and exploit as well.
Very attacking team and they get a lot of bodies forward.
Obviously defensively you know, they they've conceded some goals and

(01:57:14):
I think, you know, we if we play really well
and we can take our opportunities when they come, that
we will have a really good crack and hopefully get
the three points.

Speaker 2 (01:57:22):
You've been here before, Steve, you have won a league,
premierships and championships as a player and as a coach.
So as you look to negotiate the back end of
this season, you're first at Auckland f C. How much
do you draw on your past experiences as a player
and I guess more so as a coach.

Speaker 20 (01:57:41):
Yeah, it's obviously you know, we're in a great position
obviously to do something special in winning trophy first time
ever in New Zealand. So you know, obviously there's a
lot of pressure, but there's pressure going into every game
and you know, maybe we were a little bit unknown
at the start of the season, but you know, teams
is obviously come quickly and worked out that we're a

(01:58:01):
very good team, hard to beat, and you know teams
lifts as well because they're playing you know, the number
one team at the moment, so it's always going to
be tough running to the end of the season. And
you know it doesn't matter whether we you know, we
get the get the job done in you know, two
weeks to go all the last game of the season.
For me, it's important that the boys remain focused and

(01:58:22):
just keep working hard at what we're what we're trying
to achieve, and and remain focused on every every game
that we play, because there's no use looking too far
in front. It's you know, one game at a time
right now, and the game is the Sydney and if
we can get three points there, we were inching closer
to what we're trying to achieve.

Speaker 2 (01:58:40):
And this week, another accolade for you personally, for the
fifth straight month, you were voted a League manager of
the month. You'll need more room on your mental piece.
What do accolades like this mean to you?

Speaker 20 (01:58:54):
It was very nice obviously to have to have that,
But yeah, obviously it wasn't the best month, I don't
think for us with all their drawls in there. But
obviously we have a lot of fans that vote for that,
and I really appreciate than voting. But yeah, obvious, it's
nice to have five five five months in a row.
That's pretty pretty fantastic. But you know, it's it's at

(01:59:16):
the end of the day, it doesn't really get me
three points, so my main focus is getting three points
against Sydney.

Speaker 2 (01:59:22):
All right, all all the best getting those tonight, Steve,
and on towards the back end of a very exciting
a league season, the first for Auckland FC. Best I
like tonight made and thanks for chatting to us.

Speaker 20 (01:59:31):
Cheers Biney, Thanks Mane, Thank you.

Speaker 2 (01:59:33):
Steve, Steve Corika. There seven o'clock to night, Auckland f
C against Sydney FC, five o'clock this afternoon, Sky Stadium
and Wellington Wellington Phoenix against Melbourn Victory. The Phoenix are
out of playoff contention but still looking to finish the
season strongly. Melbourn Victory is still well and truly in
the playoff contention. I spoke briefly yesterday with Wellington Phoenix
coach John callow Ataliano and asked him if he could

(01:59:53):
take a degree of confidence from the side's win over
Newcastle a week ago.

Speaker 12 (01:59:59):
Oh, look, a Pobby had or probably had more confidence
coming out of the Sydney game in terms of where
we're at. I think Newcastle was definitely a game of
two halves. I was disappointed with the second half performance
because I felt as though they were there for the taking.
They committed more numbers for it, and we just couldn't
knock them out. But again, I think if we don't

(02:00:20):
conceive that goal off the corner, which I think was
a foul, I don't think that they were going to
create any big chances. We kind of played the more
the scoreboard and we did the game and that was
a disappointing part, but very happy that we picked up
three points.

Speaker 7 (02:00:33):
I think they merited it. The result.

Speaker 12 (02:00:35):
I think, even against Wonders, I think we deserve to
win as well. So no, I'm you know, I'm happy
with the progress.

Speaker 2 (02:00:42):
And you're analysis of the second half. What's come out
of that in terms of not being out of land
that knockout blow.

Speaker 12 (02:00:48):
Yeah, it's a good question. I think definitely the goal
was the momentum shifter. I think, yes, we were a
little bit, you know, we were regressing back, I think
as well making some of the changes. I wasn't getting
the impact that I felt that we merited. So it
was a combination of those two things. And then you know,

(02:01:10):
when you haven't won for a while, confidence is you know,
not where it's supposed to be and sometimes you forget
how to close out games.

Speaker 7 (02:01:17):
But to be fair, I thought the boys, you know,
there was one.

Speaker 12 (02:01:20):
Passenger player where they've blocked about maybe I think six
seven shots and you know we had all our numbers
in the box and we defended quite stoutly and away
from home, so against a team that you know, it's
been very good, you know, the last two three months.

Speaker 7 (02:01:32):
So yeah, again it was positive.

Speaker 20 (02:01:35):
What do you make it?

Speaker 2 (02:01:36):
The performance of off Kazu and an advanced role and
assist flick on hitter and a nice finess for his goal.

Speaker 7 (02:01:42):
Yeah, I thought he was great.

Speaker 12 (02:01:44):
I think he's actually bringing us into the game quite
nicely now as a first point in contact, taking a
little bit of pressure off Costa to be the first
player engaged on the counter or any transition phase. It's
just more about building, you know, that chemistry with the
players around him. But I thought he's done a great
job for us all season. You know, I've played him
as a six, as a ten, you know, I played

(02:02:05):
him as a fall line, so he's been steadily gone.

Speaker 7 (02:02:08):
Well.

Speaker 2 (02:02:08):
So Melbourne victory. I mean, in your time as head
coach and you've had some battles for them and they've
always been close. Is that what you're expecting tomorrow?

Speaker 12 (02:02:17):
Yeah, I think been no different to the game we
played at Amy Park. I think, you know, as much
as we did create in that game, I thought that
was a really even game up until they had scored,
and it was something that we could have prevented, you know.
The victory that built on quick transitions with some really
really good players, and that's something that we need to
be aware of tomorrow. But again, we have a nice
rivalry and you know, it will be no different tomorrow.

(02:02:39):
I think the boys are up for it, you know.
I think usually mentioned yesterday, boys don't want to go
to Darwin, you know for the straight Cup playoff, and
I think that's a good incentive. And I think also
in the back of the mind of a lot of
those care we boys is that they want to impress
the national team coach, you know, in.

Speaker 7 (02:02:53):
Order to make a case together to World Cup. So
motivations there that.

Speaker 2 (02:02:57):
Is Jen Calloo taliana head coach at Wellington Phoenix. The
mein side up against Melbourne victory from five o'clock this
afternoon at Sky Stadium in Wellington. Adaway News Talks ep.

Speaker 1 (02:03:08):
Breaking down the Hail Mary's and the epic fails. Weekend
Sport with Jason him News Talk ZENB.

Speaker 2 (02:03:17):
Five to three. That's us for today. Quickly looking hits
to tomorrow, where we'll be looking at whether New Zealand
should be bidding again for the Rugby World Cup. Gonna
chat to a heavy hitter from last time we were successful,
former Prime Minister Helen Clark on the show tomorrow. Your
views are welcome to plenty from the Masters, plenty from
Super Rugby, plenty from Supercars. The Warriors play tomorrow, will

(02:03:39):
preview that as well, so lots to get stuck into
tomorrow on the show. Thanks for listening in today, Huge
thanks to Bevan Due for producing the show. Thanks mate,
and Bevan's chosen as our exit track. Today's channel is
in a bogan with so much murdersport going on at
the moment and gone back to June of two thousand
and three. American rock super group Audio Slave Chris Cornell

(02:04:02):
on lead vocal show me how to Live. Not a
bad song to go, don't be enjoy the rest of
the afternoon, Say Tomoric. Thanks everyone, See him dadda ic.

Speaker 1 (02:05:09):
For more from weekends Sport with Jason Fine. Listen live
to news talks at B weekends from midday, or follow
the podcast on iHeartRadio

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The Joe Rogan Experience

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Full Show Podcast: 12 April 2025

Stuff You Should Know