September 15, 2025 • 11 mins
Over the weekend the All Blacks suffered a record defeat, going down 43-10 to the Springboks in Wellington while conceding 36 unanswered second half points.
Questions are being asked around the leadership of the side - including of captain Scott Barrett around what his role should be.
Piney spoke with former All Black captain Reuben Thorne to hear his thoughts on captaining the All Blacks.
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Speaker 1 (00:06):
You're listening to the Sports Talk podcast with Dancy Wildergrave
from News Talk Zed be.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Yes and the aftermath of Saturday Night's record forty three
to ten defeat to the spring Box in or Wellington.
The spotlight has fallen on a number of areas scrum
line out, the kicking game, the aerial battle and inability
to back up from the previous weekend, and the ongoing
search for consistency. But it's also fallen on Scott Robertson
and his coaching staff, and on the captain as well.
(00:36):
As always happens after defeats, the captain can become a
bit of a focal point for criticism and that has
certainly happened to Scott Barrett in the last couple of days,
not so much for the way he played, but more
for his postmatch interviews, his understated leadership style compared to
other more overtly vocal captains. Ruben Thorn played fifty Test
(00:59):
matches for the All Blacks, twenty two of those as captain.
He joins us now on Sports Talk, Ruben, before we
talk about the captain c specifically, what did you make
of Saturday night's game in general terms?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Yeah, well, I agree, it was particularly that second half.
I mean, the albasically started the game really well and
I thought, like most people watching, I thought we were
in for a heck of the game. It was side
to side, the Allbacks attach looked pretty good. The Springboks
were clearly here to play. But yeah, it was just
their second half that, you know, they were completely dominant
(01:32):
really and that was the hard But but yeah, it's
just got a find a solution to that, I guess.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Well, indeed, and as always as the case, as you know,
after an All Blacks defeat, there's all sorts of feedback
from all sorts of people directed at all sorts of places.
Leadership was a really interesting topic of conversation on the
radio yesterday afternoon. Scott Barrett has I guess you'd say
I had a challenging start to his All Blacks captain
(02:00):
c Korea. A lot of people Rubin are, perhaps you know,
wondering why he is not more of a vocal leader.
Is that necessarily important within a high performance environment?
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Well, look, it depends on it. I mean, I know
the focus is always on the captain more than other players,
but there's a number of very experienced leaders in that group. Now,
you know, you look at his brother, Boden, Jeordie, they've
been around a while, Ardie, Savier, Cody Taylor. There's there's
a whole group of them that have a lot of
test match experience who will all be contributing, and they'll
(02:36):
have different roles on the field, you know. In anyways,
Scott's the face of it, but all of those guys
are involved in that leadership and decision making part of
the game, and particularly the I guess the game management
is often not the captain, particularly if he's in a
position like Scotts where he's head down in the scrum.
(02:58):
You are relying on some of these other key guys
to make good decisions around how you manage to manage
the game and manage the field. So yeah, it's easy
to the finger at one person and say, well, I
don't like his style, but you know, in my experience,
he's the only a whole group involved you in the
leadership environment, and they'll be working pretty hard to try
(03:18):
and fix and find some solutions.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
As you say, though, Rubin, he is the public face.
I guess, he's the one who does the postmatch interview.
He's the one who has the sea alongside his name.
Is it important that he presents well to the rugby
publican situations like this?
Speaker 3 (03:37):
Yeah, well I think it is. I mean he has
to try and to speak well. He's going to be
honest and be himself, you know. And he's obviously not
a really you know, the big talker or anything like that.
You know, he's sort of leads by example and obviously
prefers to check quietly with his teammates and work with
(03:57):
them in a different way. But there's nothing wrong with that.
But you know, the public will expect him to find
up at certain times and deliver the answers they're looking for.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
And and do you think that there is a danger
that if he doesn't do that? And I'm not sure
if you're sure the postmatch interview on TV on Saturday night,
but it was you know that there wasn't a lot
to hang on to. I don't think for rugby fans
it's I guess, do we do we need our captain
to be as angry as we are when things don't
go you know, the all Blacks way? Or is that
(04:31):
not the best approach?
Speaker 3 (04:34):
Oh? Okay, it's very hard in the heat of the
moment straight after a game. When you get a camera
and an interview coming up to you and wanting answers
immediately postmatch, it's always a difficult situation, particularly when you
have been on the end of a loss like that.
You know, and he will need time to reflect on it,
and they'll they'll look back very closely through what they've got,
but you know, to expect them to front it up
(04:56):
and be okay to have answers straight away and articulate
that really clearly straight after a game, it's pretty challenging.
So I think we give him some space, give the
time to sort of look at it. And you know,
I wouldn't think it's it's not him in my views.
He's been playing well, he's doing his job, he's getting
(05:16):
on with things. You know. I think there are probably
other issues within the team that need fixing, and you know,
he's just one part of it.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Do you think the captain sees SUTs comfortably on his shoulders.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
Well, he's done a good job at super rugby level,
you know, and and him and Raiser obviously have a good,
strong relationship. Yeah, I don't know. I mean I haven't
spoken to him personally about it. I've watched him again
at super rugby level, never in the allback environment. But
I've seen him at super rugby level and he's you know,
he's very clear about what he expects from his players,
(05:50):
and he speaks well to the team and you know,
they certainly respect them. So I think, yeah, I think
he's more than capable of doing it. But as I said,
I think there are other issues with the allbacks team,
and you know, just the depth the talent that we've
got at the moment, and I think there are other
things going on that the just are making it very
(06:11):
challenging at the moment. And if you look at the
spring Box on the other side of it, you know
that the depth and talent that they have currently it's
just far more than what we have on the field.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
How challenging is it to make decisions in the heat
of the battle.
Speaker 3 (06:29):
It can be difficult, especially when you're under pressure against
a quality team like the spring Box. I mean they
were winning key moments that set peace and obviously the
aerial battle, so when you go into a game with
you know they would have had clear tactics going in
and when things don't start to work, everybody talks about
having a plan B. But sometimes Plans A, Plans B,
(06:51):
and Plans C can all be diffused by quality side,
So then it comes down to the battle of physicality
and willpower and other things. So, yeah, it is difficult,
and that's when he's got to rely on that wider
leadership group. You know, they've got to be on the
field problem solving together and looking for answers.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
And you know you were renowned for doing a lot
of the work and the type spaces. How heavily did
you rely on others who had their rise up, perhaps
more than you were able to because of.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Your role, Yeah, a lot. I mean you do a
lot of your you know, your technical and technical planning
before the game, and then when you're in the game,
you get down and you do your job, and you've
got to be aware of what's going on around you
and be technically aware of things. But you do rely
on key guys at nine and ten and fifteen, and
(07:41):
even depending on your position, the other loose forwards to
some extent to see pictures that you sometimes can't see
if you've got your head buried. You know, those guys
have to make those decisions. And as I say, you've
done a lot of the planning and prep around that
before you go out on the field. So and you're
also relying on the coaches to send down the right
(08:02):
messages know what they are seeing in the game and
in the adjustments that you need to make. That to
come from from the coaching box, which often has a
different perspective from what you're seeing on the field yourself.
So you know there's a whole combination of things here
that go on for a captain, and you've got to
be open to all of them and try and make
decisions pretty quickly in the need of the moment.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Is it likely that Scott Barrett's doing the line out
calls or is that less likely because he's the captain
and somebody else is in charge of that?
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Hard to tell. It looked like he was making the
calls from what I saw, But again, you know, a
lot of that analysis and your work for your line
out calls, the ones that you think are going to work,
and the moves, the movements and the space that you're seeing.
A lot of that work is done before you get
into the game. So they would have seen some opportunities
(08:52):
they've called to that space and maybe the spring boxs
have just reacted better or more quickly, and you know
they will have to go back and look at what
they're seeing there.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Yeah, because I guess in hindsight the one I'm talking
about as the one on the our mark seventeen ten
ahead Brodie mckellis does only just come on, he's a
rookie all black and they sort of did a bit
of a fancy move and lost the throw. Should they
not in that situation just go to the front of
the line out and secure the ball and in a
safe way, wouldn't that or as that to wave as
(09:22):
I don't know what what's your view on that?
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Yeah, look, it's one of those things that eating from
the couch, isn't We would probably say that. But again
they would have come up with that movement. They would
have trained it all through the week, so it wouldn't
have been anything new for Brody all the team. But
the Springboks picked it. I mean, it wasn't a bad throw.
It was just that they got up in the space
in front of in front of our jumper and cut
(09:47):
it off. So yeah, I mean, I'm sure they'll look
at all of those things and say whether they could
have done it differently, and hopefully they yeah, they don't
make their mistake again.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
How much pressure is there being All Blacks captain?
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Oh, it's a lot, it's a lot. I mean it's
a big job, yes, scrutinized, probably more than any other player.
You have other duties around the team, with the media,
with sponsors, with you know, you've sort of got to
be across all parts of the of the group and
the organization as well as with the coaching group. So
there's a lot going on for about captain. But that's
(10:24):
you know, that's part of the challenge for those guys
who they get selected for it.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
You know, and just to finish. When you finnished as
an All Black, we had the bleed to Slow Cup.
Haven't got rid of it in the time since, so
I haven't had it taken off us in the time
since you reckon. We'll still have it in a couple
of weeks.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Well, Australia playing well, I think it's going to be
a really very tough contest.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
You know.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
It's it's great actually that the Wallabies are playing well.
You know, we've been wanting that for a while. We've
talked about it for a while, but you know, now
that we're here and maybe they all bactually wobbling or
weave it. It makes it very very interesting. But you know,
I think they'll be good enough to get up, and
you know they will have learnt a lot from that
loss against every areas to work on and things to fact,
(11:08):
and you know, I think they'll be better for it.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Good Man, Thanks for your your time and your insight today.
Robin really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
No problem.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
For more from sports Talk, listen live to News Talks
it'd be from seven pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio
You're listening to the Sports Talk podcast with Dancy Wildergrave
from News Talk Zed be.
Speaker 2 (00:12):
Yes and the aftermath of Saturday Night's record forty three
to ten defeat to the spring Box in or Wellington.
The spotlight has fallen on a number of areas scrum
line out, the kicking game, the aerial battle and inability
to back up from the previous weekend, and the ongoing
search for consistency. But it's also fallen on Scott Robertson
and his coaching staff, and on the captain as well.
(00:36):
As always happens after defeats, the captain can become a
bit of a focal point for criticism and that has
certainly happened to Scott Barrett in the last couple of days,
not so much for the way he played, but more
for his postmatch interviews, his understated leadership style compared to
other more overtly vocal captains. Ruben Thorn played fifty Test
(00:59):
matches for the All Blacks, twenty two of those as captain.
He joins us now on Sports Talk, Ruben, before we
talk about the captain c specifically, what did you make
of Saturday night's game in general terms?
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Yeah, well, I agree, it was particularly that second half.
I mean, the albasically started the game really well and
I thought, like most people watching, I thought we were
in for a heck of the game. It was side
to side, the Allbacks attach looked pretty good. The Springboks
were clearly here to play. But yeah, it was just
their second half that, you know, they were completely dominant
(01:32):
really and that was the hard But but yeah, it's
just got a find a solution to that, I guess.
Speaker 2 (01:39):
Well, indeed, and as always as the case, as you know,
after an All Blacks defeat, there's all sorts of feedback
from all sorts of people directed at all sorts of places.
Leadership was a really interesting topic of conversation on the
radio yesterday afternoon. Scott Barrett has I guess you'd say
I had a challenging start to his All Blacks captain
(02:00):
c Korea. A lot of people Rubin are, perhaps you know,
wondering why he is not more of a vocal leader.
Is that necessarily important within a high performance environment?
Speaker 3 (02:14):
Well, look, it depends on it. I mean, I know
the focus is always on the captain more than other players,
but there's a number of very experienced leaders in that group. Now,
you know, you look at his brother, Boden, Jeordie, they've
been around a while, Ardie, Savier, Cody Taylor. There's there's
a whole group of them that have a lot of
test match experience who will all be contributing, and they'll
(02:36):
have different roles on the field, you know. In anyways,
Scott's the face of it, but all of those guys
are involved in that leadership and decision making part of
the game, and particularly the I guess the game management
is often not the captain, particularly if he's in a
position like Scotts where he's head down in the scrum.
(02:58):
You are relying on some of these other key guys
to make good decisions around how you manage to manage
the game and manage the field. So yeah, it's easy
to the finger at one person and say, well, I
don't like his style, but you know, in my experience,
he's the only a whole group involved you in the
leadership environment, and they'll be working pretty hard to try
(03:18):
and fix and find some solutions.
Speaker 2 (03:20):
As you say, though, Rubin, he is the public face.
I guess, he's the one who does the postmatch interview.
He's the one who has the sea alongside his name.
Is it important that he presents well to the rugby
publican situations like this?
Speaker 3 (03:37):
Yeah, well I think it is. I mean he has
to try and to speak well. He's going to be
honest and be himself, you know. And he's obviously not
a really you know, the big talker or anything like that.
You know, he's sort of leads by example and obviously
prefers to check quietly with his teammates and work with
(03:57):
them in a different way. But there's nothing wrong with that.
But you know, the public will expect him to find
up at certain times and deliver the answers they're looking for.
Speaker 2 (04:10):
And and do you think that there is a danger
that if he doesn't do that? And I'm not sure
if you're sure the postmatch interview on TV on Saturday night,
but it was you know that there wasn't a lot
to hang on to. I don't think for rugby fans
it's I guess, do we do we need our captain
to be as angry as we are when things don't
go you know, the all Blacks way? Or is that
(04:31):
not the best approach?
Speaker 3 (04:34):
Oh? Okay, it's very hard in the heat of the
moment straight after a game. When you get a camera
and an interview coming up to you and wanting answers
immediately postmatch, it's always a difficult situation, particularly when you
have been on the end of a loss like that.
You know, and he will need time to reflect on it,
and they'll they'll look back very closely through what they've got,
but you know, to expect them to front it up
(04:56):
and be okay to have answers straight away and articulate
that really clearly straight after a game, it's pretty challenging.
So I think we give him some space, give the
time to sort of look at it. And you know,
I wouldn't think it's it's not him in my views.
He's been playing well, he's doing his job, he's getting
(05:16):
on with things. You know. I think there are probably
other issues within the team that need fixing, and you know,
he's just one part of it.
Speaker 2 (05:23):
Do you think the captain sees SUTs comfortably on his shoulders.
Speaker 3 (05:28):
Well, he's done a good job at super rugby level,
you know, and and him and Raiser obviously have a good,
strong relationship. Yeah, I don't know. I mean I haven't
spoken to him personally about it. I've watched him again
at super rugby level, never in the allback environment. But
I've seen him at super rugby level and he's you know,
he's very clear about what he expects from his players,
(05:50):
and he speaks well to the team and you know,
they certainly respect them. So I think, yeah, I think
he's more than capable of doing it. But as I said,
I think there are other issues with the allbacks team,
and you know, just the depth the talent that we've
got at the moment, and I think there are other
things going on that the just are making it very
(06:11):
challenging at the moment. And if you look at the
spring Box on the other side of it, you know
that the depth and talent that they have currently it's
just far more than what we have on the field.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
How challenging is it to make decisions in the heat
of the battle.
Speaker 3 (06:29):
It can be difficult, especially when you're under pressure against
a quality team like the spring Box. I mean they
were winning key moments that set peace and obviously the
aerial battle, so when you go into a game with
you know they would have had clear tactics going in
and when things don't start to work, everybody talks about
having a plan B. But sometimes Plans A, Plans B,
(06:51):
and Plans C can all be diffused by quality side,
So then it comes down to the battle of physicality
and willpower and other things. So, yeah, it is difficult,
and that's when he's got to rely on that wider
leadership group. You know, they've got to be on the
field problem solving together and looking for answers.
Speaker 2 (07:11):
And you know you were renowned for doing a lot
of the work and the type spaces. How heavily did
you rely on others who had their rise up, perhaps
more than you were able to because of.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Your role, Yeah, a lot. I mean you do a
lot of your you know, your technical and technical planning
before the game, and then when you're in the game,
you get down and you do your job, and you've
got to be aware of what's going on around you
and be technically aware of things. But you do rely
on key guys at nine and ten and fifteen, and
(07:41):
even depending on your position, the other loose forwards to
some extent to see pictures that you sometimes can't see
if you've got your head buried. You know, those guys
have to make those decisions. And as I say, you've
done a lot of the planning and prep around that
before you go out on the field. So and you're
also relying on the coaches to send down the right
(08:02):
messages know what they are seeing in the game and
in the adjustments that you need to make. That to
come from from the coaching box, which often has a
different perspective from what you're seeing on the field yourself.
So you know there's a whole combination of things here
that go on for a captain, and you've got to
be open to all of them and try and make
decisions pretty quickly in the need of the moment.
Speaker 2 (08:21):
Is it likely that Scott Barrett's doing the line out
calls or is that less likely because he's the captain
and somebody else is in charge of that?
Speaker 3 (08:30):
Hard to tell. It looked like he was making the
calls from what I saw, But again, you know, a
lot of that analysis and your work for your line
out calls, the ones that you think are going to work,
and the moves, the movements and the space that you're seeing.
A lot of that work is done before you get
into the game. So they would have seen some opportunities
(08:52):
they've called to that space and maybe the spring boxs
have just reacted better or more quickly, and you know
they will have to go back and look at what
they're seeing there.
Speaker 2 (09:00):
Yeah, because I guess in hindsight the one I'm talking
about as the one on the our mark seventeen ten
ahead Brodie mckellis does only just come on, he's a
rookie all black and they sort of did a bit
of a fancy move and lost the throw. Should they
not in that situation just go to the front of
the line out and secure the ball and in a
safe way, wouldn't that or as that to wave as
(09:22):
I don't know what what's your view on that?
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Yeah, look, it's one of those things that eating from
the couch, isn't We would probably say that. But again
they would have come up with that movement. They would
have trained it all through the week, so it wouldn't
have been anything new for Brody all the team. But
the Springboks picked it. I mean, it wasn't a bad throw.
It was just that they got up in the space
in front of in front of our jumper and cut
(09:47):
it off. So yeah, I mean, I'm sure they'll look
at all of those things and say whether they could
have done it differently, and hopefully they yeah, they don't
make their mistake again.
Speaker 2 (09:58):
How much pressure is there being All Blacks captain?
Speaker 3 (10:01):
Oh, it's a lot, it's a lot. I mean it's
a big job, yes, scrutinized, probably more than any other player.
You have other duties around the team, with the media,
with sponsors, with you know, you've sort of got to
be across all parts of the of the group and
the organization as well as with the coaching group. So
there's a lot going on for about captain. But that's
(10:24):
you know, that's part of the challenge for those guys
who they get selected for it.
Speaker 2 (10:28):
You know, and just to finish. When you finnished as
an All Black, we had the bleed to Slow Cup.
Haven't got rid of it in the time since, so
I haven't had it taken off us in the time
since you reckon. We'll still have it in a couple
of weeks.
Speaker 3 (10:40):
Well, Australia playing well, I think it's going to be
a really very tough contest.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
You know.
Speaker 3 (10:47):
It's it's great actually that the Wallabies are playing well.
You know, we've been wanting that for a while. We've
talked about it for a while, but you know, now
that we're here and maybe they all bactually wobbling or
weave it. It makes it very very interesting. But you know,
I think they'll be good enough to get up, and
you know they will have learnt a lot from that
loss against every areas to work on and things to fact,
(11:08):
and you know, I think they'll be better for it.
Speaker 2 (11:10):
Good Man, Thanks for your your time and your insight today.
Robin really appreciate it.
Speaker 3 (11:13):
No problem.
Speaker 1 (11:15):
For more from sports Talk, listen live to News Talks
it'd be from seven pm weekdays, or follow the podcast
on iHeartRadio
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