Eloise Blackwell: Auckland Storm Captain ahead of the Farah Palmer Cup opening clash against Waikato

A tough first-up clash for the Auckland Storm to kick off rugby's Farah Palmer Cup against defending champions Waikato at College Rifles this afternoon. 

The two sides last met in last year's semi-final, with Waikato storming to a 69-12 victory. 

Captain Eloise Blackwell joined D’Arcy Waldegrave to dicuss the team’s preparations for the season ahead. 

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Episode Transcript

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

Speaker 2 (00:11):
Carry on with rugby now the start of a far
up Palmer Cup and gets under way. Their weekend depleted
to a degree, The best players in New Zealander are
just about hop on a plane sped off to the
World Cup. But that won't stop fierce rivalry from unfolding
right across all of the games. And he's a biggin

(00:32):
for you this afternoon, getting on to wait five past
to two and Aucklandee Orkland Stormer taking on defending champs
and White Cottle. We're joined by Eloise Blackwell, now the
captain of the storm Good morning, Eloise, good morning, Thanks
for having me and thanks very much as always for
joining us. So you kick the competition off this afternoon

(00:52):
just after two o'clock. You're taking on the champions, the
Whycasians White Cattle. So what's facing you for the opening
round of the comps.

Speaker 3 (01:02):
Yeah, White Cuts are actually the reigning champion. So I
think it's good for us to have such a like
a good test first up, just to see where we're
at and see how our preseason's gone. And yeah it's
going to be a good, good battle to give us
a gauge of where we're at. So yeah, we're excited.
We've got a very exciting team who's taken the field,
So yeah, looking forward to it.

Speaker 2 (01:24):
So tell us why it's an exciting team. What do
you like? I'm presuming the excitement's coming from some young blood, right, yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:31):
Well, I think it's like six or seven deputants. There's
five five in the starting lineup and another two of
the potential to come off the bench. So yeah, it's
very exciting. It's they're young, and I think that just
adds a that might be our point of difference this year.
Having such a young group means, you know, they're they're
quick at learning, and we don't have to play like

(01:53):
an old traditional style of rugby that you could have
potentially seen from us in the past. So yeah, it's
opening avenues for us this season in terms of where
we could take this team. So it's really exciting.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
I'd say that some of these older athletes are going
not on my watch and they'll try and sit them
down on their backsides. Don't you get don't get too
carried away. You're playing some serious football. Now, would that
be right, Eloise.

Speaker 3 (02:16):
Yeah, we sure are. I think it just kind of
well for us. The experience and the side just adds
to the mix, and I think we've got the balance, right,
We've got that youth, we've got the experience and that
This probably sounds like deja but I feel like I
always talk about this, but it's it's just such a
good balance and it goes both ways. Like we're still

(02:37):
learning a lot from these young people and vice versa,
where we're trying to teach them and shape them into
being being good Auckland Storm representatives as well.

Speaker 2 (02:47):
Is this when the school teacher and you comes to
the four Alois.

Speaker 3 (02:51):
I'll try to switch that off, but you know, sometimes
it probably does come out a little bit, But I
try to separate the two. It's difficult when you've got
some of your students and the team with you, or
former students.

Speaker 2 (03:02):
Difficult. No, they'll show due respect, Like Eloise, with all
these younger players coming through, I can only presume that
some of the other players have dropped off the other side,
if they've stopped playing, if they've moved on, or so
you've lost quite a bit of experience.

Speaker 3 (03:18):
Yeah, well, I guess the gap you'll see in our
team is just with the the black fer and girls
who are missing, but we've got some of the old
experience hanging around with the likes of our Dori Turner.
She's still hanging in there, which is good for It's
nice for me just to balance out the level headedness
and the experience from her. But you know, we've also
got the likes of a young person like Daniel Fessola,

(03:41):
who's actually been in the storm for three years, so
she's only nineteen years old, but she's you know, i'd
almost consider her, you know, well established in our team.
So we've got young people yet they've been here for
multiple years. So it'll be just leaning on them as
well to help guide and support the even younger ones.

Speaker 2 (03:58):
Much of a losses for the competition because they travel
what next week, I think they fly to the World
cut their black fans.

Speaker 1 (04:04):
Don't they Yeah, they do.

Speaker 3 (04:07):
Oh it's massive. But again, not having the likes of
those players, it just opens up other opportunities for the
likes of these young people to come through, and we
saw it last year. We ended up bringing in like
over ten different development players from our Auckland Thunder team
because of the injuries and the players out for Representative

(04:29):
so we've got depth in Auckland, so it's just nice
now to get some of these younger girls are sort
of on the fringe when we had our Black Funds
girls actually stepping up and having this opportunity.

Speaker 2 (04:41):
How long was the competition go for this year? How
many rounds? I want to say, you've got seven? Eight rounds?

Speaker 1 (04:48):
Maybe?

Speaker 3 (04:48):
Yeah? Maybe yeah? Six seven round robin and then a
semi in a final.

Speaker 2 (04:53):
And you obviously taking on the Wakator and they are
defending champions. But who else are threats out there? I mean,
you've got the lights of what Wellington Tasman and I like.

Speaker 3 (05:03):
Yeah, we had a preseason game against a few weeks
ago and they're looking pretty sharp. They've got the experience
in Hazel Tubak running the ship around at tenth, So
I think Counties are probably going to be a bit
of an underdog this year. They've got a good group
of girls coming through, so I think that's probably a
team to watch if I had to pick one, obviously,

(05:24):
other than my own.

Speaker 2 (05:25):
You only pick your own, and I'm sure that you'll
do well. You represent and those young kids, well some
of them will be sat down by the older opposition,
but some of them are just going to fleet foot
and sizzle past them. And this is what we love
about the FPC, the development. The superstars of tomorrow are
there playing today and you're at the College Rifles RFC

(05:47):
five past two, that game that kicks off Storm VI,
the y occasions. As always, alois a real pleasure talking
with you. Look after yourself, play well, play hard, play fair.

Speaker 3 (05:57):
Thank you so much and I have a good day everybody.

Speaker 1 (06:00):
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