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[Music] kiwi's Love at First like Finn we're making [Music] waves generate switch online
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[Music] today niso the voice of rugby welcome to my podcast thank you Dom it's a real
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pleasure to be here mate mate it's been um it's been an enjoyable day I I picked
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you up the airport with a a homemade sign yeah I know that was fantastic um was it well yeah I was a little bit
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worried about other people at the airport saying who the hell was isbo yeah and to be fair my art skills
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so did the NB and then instead of the O I did what is supposed to be a rugby ball but it looks like some sort of
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produce yeah look I thought it was pretty clever and uh what's the word Innovative Innovative Innovative yeah
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and some hashtags down the bottom 350 goat and voice of rug thought that counts yeah um so more live
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all black games than anyone else on the planet yeah I mean it's it's crazy to
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think about it but I guess it's a bit of a Triumph of Longevity if you're around
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long enough and they like you long enough uh eventually these things will come to you and the other thing too you
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got to remember that while the All Blacks have only played um 649 test matches and I've done over half of them
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you've got to remember that in the in the I was going to say the olden days but in former years they only played
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three or four a year if if at all I mean I don't think they played during the war
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for instance so and today they play up to 15 test matches a year and if you get to do maybe 10 or 11 of those boy
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they're going to add up in a hurry and you you log them in like notebooks I've
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had an A5 textbook um I usually get about four or five seasons in each and I think I've now got about seven or eight
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of these things uh um and it's really used as a reference I'll go back and
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look at test match that might have happened seven or eight years ago and find that the referee who's doing the
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game on Saturday at Eden Park is the same bloke who did the same two teams at Twickenham back in N or 2018 or
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something and know just silly stuff um but it's good for me it's good for it's
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my own little uh reference a lot of people might go back to the rugby Almanac or they may go to the Internet
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or whatever I just have my own little quirky thing that I do after every test match and you've done that from test
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number one or is really yes I have why did why did you think to start it at test number one I don't know I don't
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know that's too long ago to even remember I think it was just to keep just to keep a record and you find some
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interesting things in there you you know you find when the guy made his debut for
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instance which you can find elsewhere I suppose but I've got a a Sure Fire reference whether he came off the bench
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uh I always write the opposing team down too which is interesting if it's Italian
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or Argentinian it doesn't mean a hell of a lot to me even sort of 10 years ago
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but yeah it's just my own little quirky thing I guess they've got to end up in
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Te Papa one day don't they yeah wow yeah well I've actually been I've actually
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been asked to uh and I've managed to keep a couple of World Cup final sheets
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um because when I do a game I obviously write the two teams out and um and the the referee and then a whole lot of
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little bits underneath each player and um I've been asked a couple of times whether I've still got those sheets I've
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actually got and I don't normally keep them but I've got the 211 World Cup
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final and the 215 World Cup final so um yeah they're of some interest I guess
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well what about other memorabilia like have any players given you socks shorts jerseys no you don't have like a pool
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room at home well no I'm I'm lucky enough um when I did my 250th I was uh
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that's quite a good story actually because it was in Wellington and um on I think the Thursday I got a call from one
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of the producers at Sky and they said to me we need you down at the Intercontinental in Wellington because
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we need to talk to the all black Captain Richie mcco and I'm thinking to myself
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that's a wee bit strange normally these things are jacked up prior and you don't
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normally get a late call up to do an interview anyway I I put my Glad Rags on and shot down there and we're all
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sitting down ready to roll and I I said uh okay said to the cameraman ready to go and and he looked a bit hesitant next
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thing uh Richie who sitting oh AC cross from me produces an all black jersey signed by all of the All Blacks uh and
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he presented it to me and and I don't think the interview actually happened um
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it was just a it was just a ruse to get me there and it was so it was a lovely it was a lovely touch or what I was
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going to say and that that's now been framed and my 300th uh which um I think
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also was in Wellington um um I got asked by the All Blacks I think Steve Hansen was the coach at the time and he said
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we'd like to make a presentation after the game in the in the all black dressing room and it's a place I've
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never been before I had the opportunity in 1996 when they won a series in South Africa uh the media was invited into the
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dressing room and I actually declined on the basis that the all black dressing room is for all blacks and I've never
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been an all black so um when the request came in 28 from Steve Hansen I said to Justin Marshall I said mate I'm not
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going to go in there unless you come with me and he said sure I'll come with
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you I said well you know the lay of the land and you know you you've been an all
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black so that was a nice little thing and what I was coming around to was the fact that that jerseyy is also framed so
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in terms of memorabilia um I've got those two framed in on the wall at home so I'm so so
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please say that story about mcco presenting you at Jersey is something else by the way that's amazing and um I
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I yeah I heard about you um you know wanting to have these these boundaries in place and this this refusal to go
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into the dressing room CU you and I'm so pleased that to hear that you have been
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in there even if it was escorted by um the great Justin Marshall because yeah I wonder if you you know in years from now
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when you stop playing if you regret missing out on some of these moments no I don't think so I don't think so I mean
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I've always regarded um all blacks are on a bit of a pinnacle to me and uh even
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though I've dealt with so many of them over the years if you've earned the
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right to be an all black youve earned the right to be in the all black dressing room and I just see it's it's
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the inner sanctum it's the holy of holies and I don't I wouldn't feel
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comfortable in there if it was just at the end of 96 John Hart was good enough to invite everyone so all the media
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piled in there but I sort of stood on my stood on my dignity and said well I'm
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not going I'm not going in there I don't know it sounds a bit stupid I know but I
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I just didn't um but as I said I insisted that Justin come with me in 28 because he was a guy he was a guy who
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belonged in there yeah God all these coaches over the years must be like God that nisb is a
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snob what what about in um like 2011 you know John ke was hanging out there with
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Max yeah you know come on they haven't played for the All Blacks either just a
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personal well I don't think we got the invite in 211 to be honest um uh so I had the invite come I I don't
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know really I mean because it was a it was home uh sometimes when you're away
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from home and there's not many kiwis around like in 96 I sure there were a few supporters and what have you but um
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you know it's a we different when you're away from home I remember back in ' 85
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in in Argentina the only time I've been on an all black bus uh was because sir
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Brian lore one of the great fellas of rugby great rugby player terrific coach um he said to the media look boys there
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aren't many of you and there aren't many of us we're a long way from home and uh
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we would like you to come on the on the team bus to training um where you sit and all the rest of it is kind of up to
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you so we accepted the invitation and I was quite happy to because Argentina back in ' 85 seemed to me like it was
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Worlds Away um and uh so that was the only time I've been on an all black bus wow good
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experience yeah nobody says much I mean that seems to be what all black buses are like I I don't know whether anyone
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had ear phones on in those days um but no one said much because rugby and it still is um was a pretty uh a pretty
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important business and you didn't talk small talk you know if you were going to
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training you were focused on training and uh and at the end of it of course um you're probably a bit stuffed anyway but
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I don't remember who I sat next to whether it was a player or whether it was just another member of the media or
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whatever um so yes so six years ago when you made it to 300 did you did you think
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you you'd still be here 6 years on so you were 67 when you made 300 tests now
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at 73 350 did you imagine back then you'd be no probably not um I mean they're only they're only numbers aren't
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they I guess um it takes a long time to do 50 test matches because as I said um you you probably have to go five years
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and so I'm probably thinking 6772 probably too old by then um so didn't enter my thoughts to be honest
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and what about career goals from here um well I've got another year to go uh with sky and I'm looking forward to
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that and then um who knows after that I mean um bloke will be 74 on boxing day so I'm not getting any any younger and
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uh you know often these decisions that aren't made by you anyway they're made
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by the by the people who employ you quite clearly but um look if you're enjoying something and when you get up
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in the morning you want to do it uh and you're able to do it you know it's not a bad it's not a bad way
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to go [ __ ] I'll tell you what there'll be your backlash if they don't renew
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I'll be I'll be starting up a change.org petition well I mean you got to I mean
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it's a partnership quite clearly it's a partnership and if I decide at the end
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of next year that I've probably had enough um it's it's it's the end of
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Sky's current contract and of course now looking at renewing and looking at different competitions and all sorts of
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things so who knows it might be a nice sort of clean cut clean Point um but you know that's 12 months down the track so
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let's worry about it when we get there okay I want to go back and um talk about
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your career beginnings and in particular what the media landscape looked like in
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like the late 60s early 70s but first of all um well we might as well rip the bandaid off now um You Grant this bit
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are a recidivist when it comes to um being nude in hotel uh lobbies oh my God yes yes not once but twice but twice
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Christ Church and Sydney yes exactly and and I tell you what I listened once to Henry blofeld the great English Cricket
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commentator I heard Henry speaking about it happening to him and I thought no that cannot happen you are handling I'm
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not saying you're lying but you are handling the truth carelessly and um and
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I sort of took it with a grand assault and thought that honestly can't happen
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adding a bit of text to a story that damnn well can happen and uh it happened to me in Sydney the first time yes
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correct I was over there in my latter days with TV andz can't remember the reason why they did but they sent me to
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Sydney and Brent Todd as well and we were covering a Warriors game at Manley and we came back and and toddy said we
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better have a couple of beers there was a par there was a bar straight over the road and I actually had to get up early
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because you know the early flight out U from Sydney to Wellington meant you had to be at the airport by about 7 or
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something and I cont cont plated the idea of um staying up all night um but but I obviously abandoned that idea at
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about 3:00 in the morning and decided to go to my room which was 29 stories up and um anyway so I presumably I went to
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sleep and I woke up as one does sometimes needing to go to the toilet next thing I find myself totally nude
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standing in a corridor 29 stories up of the Sydney hotel but but and I was lucky
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outside the door was the Sydney Morning Herald for Saturday and it's a big Sydney Morning Herald so I gave it the
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big wraparound and thinking now I'm going to have to go down to reception and uh and
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plead my case but even better when I got to the lift there was a phone so rang reception so I got out that one scotf
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free but not so lucky in Christ Church a few years later when I was having a few
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beers after a game with um Mex and same thing happens when when I get outside when I'm in the corridor star naked
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there's no paper when I get to the lift there's no door there's no phone so I
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had to give it the old the two hands two very big hands very generous hands and and I'm standing there at reception and
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quite often it's not manned at that time in the morning and I'm seeing people
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walking past obviously looking in thinking what's happening here so I've had a I
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was going to say a good experience and a a bad experience they're probably both
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bad experiences but one was better than the other one was more yeah the the cross one the latter one when when did
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what year was that oh I'm thinking probably 15 years ago maybe so you you were proper famous at the time oh well
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yeah even more famous um those doors why do they shut so alarmingly quickly though right yes yes I know it's a
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security thing about well the thing is you're struck you're stuck you don't
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know who your next door neighbor is you can't bang on the door at 3: in the morning and say can you help me out here
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because you don't know who they are yeah oh yeah it's a shocker it's a shocker
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all right hey let's go back thanks for sharing those but you're not the first
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you won't be the last um so career Beginnings so um yeah Summer of 69 is when you started them broadcasting y um
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Brian Adams got his first real six string you got your St in radio um what are your even before that what are your
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earliest um like memories of you know the radio and sports commentary growing up was that a time where they talked in
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like like funny like over the top almost um yeah yeah you know how things are quite colloquial now a damn good
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question um sports for I used to listen to they used to call it Sports Roundup which was on the YC Network and that was
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a something that happened during the summer where they used to go to a lot of venues um they used to cover all the
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planket shield matches if there was a big tennis tournament on if the New Zealand rowing Champs were on and it was
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called Sports Roundup so as a kid growing up I used to listen to this um and then of course it became reality as
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I got older but um I mean radio was very different in those days uh um one of my
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heroes and he just passed away recently was Lindsay yo on 2zb and bazo bamble and uh and all this sort of stuff I'm
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not sure that I was big into music listening to music stations I was probably more into talk you I wasn't
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talk back in those days either was it so I was pretty much listening to the announcer talk but yeah we all I mean
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we'll get to this I guess shortly but we're all pretty much BBC type training
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so when you listen back now to uh to radio in the 60s or 50s and 60s everyone's rolling you know um how now
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brown car you know everyone sounding like BBC announcers which I did too for a couple of years um so that I mean I
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was just I was just an aid sports fan if you put any sport on on radio I'd be
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listening to it yeah so I'm guessing like you you would have grown up with like rugby like
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I've seen Clips online of um you know rugby comment and there's like classical
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music playing in the background and the commentator be like oh there there's
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Napp the brown fellow with the ball yeah like that's that that would have been
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like I suppose your experience of like Rugby Commentary growing up well Wist the mcarthy was in his prime when I was
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growing up and I never really got to meet meet the guy but then when he retired there was another guy who was in
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Oakland called Bob Irvine and they used to go on all black tours Long all black tours so if they went to um South Africa
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they' broadcast all 30 odd games I guess and my old man used to wake me up with
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my little transistor he'd wake me up at 3: in the morning to listen to the test
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matches in South Africa or listen listen to the test matches from the UK um and I
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guess that a lot of guys of my age of course no TV around in those days a lot of guys of my age who be doing exactly
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the same thing being woken up by their by their dads or their Ms uh and getting a trans sister and and listening to the
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rugby commentaries in the middle of the night yeah what were your can you remember what your dreams or aspirations
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were when you first started in broadcast media 55 years ago well you you kind of
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foreseen that you'd still be going now and no of course not no of course not
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well I mean I was going to otago University I was all when I left school I wanted to be involved in sport in some
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way and uh and What attracted me was the PE uh three-year degree from otago University and so I applied and I'd
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actually been accepted to go to otago university I think I actually had a flight uh booked my parents obviously
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did for me to go down there but by some quer of fot we had a nextdoor neighbor who was very friendly with a guy called
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Sir Lance cross who was a powerful man in New Zealand sport in those days Not only was he head of the nzbc he was on
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the ioc he was head of New Zealand basketball he was just about Mr sport in New Zealand anyway this neighbor of mine
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said if you'd like to say stay in sport and maybe working broadcasting in sport
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I'll get you um a chat with um Mr Cross so I had a chat with Mr Cross and Mr
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Cross uh said yeah you sound like an enthusiastic young guy I'll I'll get you
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to talk to a the Personnel officer at the nzbc so I went and had a check to Mr Barnes still remember his name Mr Barnes
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and um we had a bit of a yarn and uh 3 or 4 days later Mr Barnes sent me a letter and said you are now um have been
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accepted as a Cadet sports reporter at the nzbc so that's out went the out went
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the possible degree at otaga University iname sports broadcasting and the rest is history oh
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before you became um like the um the the voice of rugby um you you did a bunch of
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other stuff the way including the Olympics 76 and 80 Olympics yes yes uh yeah 76 was um was in Montreal uh and I
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went with a a team of guys and I spent the whole just about the whole two and a half weeks or two weeks or whatever it
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was doing boxing and we only had two boxes but I went to the boxing venue every day and it was a golden time for
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USA boxing they had the Spinx Brothers they had uh uh sugar eight Leonard um and others you know so it was a great
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experience for me uh so into but 1980 was a very different situation because that was the Olympic games that we
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boycotted malun said no we're not going to send an official team because he sided with the I think it was the um
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Americans over Afghanistan it was it was a political isue anyway so we didn't
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send an official team but um and I was due to go with um let's say a team of
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five or six other broadcasters um but a few Renegades I guess you could call them said well
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we're not going to go as official New Zealand Representatives but we are going
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to go to the Olympic Games anyway and and so we when I say we New Zealand had about six other competitors there so um
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they decided for whatever reason that I was then going to be the only broadcaster to be sent from New Zealand
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so they then had to approach the Russian Embassy in Wellington to see if they'
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get me a visa to get into into Moscow and they refused they said um no you can't because uh New Zealand is
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officially not going to be there so therefore we're not going to Grant you a
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Visa so Radio New Zealand said well uh said to me well look what we'll do is
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we'll send you to London we're sure we'll set we'll sort this out it won't be a problem
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eventually we'll send you to London and you wait there and when we get the visa
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and everything you you just head off to Moscow and I'm thinking you know and of
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course this is when the um the Iron Curtain was still up and me and Moscow my own that didn't appeal much so anyway
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off I went to London and um two or three days there and they came back and they said no they absolutely refused to give
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you a Visa but we've arranged with the BBC for you to cover the Olympic Games
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from London I thought um that's a great result i' never been to London before
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great City and all that and so there I am and uh got great cooperation out of the BBC Bush house which is the overc
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service of the BBC um and had a great time had a great time um and if they wanted um their reporters to
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interview a kiwi in in Moscow I could say you couldn't have a chat to Ian Ferguson the canist who was one of the
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bles who went uh that would be nice and um so they'd send it to London idd on
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send it to New Zealand um so in the end it was a great result but it was quite bizarre when you think about it yeah
00:21:50
that's a really bizarre experience and what was the media landscape like then
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so 7680 is it was it just one TV channel or two TV 1 TV2 um good question yeah I think that would
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have been pre- TV3 eh uh yeah certainly yeah um what happened I think in 75 was that the governor of the day decided to
00:22:11
produce two channels and I think South Pacific TV came in and so we had this bizarre situation in a country of how
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many million those days probably about four where we had two two channels both state-owned um campaigning against each
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other in fact we had two different um sporting organizations I wasn't really
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involved because I was still in radio but it was it was kind of a crazy in those days yeah and I love um reflecting
00:22:40
on this because it just points out um just just how long you've been doing this and just how much change you've
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seen in that time like it's it's it's baffling really yeah it is it is um some
00:22:52
things some things don't change a great deal um I mean Sky TV came along I think
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in the 1990 um which meant that TV andz had an absolute Monopoly on Rugby coverage so
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much so that um I mean we expect to see every game these days don't we and but
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back in those days TV and Zed only played one game in a weekend and so for instance these days you've got the NPC
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running and there's say seven or eight games TV andz would only pick one game
00:23:27
and uh and so when Sky came along and and won the rugby rights in 1996 and probably
00:23:33
one of the reasons they got the rugby Rights was they said we're going to change the landscape here we're going to
00:23:38
cover every single game uh which was a huge undertaking and it continues to be a huge undertaking but um yeah that's
00:23:46
what happened in in the T in tvnz days in my time that we covered one game yeah how do you feel about the um the current
00:23:54
state of the media landscape and yeah what do you what do you do you have any predictions or thoughts about the future
00:24:00
um what do you reckon as the great cockroach the great yeah the great Survivor look I I know it's tough out
00:24:07
there and and we all know what's happening in the news areas and all the rest of it um and and people now have to
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pay to watch their sport you know in the old TV inz days they had a they had a so-called license that some people paid
00:24:20
and some people didn't uh so you pretty much W watch the for nothing um but things have changed and and now of
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course you have to subscribe and I think there's probably going to be more of
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that I'm not I'm not much and you probably know more about than I do this
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streaming business when people say you can stream it I'm thinking what do I do
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now which button do I have to push uh and I have to call them you know my kids or something to tell me how to do it um
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but um look I'm always I mean there's always going to have to be media um and there's always going to be
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coverage of sport it's huge um how it's done is another thing um um but yeah I'm
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I'm still I'm still feeling pretty happy about it to be honest yeah a lot of
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people become um sort of fearful of change like when you've seen as much changes you have does it become less
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less fearful you just crack on with it well there's always something new isn't
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it I mean I I remember starting it I this is another part of my story but I remember starting at the TB and I was I
00:25:17
was Loosely called a media liaison officer and I started in 1996 and and we didn't have the internet and I don't
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think we had cell phones so I had to try and sell sports Bing to the New Zealand
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media using a landline and ax I mean that doesn't seem that long ago does it
00:25:36
so you can see how and who knows uh 20 odd years down the track or even 10 years down the track what sort of
00:25:43
wonderful Innovations will come and I'm sure I'm sure there's going to be stuff
00:25:47
that we've never thought of yeah it's funny that you you bring that up because
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it must have been around when did Jona first sto playing for the old blacks uh 94 I think yeah yes I've had Rick salit
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on the the and he tells a similar story that he sort of created the role for himself in the old blacks of mediaa an
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officer I remember Rick well they didn't have one and he sort of created it and
00:26:07
no one really knew what it meant he didn't even really know what it meant I think he told a story about a fax
00:26:11
machine on a landline as well yeah yeah no cell phones no I mean where would we be without cell phones I mean I know
00:26:18
people overuse them but you know just communication you know you suddenly want have a thought you want to ring somebody
00:26:24
what are we used to do know yeah actually we had this this chat over lunch you and I have got one
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thing in common um the only phone number we both remember is our own yes yes and
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I used to remember landline number I can still remember my landline number from when I lived at
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home as a kid I can still remember that number so can I 6 7816 yeah 861 500 um completely useless now me meanwhile
00:26:51
sometimes I can't remember the alarm code at home I know yeah and you're
00:26:55
right I mean it's the only cell phone number right well because you don't
00:26:58
actually need as long as you don't lose your phone you don't actually need to
00:27:03
because you just look up the person's name and go click and they and they're
00:27:06
there so why worry about what the number is absolutely you do worry about the that muscle memory aspect like you're
00:27:10
just not using that brain power anymore I suppose you're using it for other things though um yeah like you're
00:27:16
memorizing a lot of names and yep yep yep I make sure I keep my mind activated I do the soku every morning in the paper
00:27:23
in fact I think it's the only reason I buy the paper these days um because there's nothing new in the paper don't
00:27:28
already know but um yeah I think it's important to keep the old mind ticking
00:27:32
over God you and my dad yeah you both love suduku puzzles um actually that's
00:27:37
how this podcast happened Dad Dad um plays lawn balls with you yes he does by the way does he go all right he talks
00:27:43
about game yeah no he does well I'm just trying to think he's got yellow balls uh
00:27:48
and when I started and probably when he started you only had black and brown ballls that was it now everyone's got
00:27:53
these flash colors and I'm pretty sure I'm right in saying your old man's got
00:27:56
yellow balls really it's controversial it's very uh yeah very Progressive of the old man yeah yeah um
00:28:05
so yeah so he approached you and said oh my son does a PO how did this how did this come about yeah pretty much exactly
00:28:11
as you say and he's very proud of you by the way um and uh he said my boy Dom is
00:28:17
um does uh does podcast and um he'd love to have a chat to you sometime and I
00:28:22
said yeah tell him to give me a bell so there we are we are I'm I'm just
00:28:26
impressed that he's figured out how to how to listen are engaged with the podcast he's you're you're I think
00:28:31
you're a couple years younger than him but you're doing you're doing a lot
00:28:33
better for example dad will be like um he'll message me be like oh hey um I'm
00:28:37
going to send you an article there's something in the in the Dominion Post or
00:28:40
whatever the paper happens to be and I'll be like Dad you could just take take a photo of it with your with your
00:28:44
phone and send it through and I I can have it in 30 seconds how does he go on streaming oh God don't like that no no
00:28:52
clue no chance um I God there so much to get through we haven't even started
00:28:56
really scratching the surface of the rugby stuff yet but um you you've commentated with um Richie BAU as well
00:29:02
in cricket yeah yeah um that was a real thrill actually and it came about it was
00:29:07
1996 I was still in radio at the time and uh the World Cup was in India and Pakistan and radio said to was on radio
00:29:18
or it just started on TV pretty sure it was radio um they said we want you to cover the World Cup in India and
00:29:25
Pakistan so Smithy and me and Sir Richard Hadley uh headed off into the great unknown I mean I was never ever
00:29:34
likely doing ragby to ever go to India and Pakistan so I thought this is going to be fantastic and it was and um so the
00:29:41
first game we got I think it was our minad or something like that and New Zealand was playing
00:29:46
England and on the roster including me and Smithy and Richard Hadley were Richie Beno Keith stackpole Tony Greg
00:29:58
and he in Chapel so I got to meet all these guys oh just staggering and I and I remember having a beer the night
00:30:05
before Richie wasn't there and I I said to um Ian Chapel who I'd only met two
00:30:10
minutes earlier I said um any tips about working with Richie because I just held
00:30:16
him in absolute a he said I'll give you a good tip he said if you're on ear with
00:30:20
Richie don't ask him any questions because he won't answer them because he
00:30:26
considers if you are in the Box you don't need to be asking anyone questions
00:30:30
you are there for a reason you're there because you know what your subject is so
00:30:33
boy was that good advice was that good advice because that might have been embarrassing if I said to Richie can you
00:30:39
remember Richie back and how did you how would you have you know he probably would have just ignored me
00:30:43
you so it was great advice but you think that's a mark of respect like picking
00:30:48
someone's brains yeah oh well I mean I was I was obviously nervous I mean the
00:30:53
great Richie Beno Not only was a great cricketer but a great broadcaster are you familiar with the term imposter
00:31:00
syndrome uh yeah yeah you feel like you don't belong yeah you're like what am I do
00:31:06
again yeah I know well I mean all those guys I mentioned I'm pretty sure all
00:31:09
those guys I mentioned all play chest cricket and he and who was this imposter you're right you're absolutely right
00:31:15
yeah yeah wow what an experience yes yes it was it it really was even better we beat England by so much that day um we
00:31:24
had a good team in '96 in fact I could tell you a great story about that and we
00:31:28
came to the quarterfinal in Madras it was called in those I think it's chenai
00:31:31
now and Smithy and I had just about done our Dash we' been away for well it felt
00:31:36
like a few months but it might have only been six weeks and we decided when we got to chenai that we were playing
00:31:42
Australia in a quarterfinal and we had no chance of beating them no chance whatsoever so we took a punt we booked
00:31:49
out of our hotel and we took our suitc cases to the ground because we felt that U New Zealand had no chance and there
00:31:57
was a flight out of uh chenai to Singapore at let's say 9:00 that night and we'd be on it but we we'd only be on
00:32:05
it if we had our Gear with us um you know we wouldn't had time to go back to
00:32:09
the hotel book out blah blah blah so we took the punt and we took our bags to the ground and you wouldn't want to know
00:32:15
New Zealand bats first and Chris Harris batted out of his tree lead Jon also and
00:32:20
we scored about 280 which in those days was a huge one day score it was a winning score nine
00:32:27
times out of 10 and um so at half time uh well you know change of innings you had me and Smithy
00:32:33
despondent because uh because we looked like we were going to be stuck in in India for a bit longer and the Aussie
00:32:41
guys all desponded because they thought their team was gone as well and then um Mark War played one of the great Innings
00:32:48
and got Australia home and they won the game and we're on a way but I remember
00:32:53
doing a a panel discussion with Mark W in Sydney about three or four 4 years later and just on the on the side I said
00:33:02
to him I'd never met him before but I I cheekily said you don't know how good
00:33:06
that innings was you really don't he said what do you mean I said and I told
00:33:10
him the story and he said I happy to help boys have to help but also shame on you guys for
00:33:18
having such a long I know oh I know I'm almost ashamed to tell the story but um
00:33:23
we'd sort of come to the end of our run to be fair you know it was hot and all
00:33:27
all all the other silly excuses but normally I'm very patriotic I want New Zealand to win anything I watch TV if
00:33:35
we're if we're playing in a in a tly Wings tournament to see that the Kiwi
00:33:39
does well you know but um th those were the circumstances at the time I feel like everyone um everyone feels like
00:33:47
they know they know niso um but no no one really knows a lot about the Grant I guess yeah would that
00:33:56
be a fair thing to say in terms of the public uh yeah possibly yeah yeah always ducked away from the publicity to be
00:34:04
fair you that oh I just I I mean I'm I'm I'm happy to live in my own little world
00:34:11
and uh and and not caught publicity um you know some people seek it I've never
00:34:17
been that sort of way um yeah I don't know why that is it's just just a quirk
00:34:21
really who calls you grant uh very few people these days yeah very few people uh nisb actually came from my old mates
00:34:30
from primary school days and I still got a few of them call me NIS um but the nisb one was invented by somebody in
00:34:36
broadcasting and that's kind of stuck so I probably answer to both yeah yeah what
00:34:42
are you so you were um you were boxing day baby yeah um how was that growing up you get short changed on the old
00:34:47
Christmas present well I always claim that um whether it's true or not yeah whether it's true or not I I I don't
00:34:53
really know um yeah I'm I'm a boxing day baby uh um which is not a birthday you
00:34:59
can hide it's not a not like July the 233 or 20 you know August the 29th when
00:35:06
well no one really knows apologies to those August 29th sorry about that yeah yeah yeah yeah um yeah so you can't
00:35:13
really hide it yeah yeah I suppose it's good because you generally got your family around and bit the great the
00:35:19
great Cricket commentator Ian Galloway also had um so we used to exchange War stories about what it was like to be
00:35:26
born on boxing day m yeah one thing that I um tend to bring up and um chat about with most of my
00:35:32
guests is sort of um yeah the mental health sort of aspect of um yeah The Human Experience and I'm guessing you're
00:35:38
from that what year were you born 1950 1950 yeah you're from that generation
00:35:43
where it just it just wasn't a thing it was not no even if it did it actually
00:35:47
not must have existed because it was um like Winston Churchill there um came up with the phrase the black dog but it was
00:35:51
just it was largely sort of ignored or you were told to sort of like push on with it or yeah yeah totally ignored yes
00:35:58
absolutely how's how's your mental health been over the years yeah good I've been lucky I guess um I've always
00:36:05
been a glass half full as a as opposed to a glass half empty where does that come from um probably I mean like most
00:36:14
things it comes from your parents and I think that's probably their their attitude in life um I mean I've Had My
00:36:22
Moments when I've when I felt grieved and felt where you know that happens on
00:36:27
broadcast as you well know where you think you should be doing something and someone else does it um and I've I've
00:36:32
felt annoyed but it's never really got me down to the point where I've been at
00:36:38
desperation stage or anything so I guess I've been lucky really I guess I've been
00:36:42
lucky because I I do understand it's it's a major issue and that's where I
00:36:48
applaud applaud people like Mike King and Sir John kerin who are great Advocates um and I know them both and I
00:36:55
know them both damn well um boy that is a labor of love and haven't they done a
00:37:01
great job in that space Oh no go like um I mean there's a lot of um like people
00:37:05
doing great work in the mental health space now but I I I can't imagine how terrifying it was like for John kwin to
00:37:13
you do that first TV ad campaign or to come public with it it's like the the
00:37:19
the most daunting thing ever because it seems hard to Fe them now but this was a
00:37:22
time when no one was talking about this stuff so you're you're he was he was it
00:37:27
was the ultimate Act of vulnerability like um he risked ridicule uh backlash you know it was like jumping
00:37:35
off a cliff really and hoping for the best The Bravery it took Sir John cin to do that well I mean he's such a
00:37:39
high-profile guy and all black in this country is high-profile anyway um but to have that as you say
00:37:47
vulnerability um I just deployed him and he's a top class bloke I mean we do a
00:37:52
bit of work together at Sky these days and uh uh he always jokes about the first test that I did was the first test
00:38:00
he played in he said my God if we if we'd lost he said both of us might have
00:38:04
been out of a job so I've followed his career over the years you know and he's he's um he's
00:38:11
given coaching ago um and I've caught up with him in Japan when he was coaching
00:38:15
there and Italy when he was coaching there and he was with the blues and um but he just wears it on his sleeve V I
00:38:22
mean what you see is what you get there's no I was going to say [ __ ] but you probably can't use that would so
00:38:28
um well actually you can it's a podcast but not governed by the uh BSA yeah yeah
00:38:33
so there's none of that with him yeah absolutely I we' we've used the word
00:38:37
vulnerability which is kind of a buzz word these days um yeah how I mean I'm
00:38:43
I'm I'm from a generation where this is like new to us to have these conversations with your mates you know
00:38:48
talk about the crunchy stuff in life how are you have you got some mates that you
00:38:51
can talk to about stuff that's going on I have yeah I have and um and you know
00:38:56
as you get older everyone has health the shoes and all that sort of thing I I don't tend to go too big on to it but um
00:39:03
um you know we uh We Gather well nowadays We Gather once a week it's a bit of a ritual on a Sunday for a couple
00:39:11
and uh all sorts of subjects come up all sorts of and it's amazing the the recall
00:39:15
you've got of probably better recall of what you did um 60 years ago than you
00:39:19
have what happened yesterday to be fair um but yeah they they're the sort of
00:39:24
guys that you can uh you can have a y with and uh um you know none of us are getting any younger I guess that's the
00:39:30
that's the bottom line Yeah well yeah what are the um what do you think the biggest adversities you've been through
00:39:35
like no no one um reaches the privileged position of being in their 70s without being kicked in the ass a few times
00:39:41
right oh look yeah I mean losing losing loved ones and and everybody cope has to
00:39:48
cope with it at some point yeah and um there's nothing much harder than that is
00:39:53
there um in my experience anyway um and I haven't been kicked in the guts too
00:40:00
often when it comes to career I've been very lucky in that regard um but anyone
00:40:05
in a public position who suffers a setback and you see it in the media a lot these days with you know layoffs and
00:40:12
what have you it's not easy it's not easy to cope when you're in the in the
00:40:17
public eye and I really feel for people when it happens yeah yeah yeah I mean being being made redundant in any
00:40:26
Industries it's not no I say it's hard to not take it personally but I suppose
00:40:30
with that added dimension of it being public um adds a bit of extra sting yeah yeah so your um I mean we can talk about
00:40:38
this in as much as little uh detail as what you want to but your wife Tony uh passed away on December 3 2015 y the
00:40:45
mother the mother of your two kids n years today Believe It or Not December 3 yeah yeah oh I didn't make the
00:40:51
connection yeah yeah it is yeah how's how's today for you yeah know um I mean
00:40:57
time heals a lot obviously and I I still think about her and uh and feel for the
00:41:02
girls and and all the rest of it but she did a remarkable job quite often my absence because I was we on Rugby tours
00:41:09
a lot in in bringing the girls up and if anyone asks you what your single most um
00:41:15
single biggest achievement is it's not 350 test matches it's actually successfully bringing up a couple of
00:41:21
kids and and hoping you get them through those years when times are tough and then they're teenagers and they know
00:41:28
everything then they're in their 20s and they you know um that's that's my
00:41:32
biggest and and and and Tony was very much part of that for sure yeah yeah how long were you guys married 34 years um
00:41:40
and she came from a sporting family her brother Peter represented New Zealand at
00:41:44
bows and uh and so she was well aware of what you know sport can um you know can
00:41:52
Galvanize things but you often if you're playing it or commentating on it you're
00:41:56
not there aot lot so she kind of understood all that which was boy I was lucky in that regard really lucky you're
00:42:02
into the longevity thing long relationships long career yeah yeah yeah how did how did you meet were you was
00:42:08
she a broadcaster as well or yeah she was she worked in she worked in Broadcasting House in Wellington I met
00:42:12
her met it that way yeah exactly yeah I mean it wasn't my first marriage first
00:42:16
one didn't last too long but um oh [ __ ] I didn't know that didn't you know that
00:42:20
that suppose it was pre- internet oh hell yes how long was the first one oh four years I I think yeah yeah yeah and
00:42:28
that didn't work out but that's uh these don't happen was that was that a a big
00:42:32
thing of sort of you know shame or disappointment at the time like marriages breakups are no big deal now
00:42:37
yeah they're not a big deal that's right exactly it was maybe a different
00:42:40
generation so yeah maybe maybe didn't feel too good about it at the time it's
00:42:45
by G we're going back in but now yeah but I mean you know I've been lucky um
00:42:49
you know Tony passed away what nine years ago and I've been with shanan now for seven um so uh you know you kind of
00:42:57
got to move on you don't the memories are always going to be there but you've
00:43:01
got to move on you have to move on yeah it's it's yeah yeah yeah thanks for sharing that I mean it's hard like
00:43:09
knowing that you were coming in today like I did some research online there's
00:43:12
um like there's there's a photo I found like I found this photo online oh yeah
00:43:16
yeah yeah you and Tony and um how how old do you reckon you both are then 40s maybe yeah maybe yeah maybe yeah yeah
00:43:24
maybe yeah and there's just so many photos photos on I suppose is the good good thing about the internet it becomes
00:43:28
like a Time Capture when there photos of you it seems like you're in Fiji every
00:43:31
other week oh yes cocktails that would be wrong that be wrong yeah yeah yeah I wish um it's not a b place to go is it
00:43:40
yeah what about sha like how did you how did you meet her well I met her at the TB actually and um took a punt yeah well
00:43:47
no she she was in Australia when all this unfolded and um we sort of kept in touch I knew it just sag ODU I mean it's
00:43:54
just one of those things that evolved actually over the years and and uh uh and it's great actually um I think I
00:44:01
think in your lat ear it's quite nice to have someone else there um I don't know
00:44:07
how I would have got on had I just decided to go go Alan go alone as they say in cards um so it's nice to have
00:44:14
someone you know someone around for sure yeah cu the last thing you want to be lonely yeah yeah and I suppose um yeah
00:44:23
for the from the perspective of your your daughters um I suppose they were quite happy for you to meet someone else
00:44:28
as well obviously you know yeah it's not an easy transition um and I can understand it from their point of view
00:44:33
too you know because it's not their mom and and can never be their M and all the
00:44:38
rest of it but no they've been fantastic and as I said I really think that my
00:44:42
single grest achievement in life forget about the 350 test matches and 50 OD years in broadcasting is actually Su
00:44:49
successfully bringing up a couple of kids or two girls actually um and and you know it's never easy parenting is
00:44:56
never easy but um when it's uh when you think you've done the right thing and uh
00:45:01
and you see the end product I think that's very satisfying yeah CU When when when their
00:45:07
mom passed um so they were they were adults orbe it painfully young adults to lose their mom yeah 20s yeah but they so
00:45:14
they they flow on the nest they're off getting off getting on with their own
00:45:17
lives and I the last thing they want is the thought of like dead being sitting a
00:45:21
home at loan miserable you know yeah we have great communication I mean we we talk I was going to say most days
00:45:28
certainly every two days uh we communicate with each other which is good some people don't you know some
00:45:34
parents don't communicate with the kids a lot um we we've always had this great
00:45:39
communication they don't live in they don't live in the same city as me uh but
00:45:43
that's fine um as I say without the cell phone not sure where we'd be these days
00:45:49
well actually maybe not great communic the studio where we're recording this is
00:45:53
my pod Lab Studio and one of your daughters Works um like 100 meters up the road probably like an ad up the road
00:45:58
and you had to phone to see if she was at work today you could have done a bit more adman and spent a couple of hours
00:46:03
with you are you just so so busy that it's uh you know you fly to Oakland you
00:46:07
fly out you might catch up you might not catch up S well most of my days these days is T taking up playing balls I got
00:46:14
to be honest with you um which I find great relaxation I tried golf I still Eno enjoy golf but I was never going to
00:46:20
get any better and it started to annoy me that I wasn't getting better uh whereas BS um you know every out again
00:46:26
you you'll get one close to the Jack and you'll think to yourself I'm not sure
00:46:30
how I did that but boy it was satisfying it was really satisfying so I play a lot
00:46:34
of bows and I enjoy the camaraderie you learn a lot from people you play against
00:46:38
uh sure it's tough competition you want to win but um you're going to have great
00:46:42
rapport with your opponents too and I I really enjoy that part of bows too yeah yeah actually um I'm not sure which one
00:46:48
of your daughters it was um brook or Kirsty before but you made have call to one of them just to see if she was at
00:46:52
work today um I noticed at the end of the conversation you you said I you two or whatever um I don't know it was a
00:46:59
small thing that I overheard but speaks a lot about the relationship that you've
00:47:02
got well that's right exactly I mean we've always done that um and yeah I
00:47:05
mean we are pretty close there's no question about that um yeah and they would say oh yeah
00:47:12
I saw this Facebook post from um Kirsty um I think this is talking about your 350th oh yes uh prayer doesn't even
00:47:19
touch the surface your hard work yet humble approach to everything you do is clear to everyone that knows you and
00:47:25
although you hate the attention you deserve all the recognition yeah they' always been good with words those those
00:47:30
girls and I can remember when they were sending birthday cards or cards to me when I was overseas brilliant with words
00:47:38
absolutely exceptional and it was actually nice at the 350th because um sha came up my partner and the girls
00:47:46
were both there it was a game uh it was a game in the studio but they were all there and skot did a nice little morning
00:47:52
tea and all the rest of it so it was it was brilliant to have them all there and
00:47:55
Brook had a had a little speech written out on the phone which she was very nervous about writing reading out but
00:48:00
she she did a great job uh I think she she's uh she should have been a broadcast she got a v voice like mine
00:48:06
bit like a fog horn um and she' it's what every lady wants to hear yeah yeah
00:48:12
I've T her before I've Ted her before and um and she and she made and she said
00:48:17
some nice words so it was brilliant to have them all there yeah yeah it's I've
00:48:20
found another photo as well this is just you and the the two of them looks like a
00:48:24
bloody great Dynamic yeah it is yeah it is absolutely very proud of them very proud of them they've done well and
00:48:30
they've got good blocks around them which is important too have you um and you're a Granddad
00:48:36
now how many how many grand kids you three yeah how um have you found you got a I'm I'm probably projecting here
00:48:42
because this is my experience I in my 20s and 30s and maybe into my 40s I can probably count the amount of times I
00:48:47
cried on maybe one hand yeah um the last like five or six years I I re it's like
00:48:53
um it's a thing I'm calling manopause like I I've I've got more emotional as I
00:48:58
get older I'm a shocker I'm a shocker I'm I'm I'm worse um watching
00:49:03
TV um what's that what's that program that David lomes does where you I'm
00:49:07
missing pieces yeah I cry I cry every episode because I'm just happy for people and and that's the way I express
00:49:14
myself yeah yeah I just terrible I'm shocking oh it's wonderful though I
00:49:20
guess it is I guess it is yeah I mean I I go to the movies I go to the movies quite often sh and I go to the movies
00:49:25
quite often and um and um sometimes she'll she'll look across and I'm giving it the old you
00:49:33
know are you um yeah you slightly sort of um like embarrassed about it because you're of that age or Generation Um not
00:49:41
unless there's a major audience around no I can kind of Cape I I I think I pretend I'm not but I yeah I I can get
00:49:49
quite I can get quite emotional but I'm like you I I think of my probably 20s
00:49:53
and 30s you count on the fingers of one end um as you get older you um maybe get more
00:49:59
sentimental or I'm not sure what the word is yeah I think a lot of it is like
00:50:03
like almost like happiness tears or gratitude tears so Wonder well if New Zealand wins a gold medal at the Olympic
00:50:08
Games I'm gone I'm gone and the only and the only way that I wouldn't is if I was
00:50:13
broadcasting because I can somehow and I've C two World Cup finals which if I've been sitting at home where we've
00:50:19
won if I'd been sitting at home I would have been in tears but because you're on
00:50:22
the job uh somehow I'm able to be slightly more dispassionate about the whole thing
00:50:29
um which is crazy I suppose I mean you don't want a blubbering fool doing the
00:50:35
commentary but um I've often felt like it but but if I'm sitting at home and we
00:50:39
win a gold medal or we win something I'm hopeless I'm and if if the flag goes up
00:50:44
and the national anthem comes on I'm just hopeless I am hopeless so every time you see daame Lisa Carrington's
00:50:50
racing you got to leave the room oh just about just about yeah yeah random it's a
00:50:55
random question when you are watching sport on TV at home do you do you sort of find yourself like even like
00:51:00
commenting internally or are you able just to watch it and switch off and enjoy it as a
00:51:05
viewer yeah depends on the sport I suppose um no I think I'm I'm pretty good I'm pretty good I um I don't think
00:51:15
I'm trying to add words sometimes you know a commentator stretching for a word you you feel like
00:51:21
shouting it out for him you know but um no I think I'm pretty good yeah yeah um
00:51:27
all right I thanks for sharing that stuff yeah that's I know yeah partly by Design I guess partly because you've
00:51:33
never been in sort of the sort of uh Forum but yeah I appreciate you sharing some of the personal stuff that's fine
00:51:38
yeah um all right let's go to your first love bloody rugby so uh first test 1984
00:51:45
when the old blacks beat France at Lancaster Park in Christ Church can you remember the score no no um in fact if I
00:51:53
got my info wrong no no in fact I know very little about that game and um but I do remember the game after or the or the
00:52:02
games after that where we went on a tour to Australia so I don't I don't remember
00:52:08
much about the specifics I guess you could look it up and all the rest of it but um the games I do remember are the
00:52:15
ones that followed funnily enough and so it's so damn long ago now it's 40 years
00:52:20
ago it's crazy when you think back oh know it's ridiculous ridiculous yeah
00:52:23
yeah this is a check we had in the the car on the dve from the airport you know when you look at things happening in the
00:52:28
future like you hear about a stadium that's going to be built in 9 years from
00:52:31
now you think oh [ __ ] that's a lifetime away you look you look back I always add
00:52:35
I always add nine to my total and think I'm going to be oh my God am I going to
00:52:40
get that far you know do you cting the Summers you got left oh yeah um what has been your oh by the way the score in
00:52:46
that game in 1984 109 another French game where we got them by one point yeah and I think you know I think from memory
00:52:52
there was a lot of drop kicks by them trying to win the game something like that yeah um has there been a favorite
00:52:58
game to call and why there's been a few yeah there's been a few I think and I've
00:53:02
been asked this question a fair bit and I you know if you ask me if there were a
00:53:06
few I'd go about five but if I errow it down to one I think it was the the World
00:53:10
Cup Final in 215 where we were playing Australia and one thing about playing Australia is you always get a good game
00:53:17
of rugby because their attitude is always positive even if they had a very good Australian team at the time they
00:53:23
play with intent and they play because they want to score tribe sometimes when you play other teams it's
00:53:29
opposite and you don't get a very good game but um so the 215 World Cup final
00:53:34
Wes deserve to be there for sure we were on a bit of a run we were going well and
00:53:40
all the drama surrounding that game particularly us getting a yellow card them coming back into the match Sunny B
00:53:47
Williams coming on at halime when they substitute Conrad Smith out and then the drama at the end when
00:53:54
bod scored it was um it just had everything really plus it was a win of course so I think I think if I had to
00:54:02
isolate one particular game uh was 215 World Cup final you contrast that with 211 which was also Monumental occasion
00:54:12
it went a very good game um and it was more a sense of relief that we' actually
00:54:16
cracked it and I don't know whether we were celebrating too much we were just
00:54:20
going oh my God think we' you know it's t taken us since ' 87 you know and all
00:54:25
that um whereas in 215 it was a real celebration it was a great game of footy yeah 2011
00:54:30
was just relief total sheer relief nothing actually even the just hanging on for that 1.1 it was the number of
00:54:36
people I've spoken to who didn't watch the last 10 minutes they went outside
00:54:40
they had a smoke they buried their head in the sand just hoping that we'd hang
00:54:47
in there and and never actually whoops never actually saw the last five minutes they couldn't stand the tension of it
00:54:54
all yeah and um yeah and in 2015 so like what are you and the commentators do afterwards like
00:55:01
do you do you intersect with obviously you're not going into the dressing room
00:55:04
because but you I mean it was it was a very big game it was Richie's last game
00:55:07
and apparently he got on the team bus with his playing kit to long because he knew as soon as soon as he took the
00:55:12
Jersey off that was it that was it last time did you you meet up with the team at the hotel or anything or no I don't
00:55:17
think so no I mean generally that's not the case the media tend to stick together um maybe not so much nowadays
00:55:25
as they used to when we went on tour we were all in the same Hotel sometimes the
00:55:29
All Blacks are in a different Hotel um from M the All Blacks in 215 were out at uh well they're a long way out of London
00:55:36
so I'm not sure what they would have done but um no we I think from memory we
00:55:40
just went back and uh got changed and went and had a had a beer and what have you most of us had to fly out the next
00:55:45
day so you don't want to find yourself as you get older you don't find yourself
00:55:49
four in the morning and thinking oh what's the point in going to bed now um so you don't want to get that or locking
00:55:55
yourself out of a hotel for the third time yeah exactly as you get older you get wiser and you learn how to um you
00:56:01
learn how to celebrate um uh responsibly respons good on good on you gez um we talked before you
00:56:09
mentioned um the name um Brent Todd tody who you've worked with and also we talked about Richie BAU um and you may
00:56:15
have even mentioned Smithy as well in the cricket you've worked with Smithy and rugby as well let's let's um yeah
00:56:20
let's run through some of the names of some of the Legends you've worked with
00:56:22
and see what stories come to mind yeah so Smithy Ian Smith yeah yeah Smithy well him and I sheare a
00:56:29
secondary school in common we both went to rongai college and I commentated um I
00:56:34
commentated a lot of his games in fact a good story about Smithy and he and he relates it as well um I lived in
00:56:42
Wellington and of course Smithy I think at the time lived in nap here and he was
00:56:46
the New Zealand Wier and he was having a bit of a poor Trot and there was a guy who was in Wellington called Evan
00:56:51
mcweeney ir mcweeny and I might have said publicly at some point maybe irin mcweeney um deserves a
00:56:59
shot in the in the New Zealand team at smithy's expense because you know smithy's not going my ba and I remember
00:57:06
going to the Bas and reserve one day and and um and I'm walking in it's an it's
00:57:11
it was about 2: in the afternoon must have been a day nighter or something and I got tapped on the shoulder by a lady
00:57:16
and she said my name is um I can't think of a Christian name but it amounted to
00:57:21
the fact that she was smithy's Mother and boy did she give it to me did she give it to me and Smithy and I I've had
00:57:27
a good laugh about that in the oh that's good yeah you don't mess with someone's mom no no no no no oh
00:57:34
that's great um I I I I don't think I've ever ever met Ian Smith but I've got
00:57:38
some friends that did a radio show with them on wasn't called radio sport but it
00:57:42
was a sport station uh Dean Lan and Nathan lar yes and um Smithy had work usually remotely from home um and
00:57:50
sometimes they said they'll be doing interviews and then they'll just hear
00:57:52
the snoring noise and it was Smithy was at home and like Lazy Boy here doing the
00:57:57
show noting off to sleep classic classic um what about Murray mixed you worked with him for ages say oh mix what a
00:58:04
delightful BL I mean I admired mix as a player um in fact I think that tour I told you about in ' 84 might have been
00:58:10
mix's last tour with the all black so he was a highly experienced all black and I
00:58:14
admed him because he came from the same city and and he was an all black and all
00:58:17
the rest of it and then got the opportunity to work with them I don't think I've ever met a more passionate
00:58:23
bloke about the game of rugby he really was and I often tell the story and it's
00:58:27
it's a corny old joke I know but um I remember Mick saying once that he um he
00:58:34
used to dream about scrums and line outs and at the time he was married to um Lorraine of course who was Miss Universe
00:58:41
and I remember thinking to myself if I'm married to Miss Universe am I lying in bed and dreaming about L
00:58:47
outs and scrums I'm not sure I am I'm not sure who I am but um no what a good guy I caught up with mix just
00:58:54
recently he's in these days and um he's in good shape and uh still very passionate about the rugby that that is
00:59:03
that's a great o j it's a corny one when your daughters hear this are they're
00:59:06
going to tell you off well they may have heard it before um why was he why why was he so polarizing I I'm just trying
00:59:14
to think back I suppose when he was when you were working with him it was kind of
00:59:18
like pre social media as we know it now but there were like lists that used to go around of like gaffs that he made on
00:59:24
commentaries and yeah yeah what do you think it was about him you took Ma wats and all um you know he
00:59:30
wasn't a trained broadcaster so sometimes the right words didn't necessarily come out but the boy the
00:59:35
passion was always there um yeah some people are cruel aren't they I mean I I
00:59:40
to this day think he was now standing commentator and and I won't deviate on
00:59:45
that at all um and he was just so passionate that sometimes maybe the right word didn't come in the right
00:59:51
place and all the rest of it but uh you just couldn't you just couldn't fault
00:59:55
him for his love and passion of the game oh that's a wonderful endorsement yeah so
01:00:01
that list you you must know the list I'm talking about it was like yeah so when
01:00:05
he says things like it's all tied up at 1413 he he definitely said all those
01:00:08
things oh probably I I don't remember that one in particular but yeah there've
01:00:12
been a few there' been there's one like Andy Ellis he's a 21 year old that just
01:00:16
turned 22 yeah there's a list there's a list goes around of it's not just mix there's
01:00:22
a whole lot of strange ones you know of what people have said and you got to remember what we're doing here is an ad
01:00:27
lib you don't get to practice it you know once once the game starts the game
01:00:32
rugby starts it's an 80-minute ad lib you can write all you like before the game you know hi everyone welcome to the
01:00:37
show blah blah blah and and the team sheets are all written out for you but the moment the referee Blows the Whistle
01:00:44
it becomes an ad lib and sometimes the right things don't come out and I'm
01:00:47
being I've been guilty of it myself wrong TR scorers wrong this wrong that once started a super rugby season there
01:00:54
used to be a guy uh he was a legend and broadcasting called patio donnal I don't
01:00:59
know whether you remember the name but anyway um it goes back a we bit um and I for some reason had ptio Donald's name
01:01:06
on my brain and it was the first game of Super Rugby let's say it was 2005 or
01:01:11
whatever I don't know first game of Super Rugby so we want to get everything
01:01:14
right and the referee was um one of our better referees over the years a guy called Patti O BR and so I the moment he
01:01:22
blew the whistle I said and referee ptio Donald blows the whistle and the Super Rugby season and I suddenly thought oh
01:01:29
my god I've blown it in the very first sentence of the season first sentence of the season I've
01:01:36
got the referee wrong oh my God how do you yeah how do you um yeah how how do you put that behind you and move on oh
01:01:44
you just have to I've I've learned to ignore it actually um because you make
01:01:51
it worse by correcting yourself um not always but if if I'd gone back and said oh I'm sorry uh the
01:01:58
referee is not p p I'm just making a bigger issue of it highlighting it yeah
01:02:02
and and a lot of people were sitting at home did he really say no probably not anyway and the game carries on and
01:02:07
scrums and line outs and tries and they've forgotten about it by then but if I'd if I'd
01:02:13
overcorrected I would have just made made a total clown on myself but I I did um reasonably thorough search on you
01:02:21
like I looked on Tik Tok I looked on your Google videos I looked everywhere typed in all sorts of things like um
01:02:27
niso gffs niso bloopers I couldn't find anything oh really yeah have you is there anything that brings to mind that
01:02:34
you're prepared to you you this is probably part of the reason you've been
01:02:39
there for for like for 350 T it's nothing nothing ridiculous um I mean we've all been in those situations um
01:02:49
but maybe because I didn't correct myself maybe I've got away with it I don't know it's a strategy that's I
01:02:57
mean there wouldn't be a season go by that I don't do half a dozen wrong Tri
01:03:00
scores yeah and and you don't like that you don't like that you like to be
01:03:04
accurate um because people are sitting at home going is he watching a different game to us and um look I'm sure there is
01:03:12
I'm sure there are some bloopers out there but I can't off the top of my head
01:03:17
think of any and what about the um oh I had your um your friend um Justin Marshall we'll get to Maria in a second
01:03:24
yeah on the podcast and um he about um me oh my yes boy yes and he was he was about to say oh my God and then he self
01:03:31
censored because he wasn't sure if he could say God and yeah yeah um so that
01:03:35
sort of became like a viral moment for him well it's a trademark isn't it now
01:03:38
when you when you hear it you if anyone else used it you'd say oh come on you
01:03:43
you're borrowing it off or you flogging it off mashy yeah he's um that's good I
01:03:49
I really enjoy it when he well and uses it sparingly when things are when things
01:03:54
um you know really come to a crescend a lot of games are Philly mundane and one team beats the other by lots and it
01:04:00
doesn't get too exciting so you just have to treat it the way it is but when
01:04:04
you need when you need some highp stuff uh which Mari can produce at times um why not why not well but you could have
01:04:12
done that with um you bet you right you was that in um was that in the the game that's known as the game of the century
01:04:18
yeah that was the one where Jonah scored yeah I don't know where that came from
01:04:21
and I've never I don't think I've ever used it since I don't know why um so
01:04:26
what did you say uh Jonah's in you bet you you bet you no Kenny because tan rold from the ball and I said I I can't
01:04:35
remember now what the completely what the circumstances were but it just came it just came out of the blue I don't
01:04:41
know I think it was probably the fact that Jonah was within uh within 10 meters of he was always going to score
01:04:50
it because there was only one at the time there was only one player in World rugby who was is 100% going to score it
01:04:57
I mean there was still a couple of players to beat but you just knew that he was going to beat them so I I must
01:05:03
have POS the question can he do it or what you bet you you bet you yeah yeah yeah so then you have something like
01:05:10
that which becomes um I suppose like a viral moment for the time um then why don't you stick with it and repeat it
01:05:16
well will Jordan you bet I know yeah no I've never thought about it actually you
01:05:21
don't put too much thought into no I don't in fact I learned a lesson um back
01:05:25
in 1996 in South Africa I thought if if we create history here I need to be able to
01:05:33
um say something eloquent and and for the occasion when the final whistle blows and so I did I WR out you know
01:05:42
they've been trying since 1923 blah blah blah and I've got my head down and mean
01:05:48
in the meantime everything's unfolding on the field cuz it was dramatic there's
01:05:52
no doubt about it you remember you remember the Test match where he's banging a hand on the ground Marsh's
01:05:57
jumping around it was all drama we first ever series but so I wrote this thing down but when I listened when I got home
01:06:04
and listened to it back I thought nah that sounds like a bloke who's reading
01:06:08
something I've never done it since never done it since so I just try and go with
01:06:13
the moment and and and and so there's nothing really memorable not like Peter
01:06:19
Montgomery's you know the America cup is now New Zealand's cup yeah yeah and people would tell you
01:06:26
that too but it was appropriate at the time but Ying's a bit different to rugby
01:06:30
you know we were going to win the America's Cup we probably won that race by four or five minutes or something so
01:06:36
it's going at a much slower Pace in rugby you know things are happening at 100 milph and you're not quite sure how
01:06:43
you're going to deliver the line at the time but I mean it was totally appropriate what he did and it's iconic
01:06:48
um but I in rugby I just I I listened to it and I thought no I'm not going to do
01:06:53
that again yeah well you might um I don't know if you're involved in this
01:06:56
game or if if not you you might know the backstory but um uh Andrew Mulligan was
01:07:02
a guest on the podcast last week and he told me that the KE the famous Keith Quin line the oh oh oh llu he said Keith
01:07:09
dropped a bit of paper or something he did he did I was I was um I wasn't commentating the game but I was at the
01:07:14
game funny enough in Cape Town and um i' we tvz that's right we were kind of
01:07:20
sharing things and I'd done the game the previous day in Durban so I was kind of
01:07:25
a spectator and this game was in Cape Town and that's right exactly he had written something down and put all all
01:07:32
all legs and power and pump and pump and and he had lost a bit of paper and and he's graveling around trying to find it
01:07:38
as Jonah goes over about his fourth try of the game and in the Finish he he couldn't find it and and that's how very
01:07:45
famous very famous yeah in the end it weed out for the be right it's iconic yes it is yes it is yeah but I think I
01:07:51
guess it was a kind of a mistake yeah blver in the best possible way yeah so did you did you know Jonah
01:07:59
personally did you have did your paths cross no I didn't I couldn't honestly
01:08:03
say I knew him personally I knew him to interview like a lot of All Blacks um you know I've interviewed most of them
01:08:09
but in terms of personally no not at all no I'm just to say good day and you know
01:08:14
here you go yeah it's crazy he like I mean yeah there's so much Mystique
01:08:18
surrounding him I just I basically anyone that's got anything to do with rugby at all in any capacity when they
01:08:24
come on the podcast I ask them if they've a Jonah story just in case most of them do like Josh cronfel they were
01:08:29
movie Buddies together you'll have someone that bought a you know bought Jonah a car when they were young or
01:08:34
Mills Mila said the day before a sevens final Jonah took him to KFC and Mills was a young player he said oh we
01:08:40
shouldn't go and and Jonah was like oh don't worry about it I'll take care of
01:08:42
touch and then they lost the game the next day there's just all these and I don't know I don't know if some of the
01:08:48
stories are getting embellished with the passage of time but um it just creates oh he was a he was a superstar there's
01:08:54
no question about that yeah but but I I couldn't honestly say that I knew him
01:08:58
other than to take it a to yeah yeah yeah and what about back to back to Mary Justin Marshall why um why is he the
01:09:04
most polarizing rugby pundit perhaps ever it's interesting isn't it and mix
01:09:09
was the same I mean um people have got their opinions and uh and there's no gray area here people are either black
01:09:16
or white and mix suffered the same problem and as you mentioned earlier probably not so much through social
01:09:23
media because there wasn't as much but cor Mari stepped in when social media I
01:09:28
don't know um and I know that when he first joined us he was um you know he was actually commentating guys he played
01:09:35
with and he found that very awkward I mean he he's probably explained all this
01:09:39
to you himself he found that very awkward and I I believe that the Crusaders weren't very happy because he
01:09:45
often took the different Tac because he wanted to feel as though he was uh he was neutral and he didn't want to be
01:09:52
seen to be an ex Crusader in the broadcast and and and they felt that maybe he went
01:09:58
too far the other way um but look I I've got no problem at all with Mary I once I
01:10:04
said to him when he joined us I said mate you're a you're a bit of an arrogant prick when you played for the
01:10:09
All Blacks and he agreed and he said did you say that I said that to him yeah you
01:10:14
know and and he agreed with me he said yeah and he said maybe that's what made
01:10:18
me what I was um but he's not that he's not that sort of person but that was the
01:10:23
Persona that he um that he displayed um he didn't talk to Sky for a we while and
01:10:30
it was after the uh and I think you and I might have talked about this in the car on on the way from the airport too
01:10:35
where he stood on he stood on Barron Kell's hand yeah and I just happened to
01:10:40
be the commentator at the time and I condemned it widly uh I said you know that's just not on blah blah blah blah
01:10:46
blah and Mary obviously saw the tape and thought well I'm not going to I'm not
01:10:50
going to um talk to those Pricks and um and he admits it he absolutely you miss it yeah yeah have
01:10:56
you ever had a runin with a player over the time where you've said something and
01:10:59
then they they bail you up in a hotel left hotel lobby or no no no I haven't
01:11:04
actually um because you you generally just sort of seem to I mean I haven't seen all 350 of you test but you seem to
01:11:10
just like call what you see and it's not well that's television um people at home
01:11:15
make their own calls I mean people are sitting at home they can see things happening and they don't need me to have
01:11:22
an opinion on them um I differ from others pap in that regard um I sort of stay out of that I mean the Keller herb
01:11:31
Marshall thing um was so damn obvious that it had to be mentioned it had to be at least mentioned you can't ignore
01:11:38
these things but um yeah look I try and stay out of that sort of thing because as I say don't
01:11:46
insult the viewer by telling them things they can already see and that's the
01:11:50
difference between TV and radio I often say to Young aspiring TV commentators we don't want a radio commentary we can
01:11:57
see it we can see it we don't need a radio commentary and um hopefully they listen your yeah radio comment is a very
01:12:04
different skill set it's like um theater of the mine you're painting a picture
01:12:07
correct um but with the picture there yeah I mean if I sit in the car if I happen to be an account there's rugby
01:12:12
game on and I'm listening to it I want to know I want to know um because I'm
01:12:18
I've got my as you say your mind's ey I want to know which team's playing left
01:12:21
or right so I can see the field and then the only two other things I need to know
01:12:25
the score on a regular basis and the time gone or time to go that are the only three things you can and and the
01:12:33
number of times you sit there and you've just got in the car and the game's been
01:12:36
going 10 minutes what's the score please give me the score you know I drives your
01:12:42
mad mad the nature of radio like people running out of their cars every couple minutes you need to it seems punishing
01:12:48
if you're doing it but you need to do that reset every couple of minutes um yeah what's your personal relationship
01:12:53
with um criticism being like over the years and in particular with like social media have you largely like Got Away
01:13:00
unscathed or not unscathed no there's always someone out there who's prepared
01:13:04
to have a crack um I don't I mean I don't reply to it if I see it I just see
01:13:08
it um no my my involvement in social media is nothing on Twitter um never have been I've got a what do you call
01:13:18
them a Facebook account but um I don't I would have posted over over how many
01:13:23
years maybe five things I normally like things wish people happy birthdays uh and that's
01:13:31
pretty much it oh [ __ ] it's great for birthday remind us there a what so so
01:13:35
handy there a what yeah yeah um okay 350 tests what changes in the game over that
01:13:41
time good and bad um The Game's become more defensive uh I remember when super ugy first
01:13:48
started we were getting scores like 42 37 and um the game has become uh it's
01:13:55
quite hard to penetrate now if a team decides to be defensive then it's pretty
01:14:00
hard to uh to break them down but I'm still I'm still pretty positive about
01:14:04
the game changes in the game um like when I first started you were still having to jump in the line outs you
01:14:12
could kick the ball out on the full pretty much anywhere on the field if you wanted to I mean there's been a lot of
01:14:17
tinkering um but uh it still remains to me the Ultimate Team game um everybody's
01:14:24
got to be playing well you can't get away with your halfback having a bad day
01:14:27
it's bit like working in TV if the commentator is having an off day it drags the whole broadcast down if the
01:14:33
Cameron aren't going well you know these are these are Ultimate Team games um
01:14:37
there's a few things about rugby I don't like I particularly don't like the
01:14:40
rolling mall I never have I just think that it defies all the logic of rugby like the BLS in front of the ball
01:14:48
carrier are all offside um plus you can't tackle the ball carry you can't
01:14:53
get to him for a start off um so there's a few things in rugby that I don't like
01:14:57
but it it's still to me is the Ultimate Team game anyway and for you pregame
01:15:02
prep what does that look like for example I think like say say the All Blacks are playing it's a World Cup and
01:15:07
they're playing a team like um I don't know like Georgia for example you with
01:15:12
you know like you look at the Georgian team list and it's like I don't know I
01:15:15
get anxiety just looking at it funny as should say that because before the 215 World Cup we were playing Georgia and I
01:15:21
knew that before I left home and I also knew that down at the local bar shop in K in Wellington there was a Russian lady
01:15:28
and I said to her one day I said um do you mind if I give you spend 10 minutes talking about um some pronunciations and
01:15:35
she she kindly agreed and she set me right on all these Georgian names um you just you just Cobble it together as best
01:15:43
you can really um because it has got harder over the years and particularly World Cups where you're not always doing
01:15:48
the All Blacks you might be doing a game between Fiji and say Italy or something
01:15:52
so uh some of the names you know familiar with and you just you just talk to people uh I've even been known more
01:15:59
than once to ring embassies uh the French Embassy and Wellington have often had phone calls from me how do you
01:16:05
pronounce this and um wow because I think you've you've got to get it right
01:16:11
um because you got to respect the people involved you know they they they um and
01:16:16
I and I don't always get it right but I Endeavor to um I think that's all anyone
01:16:20
can ask because their parents are watching their family's watching and and if you mispronouncing their name all the
01:16:25
time it's just I I just it's just wrong you know so how how do you do that you
01:16:30
write it out phonetically yeah I do I do I write it out phonetically exactly exactly so when you glance down you can
01:16:36
pretty much work it out straight away if you'd left it in its in its raw form
01:16:40
you'd be no better off yeah and so uh yeah that's precisely what I do so so um
01:16:45
do you do like over the years has your pregame prep got less and less and less as you get more comfortable or nice do
01:16:50
do you have the same sort of routine or structure I still do it if I can the day
01:16:55
before the game so if we tests on a Saturday I do everything on the Friday because the teams are announced usually
01:17:01
late Thursday or early Friday so you've got plenty of time to do that so that
01:17:05
leaves Match Day free to do other things and not you know concentrate too much on
01:17:10
the game I sound like a player when I'm doing this but um so that's been my
01:17:14
that's been my um pattern no I I'd spend probably the equal amount of time on um
01:17:20
as I did now as I did when I first started wow yeah oh he still must love it you have to you have to have a
01:17:27
passion for it I tell you what there are games where you sometimes think what am
01:17:30
I doing here and you and you um you there are some d games right and and you can't there's nothing you can do about
01:17:37
it and you can't make a what's the old saying a silk purse out of a s you can't
01:17:42
you can't make rolling a [ __ ] and glitter uh yeah you can't make it better
01:17:46
and people at home are looking there thinking this is the worst game in the history of man they don't need a
01:17:50
commentator telling them it's a great game and sadly and sad L there are commentaries that I listen to sometimes
01:17:58
from across the te on another sport whether they're telling me this is one of the great games of all time and I'm
01:18:03
thinking you are watching a different game than me pal you are absolutely what because they try to be
01:18:09
salesman um and that's not our job uh our job is to be honest and reflect what's actually happening on the field
01:18:16
because the viewer is no fool if you try and tell them it's a great game and it
01:18:20
ain't a great game they're going to say you are drer so how many many pages of
01:18:25
notes would you go into like an all black test with well I I do both teams so I have two teams sitting in front of
01:18:30
me okay like that and then um quite a lot of quite a lot of scripted stuff pre-match obviously you want to get that
01:18:37
right you know bumbling and fumbling and talking about the weather and stuff uh so you need to have all that right and
01:18:45
then I have other facts you know this might be the 99th test or something I don't know um I just have a lot of other
01:18:53
facts and yeah it is trivia and I um I once had the privilege of speaking to the great Bill McLaren who is um you
01:19:00
know AG be the highest profile rugby caller of all the great Scotsman and I asked him how much pre-match stuff he
01:19:07
wrote down and he said a lot he said but I wouldn't use I'd be lucky if I used
01:19:13
10% of it probably 5% of it he said but the very fact of writing it down and it's true the very fact of writing stuff
01:19:19
down you actually sits here somewhere and um you can recall it pretty quickly if you have to and also if the Game
01:19:25
Stops a guy breaks a league or something and there's a 10-minute Break um you've
01:19:30
got a lot more information than you need but it's it's kind of an insurance
01:19:34
policy I guess and yeah we're on the yeah oh really is it back okay um thanks J how's
01:19:47
your body temperature yeah good yeah grab a bit of water yeah that's a great
01:19:52
chat by the way should I leave it there or not he leave it there yeah yeah you can leave it
01:19:58
there yeah okay yeah so the um the 2011 World Cup when Steven Donald comes on on
01:20:03
that um what was do you do you commentate on that or you can the viewers can see it yeah well the viewers
01:20:09
can see it yeah he's he's got a jersey that's way too small for him yeah yeah I
01:20:13
mean we might have made we might I was working with Grant Fox at the time so foxy being an ex or black might have
01:20:19
made a comment and he was plus he was a first five exactly so um yeah I mean you
01:20:25
but you don't go on about it it's I would have that's the difference it's
01:20:29
like a bad decision you know um if referee makes a bad decision you point out if it's a if it's a glaring thing
01:20:36
but you don't go on about it for the next 10 minutes um because it doesn't
01:20:41
serve any purpose and it drags the broadcast down um but yeah that was iconic I mean that it'll always be
01:20:47
iconic yeah so memor that whole game the whole actually the whole tournament you
01:20:51
know there were there were photos on social media of Aaron C Aaron cruden at westpack Stadium having a couple of
01:20:56
beers watching a Canadian game and then the next next thing you know he's called
01:21:00
up to the team and yeah Steven Donald of Dan Carter going down injured and we all
01:21:04
thought oh well that's the end of us without Dan Carter we're gone but it
01:21:08
just shows the depth that we could get through um you know and Steve Steven Donald coming back from White pting
01:21:15
which I can which which I can relate to because I do a bit of white bating yeah oh that's right yeah and um izy dag and
01:21:22
Corey Jane and uh um maybe that girlfri as well weren't they on the sleeping
01:21:27
pills and red bulls oh yeah yeah well me how we win that tournament yeah how do we win it oh Richie with a broken foot
01:21:35
yes yes exact played the whole tournament with a broken foot and the fact that we beat France by I don't know
01:21:40
point was it yeah in the final we did but in in the um in the uh round robin uh I think we put 30 or 40 on them
01:21:49
and so when we came to the final we thought yeah well maybe this is going to be bit easy than we thought the French
01:21:55
you never know do you yeah you mentioned Grand Fox um yeah you work with grand Fox quite extensively yeah yeah yeah
01:22:01
absolutely yeah what can you tell me about Foxy well um foxy is a real student of the game and very serious
01:22:08
about the game which is fair enough um but again a delight to work with a really uh and of course I commentated
01:22:15
well I've commentated most of these guys I commentated a lot of the stuff that um
01:22:19
foxy was involved in and um he actually came in when John Drake is great m John Drake passed away and uh I remember
01:22:27
talking to Foxy and um and it wasn't my job to appoint him but when he was appointed I had a y with him and he and
01:22:35
uh he said you know what do you need from me and all the sort of things so no he was fantastic and I've been really
01:22:40
lucky with all those guys that I've that I've dealt with and it's it's quite
01:22:43
funny because as players you never really got to know them at all as all blacks I mean I don't mix socially with
01:22:50
all blacks or haven't really over the years and so guys like mix and Justin Marshall and Foxy and these guys they
01:22:58
were just players who I might have interviewed a few times but then you get to meet them as people and um you it's
01:23:04
and it's great it's fantastic did you ever meet meet Ryan as a young fell
01:23:08
through no no I didn't no I never did no I never did good golfer is he what yeah
01:23:14
um go these are great stories um I've got about I sit on Instagram you were coming in I've got a bunch of um
01:23:19
questions from um fans by the way you you knew about this you're not on Instagram but one of your daughters
01:23:24
took a screen I think I don't know whether I'm Instagram or not I maybe I
01:23:29
don't know what I want someone wants to know I don't know if you've got an
01:23:32
answer to this off the top of your head but I'm sure you've been asked it a
01:23:34
million times before uh you're Allstar alltime all black 15 oh boy no no I've never been asked
01:23:42
that I've never been asked that but I've been asked who my great greatest rugby
01:23:46
player is and um he who that be yeah that's Christian Kalen and um I've always been pretty adamant about that
01:23:52
and people people ask you and then they disagree with you well well you asked me
01:23:57
I'm telling you that's my opinion yeah yeah exactly you want my opinion um
01:24:01
because I mean I've been lucky enough being around the you know Michael Joneses and the Dan Carters and the uh
01:24:06
marish MCCS and you name it some of the great rugby players of all time but Kalen to me was just something slightly
01:24:13
different and I I know you've been lucky enough to chat to him and he's very
01:24:17
modest and he was quite hard to communicate with when he was an all black much easier these days um but he
01:24:23
could just light came up from nothing and uh if he was if he was not making a break he was there supporting someone
01:24:30
who had he was just unbelievable and his introduction I think he scored three or
01:24:35
four tries on debut for the All Blacks um he was a generational player I believe yeah actually totally I think
01:24:43
yeah I think was three three on debut and four the next week or four on Debo and three the next week and he tells a
01:24:50
story um the flight from wherever the the where wherever the game was in game one to where it was in game two he but
01:24:57
Lori Ms was on the flight I think he was commentating at the time oh he might have been too Christian said hey well
01:25:02
Lori M said to Christian hey well on on your debut only gets harder from here then the next week Christian went out
01:25:07
and did it again or scored one more oh okay okay great y know yeah great um someone wants to know um has your voice
01:25:15
changed over the decades um well I think as I said to you we're all um in my early days we're all
01:25:22
kind of mentored if you like or tuted by X BBC announcers and as a result if you listen
01:25:31
to some of my early commentary I think you'll find that I do tend to round my
01:25:36
vows off terribly well you know um whereas I've now falling back into I guess a kind of a typically kiwi type
01:25:44
voice so I think from that point of view maybe um but other than that I I don't
01:25:49
think so I don't know other that's probably for other people to judge yeah
01:25:53
I yeah I see what you're saying so the voice hasn't changed but it's just the
01:25:56
communication style like it's far more sort of colloquial or conversational I
01:26:00
think so yeah I think so yes yes exactly um how do you feel when you watch a replay of a game you've called I very
01:26:06
rarely watched them in fact I have the 215 World Cup final sitting on my my sky at home I don't know why it's sitting
01:26:15
there but it is I've never watched it again um I guess I will one day I'm not
01:26:19
sure it's your favorite game I know I know I know there something about knowing what happened and um who won
01:26:27
that's not very exciting it's a bit like when you record something uh in the
01:26:30
middle of the night and you get up to watch it and some clown Rings you up or sends you a text and you look at it and
01:26:36
and they give you the score oh yeah can be bothered now for 80 minutes knowing that they lost or whatever happened
01:26:44
um um I sometimes just check uh and this this is very sort of In-House stuff just
01:26:52
check to see that the sound is good you know they the that I can be heard or the
01:26:56
crowd noise is not too loud or but I don't very often go back and watch a game because I think most people have
01:27:04
like a weird relationship with their own voice even I found in my radio career like I hated having like you know what's
01:27:11
called a consultant session or an air check session yes I just you know do I really sound like that yeah is is it the
01:27:16
same for you or or do do you just I kind of got used to it I guess but I I know in the early days uh you know when I and
01:27:23
I've still got the tape at home I don't know where I ever play it because it's a
01:27:26
real toore tape and unless You' got a real toore recording I've still got the
01:27:30
recording of my first ever time on air um and I if I listen to that I'd go no
01:27:36
surely not that's not me that can't be me oh my God this but we need to preserve that we probably need some
01:27:43
um um some like alcohol on it some isopropyl alcohol or something Lu it yeah I know EXA I know exactly what you
01:27:50
mean I remember going out you got to get that converted to a digital file before
01:27:53
it's too late 100% I remember going out once we we used to have a thing called U
01:27:58
recorder u e u u i don't know how you spelled it but anyway we used to take it
01:28:04
out uh on location to interview people and I remember and it was a real toore thing little real couple of little reals
01:28:10
I remember going out to do an interview with a with a boxer or somebody uh for a
01:28:14
program I was doing on a on a Sunday and um so I got to the guy and I I looked down at the recorder I only had one real
01:28:24
so there was no there was no hope but I was too polite guess the story of my life here I
01:28:30
was too polite to say to the black hey man I'm sorry uh can you wait an hour
01:28:34
I've got to go back I did the interview I pretended to do the interview and said
01:28:39
thanks for much and obviously it never went we ridiculous I know oh my God yeah yeah
01:28:47
oh my god um oh yeah if you did listen to playbacks of yourself like do you just do you just hear the
01:28:54
claws uh yeah is a self critique oh yeah no you why did I say that or yeah what a
01:29:02
silly word to put in that um because I said to you before it's an ad lib yeah
01:29:06
so you can't prepare yourself you have to react to what's happening in front of
01:29:09
you and sometimes the right word doesn't come and you substitute with something
01:29:14
uh lesser and you know in hindsight you can sit there on the couch and going that's the word I wanted but I didn't
01:29:21
find it at the time you know silly things but I think that level of care that you still have it now the in your
01:29:27
70s um is is part of the reason why you've had such a long and successful career on well you like to get things
01:29:32
right and of course you don't I mean nobody gets things right and in 80 minutes Players Knock the ball on they
01:29:38
throw forward passes the referees make mistakes and I can tell you no commentator in the history of
01:29:44
commentating has done a broadcast without making mistakes and I'm I'm certainly not immune to it and and I
01:29:50
make I make plenty of them and I'm often aware of them um but as I say I try and
01:29:55
disguise them sometimes if if they're if they're disguisable if that's a word yeah um what advice would
01:30:02
you give to aspiring commentators hoping to follow in your fa steps um well most aspiring commentators
01:30:10
will come from radio so I think I'd just go through what I've spoken to you
01:30:14
earlier about and that's remember that radio and television are too entirely
01:30:18
different things you really have to you have to pay respect to the fact that people at home can see the pictures what
01:30:25
you're trying to do is add to the pictures for them and just interpret a weebit here and there uh also be very
01:30:32
aware of your comments guys because they generally BLS who have played test matches I've played nil test matches
01:30:39
justtin Marshall's played 81 or 82 whatever it is so he's the rugby expert
01:30:45
so I'm not going to pretend to overrun anything he wants to say because he's
01:30:49
there for a reason he's there because he is the expert so you've got to be
01:30:53
cognizant of that fact yeah um what's the funniest or most unexpected thing that's happened to you while on here
01:31:01
apart from Forgetting one of the real to reals when interview your boxer things anything this brings to mind these are
01:31:06
just some questions from Instagram yeah yeah no nothing yeah nothing unbelievable I mean I've been in some
01:31:12
funny positions I mean I um I think probably the worst place I was on a cherry picker once in a in an OB down in
01:31:20
um T it was and I health and safety wouldn't allow these days but it was a stinking cold souly and the only way to
01:31:28
do the commentary was toh to be up on a cherry picker and it was so cold I had gloves on it was so cold that you
01:31:35
couldn't I couldn't write down the score and scores and I could barely talk I was
01:31:41
that cold so I mean nowadays we have lovely commentary boxes and all the rest of it that was just yeah but that that's
01:31:48
right yeah but that was I've been in some funny positions but um yeah then the other ones are a little bit hard to
01:31:55
recall do you think the role of a commentator is to inform entertain or both uh well I think inform firstly I
01:32:04
mean you'd like to think the game entertains because that's what we're
01:32:08
there for aren't we we're there for the game um so yeah I mean you can be you
01:32:13
can be entertaining up to a point without being a smartass um but I I think the informing is probably more
01:32:20
important yeah yeah yeah hey thanks for answering all these it's paints like a like a very clear picture
01:32:27
about who grunt ISB is and um just how how how seriously you take the job and how much you respect the the position eh
01:32:34
yeah and respect the game and respect uh the viewers I mean uh it's a privilege
01:32:39
to be there quite clearly there's a lot of people that like to be doing what
01:32:42
you're doing and you you're commentating an all black test match that's a huge
01:32:46
privilege and you should never forget it just some questions to close with um the that's all from Instagram by the way
01:32:52
these are these are mine um um what would you say the most important lessons you've learned over your 73 almost 74
01:32:58
years um my dear old mom once said to me uh uh just be polite to everyone and I am and I and and you know quite
01:33:09
often people come up to me and and start hanging the comments guys the way the All Blacks are playing and I just um
01:33:16
I've learned not to argue even though I may disagree I just give everyone their
01:33:22
as long as it doesn't go for long I give them their their time to uh to vent them and uh and generally
01:33:30
speaking we we p on reasonably friendly terms does it not would put me off going
01:33:36
out I think just because you know that when people have got a skin full or a few be that's when they're at their
01:33:41
worst yeah and that's where I I um respect so much the way and and Justin a mix of the two guys that I've worked
01:33:48
with the most over the years and their ability in in those situations is quite stagging really because you know people
01:33:55
can be quite aggressive in their opinions and what have you uh but they've always managed to um disarm them
01:34:01
just by being charming and being uh and listening and um you know there's just
01:34:07
no point trading blows with people uh when they determined that you're not going to change their mind so just end
01:34:12
up um having a discussion being rational and both mix and and Justin I been so good at that over the years yeah well
01:34:20
thanks for giving those guys their um their yeah their flowers the s afternoon as well that's really cool oh they
01:34:25
deserve it yeah absolutely yeah um what's the best and worst things about getting older from your
01:34:30
perspective um well you I guess you're over the hump you're you're closer to
01:34:35
the end than the beginning was is that the worst that's the um we were talking
01:34:40
about before how you count in the future will I be here for it well I guess you got to age gracefully don't you and it
01:34:46
comes to everybody but um uh I guess just being around is is is a bit of a plus um and
01:34:54
uh yeah I just think you know respecting people and you know I'm I'm I'm not um
01:34:59
you know be nice to everybody I'm not quite quite along those lines but um I
01:35:05
just I just what you no one no one's ever said a bad I I don't think I've
01:35:08
ever heard a bad word about I think I've probably got a few enemies out there I
01:35:12
don't know I mean can you snap uh no I've got a pretty I don't think many
01:35:17
people have seen me lose my temper totally no no I'm pretty even tempered in that regard um which I'm pleased
01:35:23
about because I've seen people snap and it's not a pretty sight um yeah just
01:35:29
just happy to be around mate to be honest how do you how do you stay positive and motivated as you age
01:35:36
um it's a good question I mean you've got to have a reason to get up every day
01:35:40
and uh you got to have a plan I mean you know I don't like uh particularly this time of the year when
01:35:49
the sun comes up at um 5:00 or whatever um and I'm awake I i' like to get up and
01:35:54
face the day you know um and do something but you got to stay active I mean it's it's all very well to say that
01:36:00
but um that's why I I get the newspaper do the puzzles um play a few bit of BS
01:36:07
um you know I read a lot um I've got interests like uh and I heard you saying
01:36:12
you um uh was it you're the second world war you like the second world war or who
01:36:19
said that someone said that to us today didn't they they met on the second world
01:36:22
war um anyway I I'm I made on the American Civil War of all things I've got endless books on the American Civil
01:36:29
War is that right yeah I know yeah who would have KN crazy stuff isn't it yeah
01:36:34
um follow American politics uh you've got to have interests you know you know
01:36:39
um are you what's your what's your take on the current state of American
01:36:42
politics um oh it's interesting isn't it it's it's interesting you know you get
01:36:48
eight years um Trump said four and he's having another four um I guess if you're
01:36:52
anti-trump I'm not answer anyone really I just it's different I'm not sure I
01:36:57
want to be living in America at the moment but um you know he doesn't get another four year term so well he
01:37:02
wouldn't anyway because he's 80 something now and but um it's quite a
01:37:07
complicated system and I've tried to work it out and uh you know with all the
01:37:11
Electoral colleges and the midterm elections and it just fascinates me really I've read a lot about past
01:37:18
American Presidents um read a lot about the Civil War and Lincoln when he was the president during during the Civil
01:37:24
War the Americans great presidents of the blacks have been around during war like FDI was around during Second World
01:37:29
War and Lincoln during the Civil War they regarded as possibly the two greatest presidents of all time um so
01:37:36
yeah I mean I'm just sort of interested in the world as as it is really actually
01:37:41
Trump came up um when we went to lunch today because you we both had cheeseburgers and I had a Coke Zero you
01:37:46
had a what do you have a raspberry and raspberry lemonade by the way we're not
01:37:50
this isn't a youthemism that's exactly what we had a raspberry lemonade and a
01:37:53
CO zero yeah um and I made a comment that our diets are very similar to Trump's yeah yeah exactly well he's done
01:37:59
well isn't he he's managed to stumble by I tend to I was going to say I watch my
01:38:05
diet others watch it for me sometimes um that uh try and try and eat healthy does
01:38:11
your does your partner keep try to keep you honest yeah and good honor too yeah yeah she's trying to keep me in the
01:38:16
world um if you could go back in time and give some advice to your younger self say 20 or 30 year old this what
01:38:23
would it be oh look I I don't know I think I've been pretty lucky really I
01:38:27
mean you know I was probably an idiot of my teens um you mature as you get older
01:38:33
uh no I think because I I was fortunate enough to make the right career choice I
01:38:39
think a lot of people I think don't have that um luxury they maybe finish up in
01:38:45
jobs that they don't particularly want to be in um so it's a real pleasure to
01:38:50
be able to do something you want to do I mean I guess you found that as well over
01:38:53
the years that you know you um you see people heading off to work in a gray suit and you think I wonder where
01:38:59
they're going and are they going to enjoy it when they get there um so I think I've been very lucky very blessed
01:39:06
actually yeah you spend so much of your life working out you want to find something you enjoy doing I I'd urge
01:39:12
that to to anyone like if you're on a job now that you hate TR try and try and
01:39:16
find something else figure out what what it is that's going to bring you Joy and
01:39:19
do it because um then you won't want to retire you just want to you want to be
01:39:23
like yeah yeah yeah oh exactly exactly uh what are you most grateful for at this
01:39:28
stage of your life um I guess the opportunity really the opportunities that have come uh
01:39:35
through working in the in the job that I have uh and the privilege as I mentioned
01:39:40
earlier to be able to sit in the hot seat for so many uh all black tests because the All Blacks are the ICONic
01:39:46
brand in New Zealand you you can talk about and I guess um it's the thing that
01:39:52
when you go overseas people know who the All Blacks are they may not know who the
01:39:56
current prime minister is um you know in fact they probably don't a lot of new zealanders probably
01:40:03
don't well that's right yeah that's right and and you go overseas and you
01:40:06
say all blacks and then they want you to do a Harker and um it's the one thing
01:40:11
that we are best known for sure we've had Siran Hillary K Everest and that was
01:40:16
fantastic and we've had other you know uh Rutherford split the atom blah BL blah but generally speak speaking people
01:40:24
overseas identify if you say New Zealand or kiwi they're likely to say either all
01:40:29
black or hacker do you have any regrets or what are your regrets uh no honestly no no no and I
01:40:40
don't think you can you might have a regret for a moment but you can't afford
01:40:45
to dwell on them you just got to move on so I'd have to say no you've got a good um a good grasp on
01:40:52
things he like good attitude towards life and yeah I like to think that I like to think that we're only giv one
01:40:58
shot at this um so you got to make the most of it um some people are given more opportunity than others but I really
01:41:06
Revel in stories where people have you know come from nowhere and have just had a
01:41:13
determination and I guess a talent and they've used it and that's what I like
01:41:19
that's what I really like yeah yeah I mean it's so sad to see people you know
01:41:23
that have got a talent you often see it in the sports arena people you know that
01:41:27
have got a talent and I saw it when I was playing uh rugby and cricket and what have you at secondary school when I
01:41:33
think back to some of the stars that I played with guys who are much better than me who just dropped out and could
01:41:39
have been so much better you know um they lacked motivation or some other circumstance might have come along but I
01:41:47
love it when I see somebody who's got a talent and is prepared to use it you
01:41:51
know and uh that's that's what I like is that saying a hard work beats Talent
01:41:56
when talent doesn't work hard and that's so true yep I agree with that yeah what
01:42:00
about what about Legacy this Bo um well I guess that's what other people other
01:42:06
people like judge your legacy don't I thought you'd say that none of your
01:42:09
business well no not at all no um I mean uh we're not like politicians who want to build a bridge and have a named
01:42:17
after them and all that sort of nonsense um I stat you outside of stadium with oh
01:42:22
my God that be the worst wouldn't it um well from my point of view it would be
01:42:27
um yeah look I you kind of leave the leg Legacy to somebody else I think yeah okay well you probably try and bet this
01:42:34
one way as well but uh it's um it's a story I sh quite a bit on the podcast so
01:42:38
I I had this guy Dogan on the podcast famous coaster coaster uh just recently won the America's Cup as one of the um
01:42:44
the Cy Claws and he was doing a like a 48 hour Adventure Race and Richie mcco was one of his teammates and um DG tells
01:42:51
a story that uh over overnight during one of the one of the low patches Rich he played a game with all his teammates
01:42:57
where they all had to come up with um three words that they like um people to use to describe them at their funeral
01:43:04
three words at the funeral and um one of Richie's first words was integrity and
01:43:09
DG Allon remembers thinking at the time [ __ ] you know that is exactly one word
01:43:13
I'd use for the guy that he got to know on that Adventure yeah what a great word
01:43:16
that is that covers that's one word that covers a multitude of sins doesn't it
01:43:20
yeah um Integrity is one yeah respect would be another you got to have respect of everybody really um you know in
01:43:28
television if you're working and and the and the crew doesn't respect you I don't
01:43:31
think you get the best results you know they think he's just a [ __ ] um who's
01:43:36
hogging the Limelight um so yeah those sorts of words they're nice but that's
01:43:43
as I said to you before that's for other people to judge you know you know they
01:43:48
very hard to describe yourself as anything you're a hard guy to podcast hard guy to get my
01:43:54
um yeah but yeah what you were saying about like not being a [ __ ] uh another podcast guest D Henwood you know
01:43:58
the comedian yeah yeah um yeah where a Chad and he he said the same thing it was advice from his dad his dad was like
01:44:04
as long as you're reasonably good at whatever job you're doing um if you're
01:44:08
nice to people like you will always get chosen ahead of someone that's really
01:44:12
good at the job but is awful to work with yeah yeah yeah yeah we don't want to work work with difficult people no no
01:44:19
hey Grant but thank you so much for coming on my podcast today it's been a real pleasure Dom you've you've asked me
01:44:25
questions that other people haven't asked me before yeah yeah and you've um
01:44:29
you've you've you've sidestep some of them with the grace of Christian K and
01:44:33
96 you think i' be a politician hey cheers mate love your work good on you cheers thanks