Can Wales Avoid Another Springbok Humiliation? |Plus Huw on Henry Pollock, Nations Championship

This is the Loose Pass Rugby Podcast, only on Megaphone Rugby. Hugh Griffin is back, the man himself returns, welcome back Hugh, it's been a while. Hello mate, yes, we're back. It's Wednesday afternoon and we're back, I'm glad to be back. It's good to hear you do the intro again, it's been a while.

Yeah, people have been asking, they've been begging for my blood. Where's Hugh? Where's Hugh? And how many times can I explain this? Anyway, let's just talk to people.

It's the hard work to put out a podcast on a weekly basis, trust me. And we just thought we needed to take a bit of a break there and we did. And we are still going to be pacing ourselves a little bit, I suppose. But yeah, you are invaluable correspondent up in England. I'm so glad to have you back.

And I was actually very happy to see your face coming back on my screen. But while we're at it, talk about England. You were lucky enough to attend the match Fiji versus England. And I'm saying Fiji versus England because it was Fiji's home game in England. But wasn't it the usual stadiums in the life?

Tell me about that experience. Yes, to my surprise, I thought Fiji was on the other side of the world. Turns out it's only an hour and a half from my parents' house in the northwest of England. So that was great. Yes, I did media at Fiji versus England in the Nations Championship.

Ever since the last couple of years, I've been getting able to do more and more of these media access things. And it's such good fun. I'm sorry for not being relatable, but it's the best way to watch rugby is from the media, the media benches and getting the access and things. And it was such a great experience. Other than the game, the game itself was obviously incredibly one-sided.

And as someone who wanted Fiji to win, it was very, very disappointing. But going to this new stadium, and for anybody who follows football Everton in the English Premiership, their new stadium called the Hill Dickson Stadium or Hill Dickinson, Hill Dickson. Yes, OK, one of those, Google it. And I went there and it's a brand new stadium, just new last year. Fantastic facility, very modern, but very well designed.

It's in a great place. It's in Liverpool Docks. And you kind of get onto the, I almost want to call it the campus, that's kind of the wrong word. You get through, it's got like a stone wall around it, like almost kind of like something you'd see outside a castle around it. And you go through and it's a big open space.

Everything's modern. And for anybody who's not been to England or spent a lot of time in England, Liverpool is in the north of England, whereas mostly England play their games in the south, in Twickenham, which is in London. And I have to say, people in the north, there's a stereotype in England that people in the north are friendlier than people are in the south. And it's true. It's very, very, very true.

And everybody there, all the scousers, as they call people from Liverpool, they were all incredibly friendly. It was a great day. The weather was fantastic. Very sunny day. The show that Fiji put on, they put on a big song and dance routine before the game on the pitch.

It was incredible. It was like a production from the Lion King or something. And it was just a great day, right up until the game started and then it went all to K.A.K.

Let's have to say pieces. Let's not use that word yet. Come on, my mother would have washed my mouth out of soap by now. She said she didn't do that. All right.

But just talking about that, the idea that to play this game in England, like you said, suddenly Fiji is now relocated to England. The idea was to earn some more money, I suppose. Also, I think Fiji's stadiums are too small. I think there will need to be 25,000 seated stadiums to qualify for the national championship. Was it a success, do you think?

Were there enough people there? What did it look like? This specific one that was played in Liverpool, I think was a, you'd have to say, if you put aside the kind of dichotomy of should Fiji be playing away from home or whatever, if you just put that aside and say as an event, was it successful? I'd have to say yes. There was 50,000, over 50,000 people there in the stadium.

And like I said, the events that they put on all around it was great. They had kind of stalls outside. They really went to a lot of effort to make it feel as Fiji as possible. Speaking as someone who's never been to Fiji, but would love to. And they'd obviously had no problem selling tickets.

It's funny, you know, because they played the week before in Cardiff against Wales and there was just over 16,000 people turned up, which is crazy. And there were some people in Wales were saying, oh, it's Fiji's fault for not advertising properly, which is just the biggest load of nonsense you've ever heard in your life. You know, Wales playing a game in Cardiff three years ago, it would be unthinkable that that would draw less than 50,000 people. So, you know, you shouldn't need to advertise a Wales men's international match that's being played in Cardiff. Frankly, the ticket should sell themselves, but people are like, oh, it's Fiji's fault for not advertising it.

And then a week later, there are 50,000 people turned up to Liverpool. This goes to show where the real problem was lying. But, you know, if I think someone did the maths of how much money they would have earned from those ticket sales in England based, compared to if they'd have sold them in Fiji because of the exchange rates and what they can charge and stuff. And it's kind of when you lay out in those terms, it is unfortunately a no-brainer. Yeah, it makes sense.

I mean, you want to grow the game, so get them to earn some more money. It's not like, you know, massive crowds or anything. It's almost like when South Africa played Argentina last year, Twickenham. There was enough home support to feel like a home game anyway. How many of the guys in the crowd were actually Fijian supporters and England supporters?

The split, more or less, do you think? It was mostly England, but there were plenty of Fijians there. Plenty. I can imagine any Fijians who lived in the UK had made the trip to go to that. Because it was obviously, like I said, it was great weather.

It's a great new stadium. Liverpool is a great city. I lived in Liverpool for a year. Fantastic place. Would happily go back anytime.

So there was a lot of Fijians there. I'll tell you the funny thing about Fijian men, Enver, is they all look like rugby players. All of them. You see a Fijian guy and you walk past him like, is he from rugby? Where do I know him from?

Is he famous or is he just a Fijian man? They're all big. They're all hench. They're all built. I should imagine it's what it feels like walking around Pretoria.

Yeah. No, it's true, man. Let's go into the schools. Even the guys at the school, big. Sometimes I wonder how big they can be.

We actually spoke to the Bulls creative week coach just the other day, or actually this afternoon, and we'll post that tomorrow. But that's an interesting conversation. Something for another day. Talking about the stadium experience, we've been on and on about stadium experiences lately in South Africa, you know, parking and security and access to bathrooms and beers and stuff like that. What was this new stadium?

And they had the opportunity, I suppose, to design it from scratch. And lots of lessons learned in terms of, you know, getting people in and getting people out and making it an experience worth going to. What was that like? Well, as a member of the accredited media, I have to say that I am not amongst the member of the masses anymore. I have elevated to the next level.

And so I don't know what the normal people were like. I, of course, use the private media bathrooms and all the things like that. But even this, like in this stadium, like even the media bit is the fanciest media bit I've ever been in. It had its own, like the dining room was like a separate room. But normally, like in the Principality Stadium in Cardiff or Twickenham, it's just the same room.

There's just one big room and they do everything in. It was a separate room for like the dining and stuff. It was a separate room for the press conference. The press conference was like, it was like a lecture hall in a university or like an old movie theater or something with the seats that go up like that. I will say one thing, though, Steve Borthwick, they had two, there was three seats at the desk where they do the media conference.

And the guy who's setting up the room put down the middle seats microphone and left the two on the outside up for the two guys to sit down and you get the coach and you get the captain. Steve Borthwick, the England coach comes in, sits in the seat with no microphone in front of it. Oh, wonderful. I just wanted to say this, you know, I mentioned the separate dining room and everything else in the cinema like media conference. That's exactly what it looks like at Loftus.

I mean, that stadium is 50 years old. It's got like a cinema like auditorium. It's got a separate dining room. It's called the Watergat, which is the watering hole kind of a thing. They've got a whole restaurant in there where they cater for every single person that works or plays at Loftus.

So maybe it's not that newfangled anymore. No, it's fancy for us. And it's not like that in the other places that I've been. There's one club which will remain nameless that I've been to where in the media room, which was a cupboard really, the lights weren't working. And I was told that the reason was because the cleaning lady had come in with her muffin bucket and she had spilled a bucket all over the floor and it shorted all the lights.

That's what I was told. And you're sort of off in safety. Where is it off in safety? We had to, we had to work in the dark. It wasn't the worst thing in the world.

It was cold though. It was the middle of winter. And then when you go up, because the media bit is right next to in the Everton ground is right next to the hospitality bits. So you get all the people who've paid a lot of money, which means that all the people, like all the staff and the stewards and stuff are all like catering for like all the rich people paid a lot of money to be there. So there's people opening doors for you and going, welcome, sir.

It's this way. Anything I can do for you and stuff. It's like being in a five star hotel. It was, it was great. I would happily do it again next weekend.

But that, I think from what I gathered wasn't maybe the highlight. The highlight was you had a separate media session, whatever you call it, with two players. And one of them was the infamous Henry Pollack. You know, so you got to speak to him and listen to him, I suppose. Tell me about that, because you know, in South Africa, he's the most hated guy that we don't know, because we didn't even know where he was when we wanted to boo him.

We booed the wrong guy. I mean, really, come on, guys. They asked him about that. They said, they said, what did you think when they booed Guy Pepper, thinking it was you? And he said, yeah, it was weird.

I sat on the bench thinking, why are they booing him? Like, normally that's me. He's, um, I, I've said this, we've talked about Henry Pollack on this podcast before, and that I kind of like him now. My kind of thing is that, or I don't like any English rugby player. So anyone who is deliberately dislikable, then he's kind of like, I kind of like them more than the ones who pretend to be likable, but aren't, you know what I mean?

Like that's kind of my point of view on it. And he, because he's, whether you want to call him Vin Hatter or whatever, he's there. He's talking to the media. He gives his time. He answers honestly.

You don't feel like you're getting a media trained answer from him. Like he's, he's not an idiot. He's not stupid. He, he knows what he's saying. And he doesn't like, he's not a hothead.

He doesn't say stuff that you shouldn't say. That's going to get him into trouble. But he's kind of, you can tell that the journalists like talking to him and that he doesn't mind talking to the journalists. You know, it's pretty clear. We all know that he doesn't mind the spotlight and we need more of that in rugby.

And I did a, I did a short video that I posted all over the place recently about. You've got these like elite level sports people, rugby players who want to play international sports in big stadiums on TV in front of thousands of people in the stadium, millions of people on TV, but don't want to give interviews. It's like, that doesn't make any sense to me. It's such a contradiction. Like I want to be at the top of the world, but I don't want to be famous.

It doesn't work like that. You are famous. And Henry Pollock leans into that. And so he was talking about being booed by South Africans. And he was kind of like, I was kind of thinking that he's a young guy, you know, he's in his early twenties, this guy.

And I can imagine in 10 years, he might reflect on this period of his life and be like, God, that was crazy. What a thing for a young guy to be doing. But like I said, he's not stupid. And I think he knows what he's doing. He's self-aware and he's the most talked about rugby player in England.

And by the way, he is like it or not really, really good at rugby as well. It's not like he's a terrible player. So, um, I kind of, I respect him. You know, I, I, I'm not saying I would be mates with the guy. I'm not saying that we would hang out and bri together and stuff, but, um, I don't, I don't think I dislike him any more than I dislike any other England player.

One thing that I've learned from talking to players and coaches and stuff is that the person you see on TV, like you just mentioned, or at the stadium running out and, you know, waving at the crowd or whatever, it's typically not the person that he actually is when you speak to him. Even the women as well. There's a huge difference between the personal, the public person and the actual real person. I mean, talking to a guy like Cameron Hanukom, he's extremely shy. Um, Alberto Clavo is shy.

I mean, all those guys that I often speak to are typically completely different to what they were saying. I want to ask you this last question before we move on from Andy Pollack is when you talk to him, you know, you can see that he's either cocky or wind gut, like you just mentioned, or it was literally just something that he, that he plays up. You know, you know, if somebody is actually a little bit cocky, let's go. I'm not sure if that's the exact right English word, but you know what I'm getting at here? Yeah, no, he definitely is cocky.

And it's not like, it's not like it's an act. And when the camera's cut, he completely changes. Like though you hear stories about, um, John Lydon or Johnny Rotten, the lead singer from the Sex Pistols was this big, ridiculous character. And then he'd be interviewed and he'd be like this horrible person in the interview saying all these horrible things and stuff, because that's his persona. And then he'd go cut.

And then he'd go to the interview. Was that okay? Was that all right? Did I, was that, you know, it's not like that he is on the pitch. I guess the way that he gets the best out of himself is to, is to get himself in that frame of mind where he does like poses to the camera and stuff and pulls faces and stuff.

And like I said, it works because he's a good player and he plays well. Um, he is probably, I can imagine if you just get him at home, he's a bit more toned down, but I don't think it's a complete act though. I don't, I don't think he's like a character actor or a method actor or anything. I think he is, he's a, he's an exaggerated version of himself rather than a complete character. And like you said, we need more of those.

I agree with you. We actually discussed it last night on Lacroix, who we think is not Henry Pollack, but you know, more public face should be in sort of his consensus landed on Sasha. He's got the profile, he's got the looks and the personality and the skills and everything sort of counts in his favor. And you know, when you're young, you should strike the iron while it's hot, you know, it's an earning opportunity. You know, I, I, I totally get it.

Anyway, let's just move on quickly to the nation's championship. I don't want to hop on this too much because we discussed it as well, but you are the one, you are the one that pointed out that Southern Hemisphere and Northern Hemisphere is a lot of baloney. You're going to end up supporting the other hemisphere so that your own team in the other hemisphere actually ends up above your, your supposed teammates. They're not your teammates. This whole, this whole conference, this whole championship, you know, I talked long ago about the rugby championship and now they've made it the nation's championship.

It's a bit of a, I don't know, sort of something that they scribbled on the back of a cigarette box over lunch once, you know, at the weekend, I suppose, and not properly thought out. Yeah, exactly. And so I didn't notice this myself. Someone pointed it out to me and I can't remember who it was, but maybe I saw it on social media or something, but it is the case of, because you don't play the teams in your own pool and the six nations and the rugby championship doesn't count towards it. You want the other nations, as you just said, in your own pool to lose so that you can get up and how, like in week one, when Wales were top, we're like, oh, okay, well we need Australia to beat France now so that we can stay top and stuff.

And it's, um, yeah, it's kind of trying to create this hemisphere rivalry, which I've said plenty of times on this podcast is much more of a thing in the Southern hemisphere is like, even you read like articles in like the New Zealand Herald or something, and they'll talk about a super rugby match and they go, this super rugby match was great. And they go, and those bastards in the North should be paying attention to how we're doing it and stuff. You will never read a review of a URC match for a top 14 match or premiership match. And they're saying this was great. And those bastards down South should look how we do it.

It will never happen, but you can scarcely read a Southern hemisphere, particularly Australia and New Zealand article without them going on those Northern hemisphere guys. I can't stand them. So it was much more of a one-sided thing. Anyway, I have to say that I haven't seen. Since this has come in, they've kind of lent into it in social media.

So the rugby, uh, the nation's championship has got its own social media and it's like the North versus South thing is like the whole of its branding, the whole of its thing. But I haven't really seen the fans kind of go with it on social media. I have to say, I haven't seen people going. Oh, you see the South. We, we were better this weekend.

I think it's partially because kind of the results have been sort of even, um, but it's also because you, you, you don't cheer for your rivals. Like as again, something I've said in the past, everybody else in the six nations hates England way more than we will ever hate South Africa or New Zealand this. And that comes from like more than just rugby. Um, so yes, so you, it don't think it's kind of gone with it. And this thing of playing or having pools, but having playing teams, not in your own pool, it's very rugby at the moment.

And I don't know, I don't watch enough American sports to know. I assume this comes from American sports, like NFL or basketball or something. I don't know. I'm guessing, but it's very weird. It's such a rugby thing.

And it's such a, it's one of those things where like your, your partner comes and ask you like, what are you watching? And you tell them what you're watching. They go, how does it work? And you kind of go, right. It works.

Basically you've got all these teams and you've got all these teams and then they play each other and stuff. And it just takes that extra amount of explaining. And then they say, well, I thought Japan was in the Northern hemisphere and you go, yes, but it's, you know, but I am actually, um, I'm actually, you know, the Northern hemisphere wins either way, because as we know, South Africa or Northern hemisphere these days, anyway. Oh yeah. That's a little deep that you, you, you know, threw in there at the end and we never know because SA Rugby is reviewing all commitments in July.

So we'll probably hear something from them in the next week or two, I suppose, because we're getting into a dead spot now, two weeks of curry cup rugby, you know, yawn. I don't know what I'm going to be doing to keep myself busy for two weeks because there's nothing to talk about, I suppose. And you just mentioned the word rivalry there, rivals. And I thought, you know what? We've got the greatest rivalry tour coming up in August, but now we're supposed to be on the same side.

It just doesn't work, man. Come on. You just, you know, contradicting yourself here. Anyway, that's not what we're here to talk about. You're wearing your, your whale shirt for a specific reason, because this weekend, another yet another re-jig Springbok side with four debutants and a new number 10.

Versace, I suppose, you know, and we know where they are, but I'm just, you know, we thought we had a problem at 10, but it seems like there's a factory of them down here as well. Playing Wales. So the thing is, we know what the Springboks are up to. We took them out just now, but what's Wales up to? What, you mentioned that they were up, they were first on the log after the first round and obviously they slipped back since then.

But you know what, what can we expect from Wales? You can expect to beat Wales. We finished bottom of the six nations the last time you played us. I don't know if you guys can even remember this game happened. It's seared into my brain as a traumatic experience.

You beat us 73 nil in Cardiff. And I made a video about it. You were there with Paul and we still, we still, I must be honest, you had the guts to do an instant reaction after that. And I remember, I felt after the Bulls lost against Leinsten in the final, I was very, I wasn't in the mood, but you still did it. And I did it.

But I mean, suppose for you, it must be even worse. Kudos to you six months down the line, how many months it was ago. But I remember. Yeah. So Wales have in the last four games, Wales have won three.

So does that mean that we're good again? No. So in the last game, we played Argentina away and we lost 35 21, which isn't so bad. It's kind of okay. The Welsh media kind of reaction to it has been quite, in my opinion, over the top.

And I've said plenty of times, and I used to mince my words on this. There's just no point anymore. The Welsh rugby media is, it does a massive disservice to the game in Wales, in my opinion, and probably undermines it and harms it. And they kind of like, because we won three games in a row and then we lost that one by two scores, everyone was like, ah, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a, it's a wake up call. It's a reality check and stuff.

But, you know, you know, me and there, I'm, I go into more depth than just superficial and things. So I watch every Wales game twice. I slow it down. I take clips, you know, and I look at the stats. I look at stats from two different websites to see if they match.

And I kind of knew that we weren't that good. All of the signs in the three wins that we had. Italy at home in the six nations and look, look what Italy have done since the barbarians and Twickenham. We beat them by two points. Now you put 80 on them.

Um, and Fiji and now look what Fiji just went and did against England. So I kind of like new watching the games twice, pouring over the stats, doing clips. It's like, oh, we're not that good. Like our defense isn't very good. Our attack isn't very good.

We're better than we were back in November. Definitely. And I think that they're just about getting selection, right? Not perfect, but the selection is better than it was. And the players are a bit more confident and things, but I was like, we're not, we're not anything special.

And so when we went down and played against Argentina, who we know are a team who regularly beat the all blacks, which whales haven't done in 70 years, who kind of regularly beat the spring box or have beaten the spring box quite regularly, uh, recently. And even when, um, like the game in Twickenham, you beat them, but it was a, it was a close game. It was a competitive match. And some of Argentina's players are world-class, like amazing, like world player that he world player of the year level players. I was like, I know we're not as good as them.

So when we went and lost and we had a really bad second quarter, like minute 20 to minute 40 was really bad, but the second half was kind of okay. So I came away from that game, like, oh, you know, it wasn't great, but it wasn't a disaster. It was kind of what I would have expected really. Um, so I was like, oh, it's okay. But people in Wales were like going crazy.

It's stuff about that. We lost this game. So just goes to show the people have short memories and the analysis is superficial. Like one outlet, I'll name it. The BBC wrote that this guy came off.

The bench was prominent. And I checked his stats. He made two carries for zero meters, like, like that's the kind of thing that we're competing against. So all that is to say this last time you played us, it was 73 nil. So for me, if we score and keep you below 50, we've made significant progress, um, for, for this game in Durban.

And also, again, now you're, like I said, you have to travel back to South Africa, you know, time travel, you know, not time travel, time travel from Argentina. The players won't know what day it is. Yeah. That's the thing. I mean, we saw with Scotland that didn't affect them.

I actually was surprised how well Scotland coped with both the traveling and the altitude. And now this game is in Durban. So altitude is not a problem. Humidity might be. I'm not sure what the weather's like in, in winter, but it's still by the coast.

I'm not sure. And then obviously, now let's talk about the Spemox quickly. A bit of a different side. Rossi now having a policy of blooding young players surrounded by experienced players, which is, which I like. And the one thing that stands out for this, of the Spemox side for me is Vusi Moyo.

You know, he's, he's been there, thereabouts, under 20, 21, but suddenly he's in the main group, Spemox group, and he's starting. What's your take on the Spemox side? You know, after two, two rounds with different teams every single time, beating Scotland, they're probably the best Scotland they can, almost the best Scotland, I suppose. Well, you know, you, Jones not there and Das Grey not there, but pretty much, you know, the best Scotland side. Getting close, but never really in danger of winning.

Although I didn't feel like that on Saturday. And then what do you think of the Spemox side now coming up? What are you, what are you seeing in the Spemox development? Let's call it that. I really like how Razzi, especially with halfbacks, puts new guys in and gives them the best chance of succeeding.

Back when Wales were coached by Warren Gatland, when we were good under Warren Gatland, there would always be one game in November, usually, and it would be against a tier two nation, like a Tonga or somebody. And he would like change the entire team and like throw like all of the fringe players in at once. And it would always be a dreadful game. And we'd always like win by like two points or something against a tier two nation and stuff. And everyone go, well, that was terrible.

Whereas Razzi, I mean, let's look at Papier last week. So this is a guy who's been out in the wilderness for South Africa for years. Razzi brings him back in. He plays him in a Bulls heavy team. I'm surrounded by his club teammates with his Bulls halfback partner, Andre Pollard at Loftus, where he plays his club rugby.

Talk about setting up a guy to succeed. Like Embrose can not after that say anything like they set me up to fail or it wasn't a fair chance or something. They gave him the best chance to succeed that you realistically could ask for. Or if you go back to a couple of years ago, um, 2024, um, South Africa played Wales in Cardiff and they played Jordan Hendrickson at 10 and they played him in a very Sharks heavy backline with literally his brother playing Scrum half. So you talk about familiarity.

It's there. And that cohesion is there. And again, with Fousey Moyo playing in Durban, where he plays his club rugby, plenty of Sharks players in this team, even though is the Scrum half he's with isn't Grant Williams or someone like that. It's Cobus Reinhach who has been around the block is a very experienced player. And it is a Scrum half who can say, Hey kids, I'll take control for the next couple of plays.

Don't worry about it. You know, and with the, is it, was it, is it dear Lendy and Creel starting behind him? Yeah. Yeah. It's old firm.

Yeah. Yeah. Like, okay. So the cohesion isn't there in the same way, cause it's not club teammates, but it's like the most experienced winning lists, people around him who can take the pressure off him if he needs it. And you got Gaza on the bench and stuff.

So I really like how Razzi brings in these new players and gives them the best shot at succeeding. I don't know if you remember him there. We did a podcast. God, it was probably a way longer ago than we care to remember where you asked me for possible Bulls signings. And you asked me to go out and scout some players to pick.

Oh yeah, I remember. Yeah. And you said we needed a new fly half. And Vucin Murillo was one guy who I mentioned. I was like, this guy's the under 20s.

And I was just like, who's that? Yeah. Yeah, yeah, I remember. Under 20s fly half, really highly rated, people kind of murmuring about him. And he's at the Sharks and stuff.

And obviously it's with the Sharks, it's, you never know whether they're going to sign a Springbok or a Lions player or whoever. But I actually, you know, by the end of the URC season, I was looking at kind of the team that the Sharks were picking. This is slightly off on a tangent, but I think if JP backs the youth of the Sharks, I think he could have a really exciting generation of players on his hands with this guy, Yakko Williams as well, the winger. Siyaya, who I wonder might've gotten a go in this game if he wasn't injured. I think he's injured.

Ethan Hooker as well. And then you've got obviously, um, Andres de Hazen's in there. Jorenzo Julius, we know and love. He's a great player. Bradley Davids at Scrum Half.

You know, it's a, it's an exciting group of players they've got there at the Sharks. And it's great to see Razzy take a chance on this kid with an experienced team around him, a monstrous forward pack. When that team was named to play Wales, I'm like, oh, these guys are going to eat us alive in the forwards. And you are. Um, Argentina bullied us up front and they're not as physical as you.

And, um, so yeah, I, I, I, uh, as with most things, it seems that Razzy does it the best of anybody. Strictly about Paul de Villiers. I wanted to get your take on Paul de Villiers. Now, third game in a row that he starts, um, number six, I was always thinking that maybe Marcu might end up being the crown prince, but he seems to be a bit of a bench specialist. Call it that for a variety of reasons, because he plays different positions.

Hooker, you can play eighth man, whatever you want him to do. But you're in the presence of Paul de Villiers. I mean, like almost like a human dynamo. Cause he's like, you know, that this manian devil, but every time you look, he's there, you know, that kind of thing. What do you think of him?

Well, he's playing for his career, isn't he? Cause he's now competing with Sierra Coliseum, not only at springboard level, but club level, but all you can ask for is a chance. And what was it? Was it, um, coach Kennedy? Yeah.

He said, you have to be ready to be ready. You have to be like a fighter pilot in the, in the, in the mess at the, at the airbase. You have to be ready to scramble at any moment. And it seems like Paul de Villiers was ready to be ready. And when his opportunities came along, he's taken it and you're right.

He's like a little ping ball pinging around the pitch. He's not the biggest guy, but you notice he's there. And, uh, I don't, I can't criticize him really. I'm sure there'll be things that he's not done, right. But he's, it's his first couple of caps.

So yeah, um, all, all credit to him. All credit to him. Okay. So now we know what to expect in Durban. Um, for me, the game of the weekend probably is going to be the All Blacks versus Ireland.

Just briefly. Number one, what do you think of the All Blacks under Dave Rennie? Cause you've now seen a couple of games with him in charge. And then obviously Andy Farrell, not traveling to Japan and, uh, Rian made the joke last night. We said, I think he's going to ask to play all our games in November.

I took him because if Ireland can do it, why can't we do it? Why do we have to travel? Kind of a thing. Tell me about what you see. Number one, about the All Blacks and then Ireland, what do you expect?

Yeah, no, I think you don't want to play in Twickenham in November. You want to play in maybe Italy, maybe in much nicer weather, much warmer. Um, but I think, yeah, I have been, it's only been two games. So it's a bit early to jump to conclusions. It seems like if I take it back to the pre-2023 World Cup where they kept Ian Foster in charge, but they changed all of his assistant coaches.

It was a bit of a crisis. The All Blacks were in, that was actually off the back of them losing a test series to Ireland in New Zealand. And they completely changed the starting 15. It's one of these things in rugby. People like to talk about, oh, they changed the system.

They changed the tactics. They changed the tab. Yep. They completely changed the selection after that. And Dave Rennie has come in, he's picked Reuben Love at 10, which was a big call, but I back it.

I think it was the right call. They've gone with that Hurricanes team that dominated super rugby. So they've got the Hurricanes nine, 10, 12. I can't remember if it's the 13 as well. Hurricanes wing is in there as well.

And I think he's just going to be going super consistent now from now to the World Cup. I think he's going to pick his team and stick with it and get as many reps in as possible. What has really caught my eye about the All Blacks so far is something that was the case under Razor and is, if anything, gone even more under Dave Rennie. Again, it's very early, only two games in, but under Razor, the All Blacks did more passes in a game of rugby than any other team in the world. Like regularly 250 passes in a game, which is crazy.

Like the most teams don't break 200. And in the game against Italy, the All Blacks passed the ball over 300 times against Italy in a single game of rugby. I can't remember ever seeing that before. 300 passes in a game of rugby, crazy. And I think I was chatting to Harry about this and Harry was saying that the All Blacks and the Springboks are kind of more divergent now than they've ever been.

They're more opposite now in terms of how they play. And for all the talk of Tony ball and stuff, the Springboks at the moment are so direct. They're so direct. Yes, it might be, they're not running up the middle, they're running in the wings, but it is literally, you pass the guy, the next guy, the ball, and he runs forward. And if there's someone in front of him, he runs into them.

And if there's no one in front of him, he scores a try. Like that's how it goes. Or sometimes there's someone in front of him and he goes through them like they're not there anyway. But they're still very direct, the Springboks, whereas the All Blacks are not so direct. But they're still playing some good stuff.

And you saw against Italy that the thing that still sets the All Blacks apart, that still makes the All Blacks the All Blacks, is if they get half a chance, half a break, it's try time. And as a Wales fan, who I've never seen Wales beat the All Blacks in my lifetime, I know exactly how it feels to get to the end of an 18 minutes against the All Blacks. And you think, ah, we gave them a good game day, you know, we limited their opportunities and stuff. And then you look up at the scoreboard and you've lost by 40. How did that happen?

Because they're so good at a small chance, turning it into a try. And that seems to have been back in these last two games. Players playing with confidence, again, picking those Hurricanes players who are on form. And I think that's something that Dave Reddy is getting right at the moment, is the selection for me. He's getting the selection right.

And we know if you talk to someone like Jake White, he says, the first thing he thinks about when he wakes up and the last thing he thinks about before he goes to sleep is selection. And I think that's probably something that maybe Razor was getting wrong and other coaches have gotten wrong. So, and he's coming up against Ireland and the biggest debate around Ireland for several years now has been selection. And I have to tell you Enver, that my Irish friends are not confident. I'm not sensing confidence at all coming from anyone in Ireland right now.

And I think if New Zealand, I feel like there's a lot of bottles at banks. How many times have I said this on this show? People keep complaining, Irish fans keep complaining, but they keep winning. So even if they play badly, they still win most of the time, not always, but most of the time. And so if you're frustrated, a frustrated Ireland fan, you're even more frustrated because if you complain, you sound like, what are you complaining about, bro?

We won. But now if they lose by two or three scores against the All Blacks, which I think is very possible, that reminds me, I need to do my super brew. Then I think you're going to see a big outpouring from Ireland if they lose this game, because I think there's a lot of bottled up tension in Irish rugby at the moment. And if they lose badly at Eden Park, then I think that you'll see that unleashed. Fortress Eden Park, for that matter.

Ireland, you know, Farrell's not, he's been criticised for not building depth like Rossi has now done. I mean, every week there's another team. I mean, how deep are the Springboks at the moment? What's the story of Ireland? Is he still sticking to his old guns or is there signs of building a bit more depth?

There are signs of a change and the Leinster domination of the team is kind of subsiding a little bit. There's a lot more Ulster players in there now, particularly, and a few Connors players getting game time as well. Less so Munster, which is another story for another day. A bit, but again, you do get the sense that sometimes he picks a Leinster player for the cohesion and stuff, but it's difficult to argue whether that Leinster player is really the best player for that position or for that team or the best player in their position in Ireland. And you do get still some quite unheralded Leinster players get capped and they don't set the world alight.

And maybe they haven't really set the world alight for Leinster either, but they get in still. Jamie Osborne's a great player and I think he's got a really long Ireland future ahead of him. I'm really impressed with him when I watch him play, but they played him on the wing. He's normally either a centre or a fullback, but they played him on the wing and you kind of like, is that really the best selection? So it does seem to be loosening up a little bit, but you still feel like it's reluctantly from Farrell.

You just mentioned New Zealand will take the smallest chance. So that means, you know, exploiting a small crack in the defence. And when I say crack in the defence, the name Sam Prendergast jumps to mind suddenly. They've, you know, sort of wrapped him in cotton balls a little bit and he came back towards the end of the UFC, did quite well in the final. He played really well.

They have Sean Landry Pollock, let's be honest. But I see rumours about him being targeted by the All Blacks specifically, maybe because of his little bit of, you know, he's a bit brittle on defence, let's call it that. He's targeted by everybody for that exact reason. He seems to be standing up a little bit better recently, although he's only played one game. This still comes back to my thing, always about Sam Prendergast is I don't think he plays enough.

I think some people want to take him out of the spotlight and stuff. I'm like, play him more. He needs, he needs more game time. He's a young guy. Stop resting him so much.

So yes, they definitely will target him. But then again, like I said, the All Blacks aren't that direct. So, but he's playing against the 12 who'll probably be running at him. He's a guy you'll know very well in Geordie Barrett. So, uh, there's probably, yeah.

And you see, they called up Rico this week as well. They called up Rico Ioane. Another teammate. All right. Yeah.

Okay. So your expectation, the All Blacks might just take that one. Yeah, I think so. I think a comfortable All Blacks win is the likelihood. I'd love to be wrong, but I think that's where my money is going.

Just on that subject of the South Africa, New Zealand rugby diverging. I had a podcast on that on Sunday on Lacquer Rugby Pod. I'll put the link up here. We talked about the kicking spectrum, South Africa kicking so much and New Zealand not kicking at all. It's like worlds apart.

And it's quite an interesting one. But he also talked about the aerial game. The game is being played on the grass, but it's also being played in the air. So there's now two. It's like 4D chess now.

We talked about that. That's quite an interesting one. All right. Let's just move on quickly. Last of the Nations Championship before I want to talk about the Springbok Women.

I think the other big game will probably be Argentina versus England. Argentina now losing the first game against Scotland, beating Wales. Now fighting in the river. We always know New Zealand. Argentina takes a while to find their feet again, you know, when they start playing internationals together again.

England lost badly against South Africa, beat Fiji. What are you expecting from them going to Argentina, traveling to Argentina? Because they've been doing a bit of traveling in this temperature. Yes, absolutely. You never know with Argentina, do you?

How many times does Argentina win back-to-back games? It doesn't feel like it happens very often. So you never know. Argentina can look amazing one week and then not turn up the next. With England...

Having been in a press conference now with Steve Baldwick, I understand why the press find him so frustrating. He's not charismatic and he's so overly positive. And he's like, he's so, it's so funny the way that he's like, he kind of doesn't want to answer the questions or he makes his own statement and stuff. He's trying to be a politician, but he's not very good at it. And so from England, most of the reaction after the Fiji game was that it means nothing because Fiji was so dreadful.

The Fiji were awful in that game that you kind of take nothing from it. And you look at the star players, the two guys who scored the most tries in that game being Henry Pollock and Noah Killory, the winger, young winger. They're probably not going to start. They're probably not going to start the next game. The center partnership is probably going to change.

They don't know what's going to happen at fullback. So you don't know. It's a big unknown coming to this game. I think Argentina owe England one. I don't think they've beaten England in a long time, but the England seem to have a bit of a hoodoo over Argentina.

So you never know. I think if you don't want, it's one of those where if you don't like England, which I assume is most, you know, sane, well-balanced human beings, you, you kind of want England to win this game in a weird way, but long-term, obviously short term, if they get smashed, it's great. But long-term, if England win and win well, then it raises, it eases the pressure on Baldwick. And so he'll keep his job for longer. So we'll keep seeing them pick up really bad results.

So this is the thing. This is something that gets said in football a lot in, in the Premier League, obviously living in the UK, football is everything. And you hear football conversations. You need to listen to what your opposition fans are saying. If your opposition fans are saying, we want you to keep your current coach.

It's not a good thing. So I think that's what it is at the moment. Okay. Right. Let's talk about the Springbok women.

You sent a message to Eloise Webb, who you interviewed her last year, during the World Cup and the likes. The Springboks really, the women's really surprised everybody who had first off against the USA. I don't know what happened with the USA, a jet lag or something, but what a, what a first half it was. Second half, not so great. And then Loftus was a completely different story.

What do you see about this from the Springbok women? Are they improving? Was it a bit of a fluke? What's happening? Yeah.

DMing Springbok women on Instagram is just my life now. It's just normal. I know, I know, I know. The life of a rugby celebrity. I know, I know.

So I, I was really impressed that that first half in Ellis Park, nobody saw that coming. Nobody saw them. And even into the second half, there was 35 nil up at one point. I think for anybody who doesn't know, for any men's rugby fans who doesn't know, this is kind of like USA, a sort of Scotland level, maybe, um, if you think like the quality of Scotland in men's rugby, maybe, maybe a little bit less, maybe kind of, uh, between Scotland and Italy, maybe, um, kind of that level kind of top tech comfortably top 10, but not one of the top teams is where USA women are in the women's game for South Africa to be 35 nil up in the, at one point in the second half was crazy. Nobody saw that coming.

And then actually I do think even though they lost the second game because it was so competitive firstly from, from, for the USA, it's great that they show that they can do that because this team was really in a rut last year going into the world cup. So they're now showing signs of coming out of that. So for the USA, it's great, but I think having a really close competitive game for the Springbok women where they're now disappointed to lose. And I saw a quote from coach Swayce where he said, if he offered him a drawn series two months ago, he would have taken it. So it's now be slightly disappointed.

You haven't won. It shows the progress that has been made with this team. And if anybody hasn't watched the highlights of that second game, even though I know you lost, please do, because some of those tries that were scored were unbelievable. And when I interviewed coach Swayce, he said, oh, we don't really have, you know, razzle-dazzle backs and things. Whereas in this game, some of the backs tries that were scored were unbelievable.

And there was one disallowed try where Yaki Celius takes the ball from behind her own try line and runs the whole pitch and scores. Unfortunately it was disallowed, but definitely go back and watch the highlights of this game because the tries were spectacular, really nice level rugby, really good level rugby, good core skills. Um, and I, it's one of those, it's such a cliche in rugby, especially international level, when a team loses, they say, oh, it's all about growth. We take the learnings and stuff. But the Springbok women are like the one team in the world where you're like, oh, you actually believe it.

You actually believe that they learn every game in the Springbok. Women are playing loads of games. This is it goes my microphone. Springbok women are playing loads of games this year. They're playing over in Fiji next.

They're doing a tour to Fiji. Um, and then they've got some great games. This, uh, no, well, it's not in November, but end of year tour. They're playing Wales. They're playing Ireland twice.

They're playing all Blacks, Black Ferns. Again, on the same day as we played all those shows, played all Blacks. Yeah. Big one. Yeah.

It's really exciting times for this team. And even though they lost, I think that, um, it was still a great step forward for the Springbok women in this. And remember there was no Nadine Roos. There was no Hele the number eight. They were both out injured.

So I think it's, uh, it's been a very productive couple of weeks for Umsweis. All right. Now you've been following them quite closely. You've spoken to Umsweis. I've spoken to Umsweis.

Paul and I have spoken to Umsweis. How much of this sort of resurgence is firstly due to the coaching change? Umsweis, the prettiest youth rugby coach, I would think. And also the focus that's being put on women's rugby now in South African rugby specifically. It's now the second biggest priority behind the men's game ahead of the sevens and everything else.

What do you ascribe this, this rise of the, of the Springbok women's team to? Yeah, you've to put, to put it basically, I mean, unfortunately it's a, it's a very uncomplicated answer, which is this. A lot of nations in women's rugby aren't really trying, aren't really putting any effort into it. And that's why a T a nation like Canada can be so high up when they've got no infrastructure below the international team, because the competition isn't that hot. You've got Wales have kind of showing signs of coming out of it now, but really in the mire.

Scotland's look like they're, they're dropping, unfortunately. Ireland's are strong now, but go back five years, they were nowhere. And it is the case now of if you kind of put basic structure in place with what they're doing with the, the, uh, domestic competition in South Africa, having a proper coach, an established experience, successful coach in Swayze coming in, it's very easy to take big steps forward because a lot of your competition isn't putting that kind of infrastructure in. Like the coaches who are coaching the six nation sides don't have anywhere close to the CV that Swayze has. And I think Swayze will admit himself that, um, he's the right man for the right job with the women as well, because this is a guy who is got huge rugby IQ.

We know having spoken to him, just how like encyclopedic he is on rugby, but he was there with the Springbok men. And maybe that wasn't the right job for him at that time. Whereas this feels like it is the right job for him. And it feels like he loves it. And he feels like he has a purpose there, which I think is a really important thing as well as he feels it's not just a job for him.

It's a purpose. He's serving a, he's doing a, doing a duty there. I think he, maybe he feels like, and by having kind of those basic steps, basic structures in place, you've made a lot of progress really quickly. And kind of the, the exciting thing for you or the scary thing for all the rest of us is you've, you feel like you're encouraged now and you're like, Oh, okay, this is going well. Well, let's do more of it.

And that's scary for the rest of us, because that just means that you're going to be overtaking even more of us even more quickly. Yeah. I just want to say something about SA Rugby. You know, they arranged these games against USA on the same day as the Springboks were playing in the same stadium at, you know, just a couple of hours before the main game. And our friend Paul Avernon is going to all of these games and he didn't know until the night before SA Rugby sent an email to say that the women's rugby is on the same.

No communication, no marketing. You know, you want to make a sense of it, you know, do some, you know, go to some trouble, do your own work. Sorry, SA Rugby, but you know, you want us to support you and we are supporting women's rugby on this channel specifically and your channel. But come on, man, do your work. Anyway, you, this was such a pleasure, man.

I enjoyed it immensely. And I really, I just realized how much I missed it. So thank you for making time. Can I quickly tell you one more rivalry story on this? Rivals has kind of been the theme of the podcast.

One more rivalry story. So I had the pleasure of interviewing two Chilean players last night. And one thing I always like to ask players from around the world or people from around the world is about their rivals to see what kind of thing you get. And, you know, with like professional players and stuff, you often get like an answer just like, oh, you know, you know, we wish them the best, you know, got a lot of friends there, you know, that kind of thing. And I asked these Chilean guys, do you cheer for the other Southern South American teams?

Do you cheer for Uruguay when they're not playing you? And one of the guys just goes, never for Uruguay. I will never cheer for Uruguay. And they got really animated talking about this rivalry. And they talked about how in Super Rugby Americas, there's a Chilean team and a Uruguayan team.

And he said that those games can get really nasty. And he said that last time they played, there was a fight in the tunnel and they told the cameras to go away so they could fight with nobody filming them and stuff. And he told me stories about a Sevens match where the Sevens match had to be stopped because there was a fistfight on the pitch between the players like these guys don't like each other. And I love that. Yeah, I love it as well.

You must make sure to send me that when you tell me when it's up so we can post it as well. You make people aware of it. I'd love to watch that. I like that kind of thing. It reminds me a little bit of the North-South rivalry over here.

Maybe not fisticuffs, but you know, there's no love lost here. We might, you know, support them when they play Leinster in the semifinals, it's almost now. And they might support the Bulls in the final when they're not playing in the final, but you know, arch enemies. That'll never change. I love it.

And there was two of them and I was like, what about Argentina? And one of them was like, no. And the other one was like, yeah, maybe sometimes Chile for Argentina. Yeah, sometimes. And the other guy was like, what?

Judas. All right, can I finish off now? Yes, sorry. So after that belated interjection by you, thank you very much. I appreciate you making time for me.

Like I said, I just realized how much I missed this while I was talking to you. And thank you for that. Absolute pleasure, mate. Any time. This is the Loose Pass Rugby podcast, only on Megaphone Rugby.

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