The Prime Minister was mid-air on her way to the East Asia Summit in Cambodia at kick-off, but was able to watch the last 20 minutes after landing in Phnom Penh. Video / Claire Trevett / Jed Bradley
A beaming Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern paid a delighted tribute to the Black Ferns after their Rugby World Cup win against England last night, saying they had made the sport “everyone’s game.”
“Rugby has always been a national sport, but the Black Ferns made it everyone’s game. You can’t puta price on that. They’re amazing.”
Ardern was flying to Cambodia while the Black Ferns were playing and landed with about 20 minutes left to play. She said for her it was “a game of three parts” - the first on a plane, then in a motorcade and then a hotel lobby.
Speaking to reporters in Cambodia last night, she said the Air Force had been passing on game updates sent through their communication system, which she read over a loudspeaker to the rest of the plane.
She then watched about 10 minutes on a phone from her motorcade through Phnom Penh.
She was at the lobby of her hotel, still watching, when the final whistle blew with the Black Ferns ahead 34-31.
Ardern posted a photo on her instagram from there, of herself holding her phone in one hand and punching the air with the other as others crowded around the tiny phone screen and perplexed onlookers watched on.
Asked if it had taken others in the lobby by surprise, Ardern laughed:
“All I think I did was display the same emotion that I think a lot of New Zealanders displayed.”
She said she had been disappointed to have to miss the game - she was heading to Cambodia for the East Asia Summit today.
“You watch an event like that, you know it’s a piece of history. Just to every New Zealander who went out to support the Black Ferns, you’re part of that history. It was a world record crowd on two occasions, and some of the best rugby I’ve seen in years.”
She said she had been in touch with a few of the team to congratulate them, having got to know them over the last few years. She had spent some time with them on Thursday night ahead of the game.
