Brodie Retallick will head offshore after the Rugby World Cup later this year. Photo / Getty Images
Brodie Retallick will head offshore after the Rugby World Cup later this year. Photo / Getty Images
For the past decade, Brodie Retallick has been the gold standard for New Zealand locks.
Making his Super Rugby debut in 2012, he didn’t waste any time in establishing himself as a workhorse and formed a formidable partnership in the engine room alongside Craig Clarke as the Chiefs went onto win the first of two consecutive titles.
He made his All Blacks debut the same year and featured in every one of the team’s tests that year.
Both the Chiefs and All Blacks have seen many incarnations since, but the 2014 World Rugby player of the year has maintained a consistently elite level of play and, now in his final season with the Chiefs before taking his talents offshore, the 31-year-old remains the pinnacle in his position.
In a physically demanding role, maintaining such a level of play for so long can be a tall order, but it’s an area Retallick has continually challenged himself in — particularly in recent years with the emergence of the talented young Chiefs locks.
“I’ve just been trying to keep my standards high and our group is a younger group — so that keeps you competitive,” Retallick told the Herald.
“I also just want to go out on top and playing some of my best footy; I don’t want to be dropping off towards the end of my time here. So, I’ve kind of been challenging myself around that — to keep playing well and making sure I do the right things off the field so I could turn up on a Friday or Saturday night in the best form I can.”
While that has been showing on the field, Retallick said the physical demand of the game was taking more of a toll these days.
“It’s a pretty sore body these days, to be fair. Pretty stiff — it takes a little bit to get out of bed,” he said.
“But you’ve just got to try and keep going and get in the pool or on the bike. At the moment we’re on the road and travelling; travelling doesn’t really help, but just trying to keep the body moving again. It’s probably taking a good two or three days before it comes right these days.”
Chiefs lock Brodie Retallick scores a try against the Crusaders. Photo / Photosport
He has been able to focus on rest and recovery this week as the Chiefs set their sights on the playoffs, with Retallick not named to play in their final regular season match against the Western Force in Perth on Sunday morning.
With 125 games for the Chiefs — and as many as three more to come as the Super Rugby Pacific leaders look to reach the heights of those back-to-back titles again — Retallick will hand the reins over to the young group nipping at his heels in 2024.
Both he and long-time All Blacks locking partner Sam Whitelock will be continuing their careers offshore after the Rugby World Cup later this year, meaning for the first time since 2013 the national team will be looking for a new full-time locking combination.
Retallick’s unavailability for the All Blacks in 2020 due to being on sabbatical in Japan did provide an opportunity for other players to get an extended run in that starting jersey, with Scott Barrett and Patrick Tuipulotu splitting the starts in that year’s Tri Nations.
While locking depth has been a concern recently, both Barrett and Tuipulotu are signed with New Zealand Rugby until the end of the 2025 season, while Tupou Vaa’i, also signed until the end of 2025, has had opportunities to cut his teeth at test level over the past few years with five starts and 13 appearances off the bench.
Retallick said the young locks emerging in the game now should have the national team in good stead once he and Whitelock vacate their positions — noting the packed locking stocks at the Chiefs as a prime example.
“With Tupou, two or three years ago he wasn’t even in the Chiefs and then six months later he was an All Black. That shows how good a player he is, and Lordy [Josh Lord] coming back from a knee injury, with Manaaki [Selby-Rickit] and Naitoa [Ah Kuoi] — the Chiefs locks are a great crew there and they’ve got some great stocks.
“They’re tall men as well, which obviously helps at international level, so I think it’s all looking pretty good.”
