Rugby: New Zealand Rugby CEO Steve Tew teases Hayley Holt over Richie McCaw relationship

Hayley Holt and Steve Tew (inset)

Outgoing New Zealand Rugby CEO Steve Tew has revealed who he believes is the best All Black of all time - and poked a bit of fun at Breakfast presenter Hayley Holt at the same time.

When asked by Holt on Breakfast who was the greatest player to pull on the All Blacks jersey, Tew took the opportunity to tease Holt when he picked Richie McCaw - who Holt dated for two years.

"I think that's a really hard question to answer but in my time - he's a person you know reasonably well," Tew grinned, as Holt's Breakfast colleagues laughed.

"Richie was a fantastic captain, and an outstanding athlete and the best All Black I saw play."

Holt took it in stride, joking along with a follow-up question, asking Tew "how have you kept these players - such as the person I know reasonably well - in New Zealand?", to which Tew believed the special nature of the All Blacks environment played a large role.

Holt and McCaw dated from 2007 to 2009. McCaw met his now-wife, Black Sticks player Gemma Flynn, in 2013, at which point Holt, who was a radio host on More FM, gave her some handy advice.

"Well, she could say yes to the Christmas morning road bike ride," Holt said.

"I had several opportunities, but basically I decided to stay in my pyjamas and drink champagne," she laughed.

"Do you think that's why the relationship ended?" co-presenter Marc Ellis asked.

"You didn't go on the bike ride, but stayed home and got boozed instead?"

"Oh, I think there were many reasons why that relationship ended," Holt joked in response.

Her advice may well have proven to be sound, as McCaw married Flynn in 2017, with the couple's first child, Charlotte Rose McCaw, being born last December.