Nick Mowbray, Dame Julie Christie, Eddie Jones and Kerri Williams. Photo / NZ Herald, Photosport
A decision to extend nominations for new directors indicates strong candidates are thin on the ground for New Zealand Rugby; All Blacks and Lions test mooted for Las Vegas; And the Eddie Jones exposés keep coming. All in this week’s Sports Insider column...
OPINION
New Zealand Rugby has quietly extended the nomination deadline for directors to apply for its brand new board.
This is not good news as there is one inescapable conclusion most will take from the delay – that not enough strong candidates have put their names forward.
While not positive news, it’s not particularly surprising.
Being on the board of New Zealand Rugby (NZR) often attracts a disproportionate amount of attention to other directorships and in recent years has proven to be a nightmare for many credentialled and well-intentioned types, including departing chair Dame Patsy Reddy.
Very few directors have added to their reputations as the Pilkington Review laid bare the current board’s challenges around governance and securing the game’s financial future in this country.
It might be that potential candidates for a new nine-person independent board have been put off due to seven current directors misreading the room and putting their names forward to remain in place.
Who would want to work with anybody who stuffed things up in the first place?
Or it could be that smart-thinking contenders realise the mountain is too high to scale and NZR’s problems are so deep and intrinsic that they can’t be solved?
They could be right on both counts.
Either way, NZR used its recruitment company Sheffield to discreetly notify candidates that the closing date for applications of last month had been extended until the end of this working week.
“[We] felt it best to extend the closing date slightly to allow any remaining candidates the chance to put their names forward,” said the Sheffield correspondence.
The “NZR Appointments and Remunerations Panel” (ARP), convened last month, will interview selected contenders late this month, it added.
The chair, Rachel Taulelei, and fellow panel members, ex-NZR directors Mike Eagle and Peter Kean as well as Kirsten Patterson, Neil Paviour-Smith and Pauline Winter, have an unenviable and almost impossible job in front of them.
Not only do they need to ratify a board before Christmas but also one which can collectively take on three immense and immediate challenges, including the new Sky broadcasting deal and the business structure of a dysfunctional ‘not fit for purpose’ organisation.
Firstly, the nine directors must elect a chairperson. There is a reasonable chance that all nine may not even know each other, let alone have had the time to determine who among them is best to lead.
From my observations and what I hear around the traps, Catherine Savage, of New Zealand Superannuation Fund fame, seems to be the best of the current directors and probably appeals as chair, given her institutional knowledge.
In Sports Insider’s view, there are New Zealanders who could make a difference and steer our national game back on track.
The appointments panel will understand the complex matrix of skills required among directors to achieve that goal – but finding (and convincing) talented people to put their hand up will be challenging, as evidenced by the nomination extension.
In no particular order, the new board will need to understand the byzantine world of international rugby politics to ensure we are not shafted at World Rugby level, have an intrinsic feel for community and grassroots needs and be capable of making brave and potentially unpopular decisions.
Lastly, they will need an acutely sensitive bullshit filter, which sees through the nonsense American private equity partners Silver Lake and others have foisted on us while also having directors who know how the start-up world really works.
I can think of a clutch of prominent Kiwis who could add real value to a new board, even if some clearly have conflicts of interest that would need to be managed.
These include some identities that might seem left-field but in my view have the experience, networks and understanding of the real business world.
They include people like Zuru founder Nick Mowbray (who may have no interest in rugby but certainly knows the tech and start-up worlds intimately). Likewise for Rod Drury, who now has time on his hands after stepping away from another successful Kiwi start-up in Xero.
I also think of others like Dame Julie Christie, who has been inexplicably passed over previously when applying for the board and has an understanding of content in a Kiwi context unmatched by anybody else.
So too does Ric Salizzo, who has successfully rebirthed his Sports Café show.
Then there’s the likes of super agents Simon Porter and Craig Innes. Yes, both have conflicts of interest but could surely serve on an advisory board to the full board. People like Sky’s fandom expert Justin Nelson and corporate affairs boss Chris Major also could be considered.
Within the sports world, there are others like former Sky boss John Fellet and Rob Smith who could add be useful in advisory capacities.
For the board itself, there are also proven and successful performers in our corporate world like Fonterra’s Miles Hurrell who could add value, and other under-utilised identities like John Hart.
Throwing the bathwater out with the baby is a danger around institutional knowledge with current directors but there are enough former directors of merit who could be revisited, including Auckland businessman Richard Dellabarca and also Kean.
Other names who could be considered but who I doubt have put their names forward include former NZR executives Dame Therese Walsh and Peter Parussini, both of whom have kicked on to impressive corporate careers.
Personally, I would be trying my utmost to convince our first World Cup-winning All Blacks captain and current chair of the Players Association David Kirk to put his name forward.
Your country needs you, Kirky.
Beyond deciding on a chair, the new board also needs to immediately address the cumbersome executive structure foisted on us after the Silver Lake deal, where NZR effectively has two chief executives with it being unclear who is actually in charge.
With Craig Fenton walking from the new role as boss of the money-making arm, New Zealand Rugby Commercial (NZRC), after only 10 months in the job creates the opportunity to right an obvious wrong.
There should be one CEO with one capable executive and his/her team reporting to him/her on commercial matters, while another does the same on community needs. If that sounds suspiciously like what we had in place pre-Silver Lake, you’re right.
As it stands now, the rugby public has no idea whose vote counts the most on important matters (like whether more All Blacks tests are hived off to other bigger economies ... see following item) – NZR’s or NZRC’s?
Once that madness is sorted, we then need a board who steers the executive and not the other way around.
Then somebody has to get on to completing NZR’s most pressing negotiation – the Sky TV rights renewal – given its significance as the union’s biggest revenue earner at in excess of $100 million a year (with talk of that being almost halved this time around).
Confidence would be higher if somebody like Dellabarca, involved in securing the $100m deal, or Christie were involved.
But sadly it seems like the latter has given up on any rugby involvement.
Right now, Christie seems to be happy helping out pal Anna Mowbray (Nick’s sister) and her husband Ali Williams on Auckland FC’s social media content strategy.
And did I mention the crowd for Auckland FC’s A-League derby against the Wellington Phoenix in the capital last weekend drew a bigger crowd than the All Blacks-Argentina test at the same venue?
Enough said.
A desperation for money could cost New Zealand rugby fans a Lions test.
Already there are growing hints that one of the three tests scheduled between the British and Irish Lions on their 2029 tour of New Zealand will be played in the United States or Japan.
English press are reporting the Lions and NZR are in discussions over playing the Lions in Las Vegas or Tokyo.
Taking one of the three traditional tests from a Lions tour and playing it elsewhere is a kick in the guts for Kiwi fans but their voice means little in an era where NZR still seems to think the All Blacks are a juggernaut brand with 90 million global fans.
As far ago as 2018, England’s Guardian reported that the Lions were keen on a fixture across the Atlantic and NZR’s obsession with the American and Japanese markets will ensure it happens.
Auckland and Christchurch’s new Te Kaha stadium will get at least two of the three yet to be scheduled tests.
So which fans would miss out on if Vegas held a All Blacks-Lions test, which only comes around every 12 years?
The diehard southerners in Dunedin or the Wellington faithful at the Cake Tin?
Time for a public outcry.
A more sensible scenario would be to pack off the so-called “All Blacks XV” or the Māori All Blacks to fulfil this contrived nonsense and save the proper test series for Kiwi fans who have supported and savoured Lions tests for well over a century.
“It was like living in a dictatorship ... remember what it felt like when someone was being bullied at school and you were just glad it wasn’t you? That was the vibe,” said former England halfback Danny Care.
And there it is, another scab ripped off Eddie Jones’s ruptured coaching career.
In his new autobiography Everything Happens for a Reason, Care wrote scathingly of the feisty Australian’s coaching tenure in charge of the Red Roses.
None of what Care had to say will surprise anybody in the know in international rugby coaching circles, who have rolled their eyes for years over Jones’s erratic style.
Even after the Australian World Cup disaster, Jones somehow always seem to manage to find another gig, inevitably taking his new charges backwards almost immediately (in this case, Japan, who lost by 45 points to Scott Robertson’s second-string All Blacks after only losing by seven under Jamie Joseph in a 2022 match).
Care’s book reveals ongoing behaviour from Jones that created a bitter and divisive attitude within the England camp and undoubtedly negatively impacted the mental health of a number of players.
At times Jones’s players felt “like characters in a dystopian novel”, wrote Care. “Everything’s a test,” they would whisper to each other.
“Did Eddie rule by fear?” asks Care before the 100-test halfback answered his own question. “Of course he did, everyone was bloody terrified of him.”
“Some of [the analysts] ended up as shells of their former selves. It is a scandal and makes the judgment of those who reappointed Jones for a second stint (before finally sacking him in December 2022) all the more questionable.”
Sports Insider thinks it’s also worth mentioning that Jones once fired former All Blacks coach John Mitchell as an England assistant when the Kiwi went to watch his Black Caps son Darryl play – on a scheduled day off!
Bill Foley The US billionaire has had a big week with his Bournemouth FC Premier League team handing Manchester City their first loss of the season while the brand-spanking new Auckland FC team nail the Phoenix in the first Kiwi A-League local derby.
Grant Nisbett The Mr Reliable of Kiwi sports commentary calls his 350th All Blacks test when Razor Robertson’s men meet Ireland in Dublin this Friday night. Here’s to a memorable call, Nisbo!
Kerri Williams Retires at 30 after a stellar rowing career, which includes being only the fourth Kiwi woman to claim gold, silver and bronze Olympic medals.
Joseph Parker Inches closer to another world heavyweight boxing tilt by looming as the likely opponent for IBF champion Daniel Dubouis in Saudi Arabia next February.
Scott Robertson has called up five new faces for his first All Blacks class of 2025, with his 35-man squad for next month’s series against France named.