Stirling Mortlock, Wallabies legend, discusses the intercept that broke New Zealand’s heart in Q+A

Sports Insider sits down with former Wallaby captain Stirling ‘The Interceptor’ Mortock. He discusses his thoughts on Eddie Jones; How tech can positively impact the game; On whether Saudi Arabia will take over World Rugby; What he’s doing in New Zealand and why he can’t escape Kiwis who think he was offside when he took his crucial World Cup intercept try 21 years ago.

Sports Insider: All Blacks fans still suffer horrible flashbacks of your intercept try in the 2003 World Cup semi in Sydney. How often does it get brought up with you?

Stirling Mortlock: Hah! Every time I run into a Kiwi rugby supporter, they seem to bring up that moment, and insinuate that I was offside! That’s probably more in Oz but as you’d expect it comes up when I’m over the Ditch also, and in London and Paris. Kiwis are everywhere… and they were all at that match. Five million of them.

SI: A teammate on that night was Phil Waugh, now in the hot seat at Rugby Australia. Our perception on this side of the Ditch is that the game is in a whole lotta trouble over your way. Is he the right man for the job?

SM: Admittedly, we’ve had a few challenges in Australian rugby, but ‘Waughy’ is absolutely the man to set Australian rugby up for success. There are a few reasons that I believe Phil will succeed…

First up, he categorically knows that cultivating and reconnecting with the community game is critical, as well as investing in pathways for players and coaches. And we’ve already seen plenty of evidence of this since he started his new role.

Australia's Stirling Mortlock runs away to score in the 2003 semifinal win over the All Blacks. Photo / Photosport

Phil lives and breathes the values and lessons that our game teaches, and he knows that that is a valuable point of difference for rugby.

To win consistently, you need high performing squads with clarity of game plan and clarity of roles and responsibilities on and off the field, leveraging your strengths, as well as continuity of team and cohesiveness – ‘combinations’ as we used to call it.

I believe Waughy is pulling Australian rugby together to make this happen.

SI: Eddie Jones was your coach that night in Sydney. Are you disappointed by the mess he has left behind? And does Joe Schmidt strike you as somebody who can fix the Wallabies?

SM: I’m conflicted, as Eddie was the coach who had the greatest impact on my game and career. He coached me for eight years. So, I probably have more of a glass half full mentality on this… I understand why he did what he did. Aussie rugby has only been competitive in men’s and women’s 7s and men’s under 20s in recent times. Eddie obviously felt the only way forward was to make a step change or paradigm shift. Did he get it right? Evidence would suggest not but we may have a slightly more nuanced view in future years.

Joe Schmidt is obviously a proven, world-class coach and, given the time and resources, he’ll not only build a great Wallabies outfit but will help all of our national and Super Rugby teams and players, as well as bringing Australian coaches through. I also think he won’t let the pain and learnings of 2023 go to waste.

SI: Number of Super Rugby teams that Australia should have… four or five? Where do you stand on that great debate?

SM: It’s a difficult question and there is no perfect answer – player depth is an issue, competitiveness is an issue. Australia is the most competitive sports market in the world – for talent from grassroots to professional sport, for volunteers who are vital to the system working, for fans and supporters’ wallets and for government and commercial partnership funding.

Rugby having a presence in every major Australian market is important. Fundamentally though, a national footprint needs to be affordable, and it can’t compromise the rest of the game. Is there another way to do it with less than five Super Rugby teams? The Bledisloe in Melbourne last year was a cracking event and had nearly as many people in attendance as the Taylor Swift concert that I took my daughter to on the weekend – perhaps not three nights in a row!

SI: What have you been doing since retiring from playing?

SM: I was so fortunate to have a really fantastic experience moving from fulltime sport into the business world, with NAB allowing me to work part-time as I transitioned from the Melbourne Rebels. An opportunity at NAB later saw me move the family to Sydney where I also took on a role with the Rugby Club Foundation. This is something I’m super passionate about. As the foundation’s treasurer and chair of the Investment Committee, I’m incredibly proud to say we have overseen the distribution of almost A$2 million to rugby’s grassroots since 2018.

Since leaving NAB, I’ve been involved in the boutique alternative advisory space working with high-net-worth and family office investors to deploy capital, as well as direct investing and co-investing into interesting tech companies.

In mid-2020, I jumped at the opportunity to reunite with my former Gordon Rugby teammate James Godfrey to establish XV Capital.

SI: Give us a broad overview of what you’re trying to accomplish with XV Capital?

SM: XV Capital is a ‘sports innovation accelerator’ and our mission is to accelerate the adoption of transformative technology by sport.

In a nutshell, we work with sports to understand their challenges, future pressure points and opportunities. We then help identify sports technology options that respond to the challenge or opportunity and help them to innovate while moving them along the path to a more sustainable future. We also work with sports-tech businesses the world over to help them get ‘match fit’ and then introduce them to sports bodies looking for the solutions they provide. Ultimately, we also invest in sports-tech businesses with the greatest potential to ‘change the game’ for sport.

XV Capital works with all sports and categories of sports tech from smart ball technology company, Sportable, to an awesome Kiwi community sport coaching app CoachMate, to head injury-related tech like Prevent Biometrics’ mouthguards and BrainEye which tracks eye responses to stimuli on a smartphone.

Our focus right now is on helping sport in Australia, New Zealand and Japan and we’ll work outwards from there. We’re about to launch a sports-tech investment fund, the first in the region and it’s generating significant interest in both Australia and NZ.

Incidentally, I was lucky to attend the Halberg Awards last week with CoachMate and our NZ-based partner Rob Smith – what a sensational night! Per capita, Kiwi sport fights well above its weight. It was great to hear about some amazing achievements by so many talented athletes and also catching up with a few people I hadn’t seen in ages – Richie [McCaw]. Enough said.

Wayne Smith whose leadership award acceptance speech was nothing short of inspiring. ‘Goldy’ [Jeff Wilson] whose hair looks more like mine every day. And Raelene Castle who is clearly doing a brilliant job at Sport NZ. And Sir Murray Halberg sits in very rare company – very few athletes achieve more after they retire from their sport than during their time competing. What a wonderful legacy he has left.

Stirling Mortlock beats Chris Jack to the high ball during the Tri Nations Rugby Union match between the All Blacks and the Wallabies at Eden Park in 2006. Photo / Photosport

SI: There was talk of your company potentially building Major League Rugby as a product in the American market. Whatever happened with that?

SM: The North American rugby opportunity is still very close to our heart as XV was actively involved in the successful US 2031 RWC bid process, representing the interests of MLR owners. We also have shareholders who are MLR team owners and there was a recent announcement of the partnership between MLR, Gilbert and Sportable, one of our portfolio companies.

We are not hands-on working for MLR, but we are always looking for opportunities to help them grow the game and create a Rugby World Cup-ready ecosystem. At the end of the day, we want rugby to thrive wherever it’s played.

SI: You had quite a few concussions during your playing time in an era where less was understood about the impacts of collision sports. Did that influence your interest in certain tech such as the mouthguards for example?

SM: Totally. I often joke that I had every injury known to man! I ended up playing 15 seasons of professional rugby and had 15 operations. Obviously, I had many more injuries than operations. Whenever I had an injury, it was usually very clear what scan or X-ray was required which then led to a diagnosis and treatment plan.

However, when it came to head injuries, besides consistent stand-down periods there was little to nothing in the way of scans and ability to objectively quantify brain health. That has changed a lot and the sports tech delivering brain-health data should give everyone comfort that contact sport will be safer and keep kids, and adults, in sport longer rather than rule them out too early.

SI: Tell me about the smart ball investment.

SM: Sportable is one of our foundation investments and we’re extremely proud of how this business has evolved. When we began working with them in 2021, they were focused on rugby but hadn’t been used in any tier one competitions. Since then, the ball has been used in the Six Nations, Wallabies tests, Super Rugby in Australia and the World Rugby U20 Championship.

Excitingly, the AFL and AFLW will soon be using the smart ball and it’s also now ready for use in football, rugby league and American Football. Sportable’s smart ball has been proven to deliver valuable match officiating, and high performance and fan benefits, as well as commercialisation opportunities.

SI: Do you think Saudi money is inevitable in international rugby?

SM: I don’t know if it is inevitable, but they are certainly looking at it. While Australian rugby has its issues and the economics of the game in our region are of concern, these issues are surmountable if we work together and play to our strengths.

One of the great things about rugby is it’s a game for everyone – male or female, no matter your shape and size. Rugby is a truly global game – it’s an Olympic sport – and interest in it continues to grow. Some of the recent rule changes and the application of technology such as instrumented mouthguards and digital eye scans are giving parents increased comfort that their kids will be kept safe, not to mention the values and lessons they’ll learn along the way.

Saudi Arabia are investing to develop their community sport base and investing in sports innovation. We should embrace that interest. But where it leads to, who knows.

SI: Flash ahead for me to the 2027 World Cup hosted in Australia. What sort of shape do you hope rugby in Australia will be and the game generally globally?

SM: We’ll be back on track. Australia loves a World Cup and the Wallabies are one of Australia’s truly ‘national teams’ and one the country gets behind. More Rugby World Cups in Australia, men’s and women’s, not to mention the Lions tour, will be awesome. School and club rugby is pretty strong, there’s healthy tribalism, some very good players coming through, our Sevens teams are on a great path. The intercept for Australian rugby is on…

Trevor McKewen is one of New Zealand’s most experienced journalists and sports business commentators, and a former Head of Sport for NZME. He has also held senior executive roles at NZ Rugby and the Warriors and holds a particular interest in the commercial side of sport. Now semi-retired, he writes the Sports Insider column weekly “to keep sports fans informed and administrators honest”.