So I'm not so confident.

Yeah, I feel pretty good about this game.

I think it's the implications of the loss last week that will come back to bite the Warriors potentially in a week's time when they have to head over to Sydney and meet Penrith.

I think that's when the true implications of that defeat last weekend will be felt, of course, provided that they win on Sunday.

And I think they will.

I think...

It probably was a bit of a good wake-up call for the Warriors in some respects.

They're our

Adam can you fill our listeners in with what's going on? What's the big gig?

I can indeed, Nick.

Well, I'll tell you what, with your motor engine revving sound effects over the last week or so, you're right on the money with your prediction of what this event is.

Race of Champions, this is called.

This is a big international organisation that basically has been going for several decades promoting the sport of motorsport all the way around the world.

They run all these sorts of showcase events, and basically what they're going to do in simple terms is come to Wellington here, build a parallel racetrack inside Henry Stadium, inside the bowl where the field usually is, and have a whole bunch of big names in terms of world motorsport, no matter what discipline they race in, whether that's Formula One, whether that's supercars, whether that's rally, they're all going to be coming to Wellington and racing for the fans across two days in January, 9th and 10th of January, is when it's been confirmed to.

So a big showcase event coming to Wellington to promote international motorsport, Nick.

That's pretty damn cheap.

How much weaker is New Zealand rugby with not having South African teams in super rugby? Adam Cooper.

Oh, well, I think, you know, when you look at some of the way those upfront battles have played out, especially in the most recent two tests, absolutely.

We do, our forwards lose that regular chance to test themselves against those huge guys from South Africa.

I mean, It was always a bit of a flaw having South Africa as part of Super Rugby in general.

I think that, you know, from a competition perspective, the time zones, the travel, everything like that.

But the experience that these players got, you know, not only playing against particularly South African forwards, but the travel experiences they got from that, the ability to play and travel.

You know, altitude, unfamiliar conditions, ferocious crowds cheering against them.

No, absolutely no

I didn't think he had a bad second test.

No, but, I mean, Dave Rennie's even used the term rotation.

And there is a fair bit of that going on.

And I think, you know, you can look at Cody Taylor's admission from the entire 23 and probably, you know, put that down to that as well.

I mean, that seems to be the indication he's going.

We need these players to be refreshed.

He's sort of indicated.

Should we accept that they're not going to probably do that well because they're under financial stress?

We were fitter.

Yeah.

Yeah, no, they played the full 80, didn't they, the All Blacks? They got there at the end.

They waited for maybe some of those South African guys coming in from a different phase of the season to get tired.

And, you know, as soon as South Africa lost some of their starters, especially some of those big forwards, you know, it was the All Blacks.

And they just... went to Alice Park and absolutely just made a real statement to start this series.

It's going to be fascinating now to see who has the biggest response.

This game, believe it or not, I thought was just as big as that.

We're a team.

Yep.

Well, apart from the captain who turned up a little bit late, but that's another story.

But no, you're right.

I think the All Blacks, you see a lot of social media clips and they've spent so much time together and you can only judge from what you see and what they're putting out, but they just look to be really enjoying each other's company.

There seems to be a really good culture in there at the moment and the morale that's in this team.

Obviously, the last couple of games against those former Super Rugby sides over in South Africa, there have been some really good results and the All Blacks have shown they can...

Who do we need to watch out for? Are the captains out?

We'll quickly

brush over the All Blacks, Nick, because we do want to get to the Saints as well by your edict.

But we will...

Yeah, I mean, it should be.

I mean, it's going to be interesting tomorrow too.

Evenly poised sides, really.

The Stormers don't have a lot of their spring box and they are in their pre-season.

So I think it's going to

Okay.

Then I started ballet.

Um, and then I went to Arts Educational school at 11, which was like a full-time vocational training.

And then, uh, at 16 I had to decide what sort of avenue, avenue to go down, and I couldn't really decide, 'cause some teachers were saying to me, "You should go into musical theater," some saying, "You should go into contemporary dance." Um, but my brother, who's a year older than me, had gone to the Royal Ballet School at 16, and I thought, "Well, if it's good enough for him, then it's [laughs] good enough for me." And also I thought, if I have that training at, you know, that, that ballet training, that's the best training you can get-

Was it tough?

Yeah, really tough.

It's tough physically because you're just working all day, every day, um, apart from your six weeks off in the summer.

And but then we used, we used to do, like, little other jobs in the summer as well, so it was never like we had that much time off.

[laughs]

... uh, at Glasgow, let alone a gold.

And, and how, you know, I, I don't know if unexpected's the right word, but maybe a little bit of a surprise is the best way to do it, that she actually clinched that a- a- a- a- alongside some other very good sprinters in that race in the pouring rain in Glasgow.

It just had all the, all the elements, didn't it, of, of something pretty special and, and pretty unique.

So you just have to hope with her success along with, you know, some of the other success we've seen in the pool with, um, the likes of Lewis Clairebout and Erica Fairweather, that it can only mean good things for what lies ahead in the next two years leading up to the Olympics.

'Cause at the end of the day, yes, we can celebrate these Commonwealth Games performances or not, the Olympics is actually what matters.

And, and we should be talking about him too.

Oh, yeah.

Were you told that, or was it something you thought about yourself?

I think I was told it.

But I also, I think I'd worked a little bit with what was Festival Ballet, London Festival Ballet then, which is now EMB.

And I'd got a bit of the ballet bug.

You know, I sort of had pictures of ballet dancers on my wall at home.

And so I kind of, I loved that.

I loved ballet.

You're not taught about that side of the industry and it's very, very important.

It's kind of like, let's go.

It's exciting, isn't it? I mean, we don't really know what to expect.

We've seen Dave Rennie sort of...

Show his first hand in terms of some of his selections, how he sees things going with this New Nations Championship competition with the season opener against France.

I mean, you know, Artie Savia at eight, that's a surprise.

I couldn't believe that when I saw that yesterday.

Everything that had been sort of indicated was he was very likely to be wearing that seven jersey, which... is his best position.

Did anyone sort of not mention the bomb squad, the Hurricanes bomb squad that's going to come on? I know that Dave really said, don't call it that, don't call it that, but that's what it looks like to me.

And I'm going to come and ask you too, Elliot, which one of these teams are better defensively?

Tough one to call, Nick.

Very tough one to call.

I think in terms of a team that's really honed its defence this year, the Hurricanes have done that.

And we know just what a colossal defensive mind Corey Jane has brought to the Hurricanes.

You know, he was part of this championship winning team as a player in 2016.

That was towards the end of his career when he actually was part of a group that was in charge as a player of sorting out the defensive systems.

Is this an All Black trial? Will there be any bolters named out of this?

And there's enough talent there to give us a go if they want to, Adam Cooper.

Yeah, there is.

It should be a good game, and you'd hope it is for the sake of the semifinals, but the Hurricanes are easily favourited, and rightly so.

I mean, there would have to be a catastrophic failure of everything that has worked for them this season so consistently and so well for them to fall short against the Blues.

Yes, the Blues are capable of winning.

There's no doubt about that.

You know, Bowdoin Barrett's coming back to town.

I'd be worried about our own contract next year.

I don't know what you thought about Friday night, but they didn't really turn up, did they, for a knockout game, the Brumbies?

No, not at all.

I mean, you know, you don't wanna take much away from the Hurricanes having a stellar performance, but it never really felt there was much in the way, um, you know, ahead of, uh, all those, uh, br- br- brilliantly impressive tries they scored, 66 points they, they piled on.

Obviously, a perfect kicking night from Ruben Love as well.

It just never felt like the Brumbies were in that game at all.

Um, it was, you know, they were already trailing by 30-odd points at halftime.

Um, and, and yes, there was a, obvious- a, a few spells of messy rugby where the Brumbies got a few sneak chances and things and, and got a few points to their name, but certainly, a, a very one-sided affair in the Hurricanes' favor.

It certainly isn't the way they wanted to start their, their three-test series at the start of a really, really busy test cricket period.

I don't think we have to worry about the Hurricanes losing tonight.

A lot of confidence there.

Nearly full strength.

I mean, that would have to go very awry for them not to put a huge score on the Brumbies.

I mean, a big score against them a month or so ago under the roof in Christchurch.

The Brumbies actually haven't come to Wellington since 2015.

And you look at the head-to-heads between these two teams over the last couple of years, and...

Well, I hope so, but the weather's not great, is

So that's where the extra resource does come in handy, yeah.

Koops, you want to add anything? I just think, you know, from their outset and, you know, I've obviously seen them face to face when they've been down here to play the derbies from top to bottom of that organisation, management down to players and everyone else.

There was just a clear desire and, you know, just a real determination to win from the get go.

You know, they weren't going to let anything get in their way.

Obviously they fell just short last season, but there was just an attitude that you could just tell from Bill Foley down to everyone else that they were there to win and they weren't going to muck around doing that.

And I think the Phoenix surely would have to be spurred on by that because just look at the Derby tallies as it stands.

The Phoenix still haven't won one of those and they've lost many in embarrassing fashion.

If it was me and I was running the Hurricanes, I'd put my strongest team on there and I'd keep my strongest team being my strongest team because it's hard to lose when you're a winner and it's very hard to win when you're a loser.

Is there anybody like that in the team?

Well, seemingly not.

I mean, there's been a huge overhaul of nearly all jobs that involve chief officer or high performance at New Zealand Rugby, both for the All Blacks and the organisation over the past six to 12 months.

When I saw that come through yesterday, Heather, it sort of struck me as going to New World and buying the Pam's tin rather than the boutique brand of whatever you want.

You know, it just had a sense of, oh, OK, this whole desire to scour the globe, like New Zealand Rugby said, to bring some fresh set of eyes and ears in to lead this organisation through, you know, just sort of almost... fell flat.

Yesterday, they realised that Steve Lancaster has done a relatively good job.

He's steered the ship through some pretty big moves they've made this year with the All Blacks coaching staff.

Coops, while I've just got you, on the ANZ premiership bringing back the old girls, how do you feel about that?

But I think it's clear that just they needed a refresh in leadership and we need some new ideas and try and move the sport forward.

What do you think, Coops? Yeah, I mean, I think if I was a board member of surviving this, I'd feel a little bit of not necessarily survivor's guilt because you're not necessarily surviving because you're still leading the sport through its one of its tumultuous eras.

So complacency is the word I use as to where Netball got.

They were so strong commercially.

They had incredible following.

You wouldn't see many silver ferns tests anywhere in New Zealand that would have sell out.

Many ANZ premiership games.

Adam, can you tell me why it is? Explain to me why it is that New Zealand Cricket's board is agonising over NZ20 to the extent that it is because it looks to me like a no-brainer.

All right, Liam Lawson, talk me through this.

Yeah well this is starting to get a little nerve-wracking and obviously we want to know exactly where the New Zealander is going to be in terms of the Formula One set up next year under his Red Bulls team well yeah it was going to be soon what we thought we'd know October was the time frame initially put on it by Helmut Marko and the crew at Red Bull not to be though and after a Pretty controversial weekend where Liam Lawson is making headlines for reasons he probably preferred not to be.

We're hearing that as Max Verstappen, who of course is the headline driver of Red Bull, is in a real fight to get another... championship title at the end of the season with five or so races left that's where they're putting all their eggs in at the moment here this so no decision now likely to be made no clarity given for the likes of liam lawson and the others chasing these seats until uh early uh december uh december 1st that round of formula one so yeah quite some time away

okay and are you talking netball tonight are you

We are indeed.

Yeah, obviously, Heather, I know you got the ball rolling on this on the show Friday afternoon, and then it sort of all happened from there, didn't it? Netball New Zealand reappointing Dame Noeline Taurua.

So keen to focus on this on Sports Talk tonight, because I think, Heather, this is the outcome that all or the majority of netball fans wanted, just by, you know, just gauging by all the feedback that came in right through this saga.

But this is...

All right, Liam Lawson, talk me through this.

Yeah well this is starting to get a little nerve-wracking and obviously we want to know exactly where the New Zealander is going to be in terms of the Formula One set up next year under his Red Bulls team well yeah it was going to be soon what we thought we'd know October was the time frame initially put on it by Helmut Marko and the crew at Red Bull not to be though and after a Pretty controversial weekend where Liam Lawson is making headlines for reasons he probably preferred not to be.

We're hearing that as Max Verstappen, who of course is the headline driver of Red Bull, is in a real fight to get another... championship title at the end of the season with five or so races left that's where they're putting all their eggs in at the moment Heather so no decision now likely to be made no clarity given for the likes of Liam Lawson and the others chasing these seats until early December December 1st that round of Formula One so yeah quite some time away

okay and are you talking netball tonight are you

We are indeed.

Yeah, obviously, Heather, I know you got the ball rolling on this on the show Friday afternoon, and then it sort of all happened from there, didn't it? Netball New Zealand reappointing Dame Noeline Taurua.

So keen to focus on this on Sports Talk tonight, because I think, Heather, this is the outcome that all or the majority of netball fans wanted, just by, you know, just gauging by all the feedback that came in right through this saga.

But this is... damage the sport to a whole new level than I think anyone thought was possible, right? Just the way it's been handled.