Inside the Incredible Rugby Cultures of South Africa & new Zealand ft. Ben Pegna

Okay, Ben, so you mentioned about how you went to New Zealand early on in your life to, to play rugby briefly.

You've obviously come from that, from a UK kind of background.

So what was the first thing that jumped out to you when you picked up a ball in New Zealand?

It was tough.

It was what I expected.

I wanted it, it to be tough, so I'd always looked up to the New Zealand players.

I'd grown up with like old VHS videos that my dad had of the All Blacks playing, and 100 Years of All Black Rugby.

And, and, um, I remember watching, um, South Africa/New Zealand Flower Bomb tour on VHS tapes and stuff like that.

So it was something that was, I had an impression of.

I, I went to play in the south of New Zealand, at the very bottom of the South Island in Southland, and I was in a rural place as well.

So it was, it was, [laughs] I remember thinking, "This is ...

I'm, I'm, you know, I'm pretty ...

I've gone from being in London to there." So there was lots of things.

I arrived.

I'd, I'd been, I'd gone via the Hong Kong Sevens, watched that, jumped on a plane, headed down to Southland, landed in Invercargill, and then I ended up playing the next day.

I came off the bench and played the next day.

But I was playing for a small town- Um, and it was incredible because the people are amazing.

Everybody's invested into it.

Everybody knows about it.

And the one thing that really does always stick out to me was, um, I played and I'd, I hadn't played particularly well.

I'd missed a tackle by the side of a maul, and on the Monday morning I was in the dairy, which is the news agent, and this lady came up to me, this quite elderly lady, and, uh, she said, "You, you played at the weekend, didn't you?" And I said, "Yeah, I did." [laughs] And she goes, "Oh, you know when you missed that tackle?" [laughs] And she ...

And I went, "Yeah." And, and I was a bit arrogant.

I probably, I was sort of ready to dis- be dismissive.

And she said, "You know, if you'd stood, take, like, two steps closer to the, to the, to the maul when you were starting up, and your outside foot had been inwards, uh, up, you know, then you would've given yourself a better chance [laughs] to make that tackle." And she gave me a proper analytical breakdown of what I had done wrong, and, and, and I was just humbled and, you know, it was really helpful.

But also it made me realize, wow, these, everybody in the whole town is super invested into this and knowledgeable.