John Afoa

Oh, you know, who knows what happens these days.

But I think, you know, when that team gets named and they walk into the camp, they're there as All Blacks.

You know, they have the heritage and they have the identity, but they're there representing New Zealand as the All Blacks.

And I think it'd be more so the coaches getting the best out of them, knowing the coaches, getting to know the players, what works.

And it could be a cultural thing, could be just a personality thing, but if you're trying to coach everyone the same way, it's not going to work.

And I think it's just really having an awareness around it to get the best out of these lads.

It's the man management.

It's the getting the emotion right.

It's getting the motivation right.

It's tweaking the combinations.

NBC, that's hands-on coaching.

That's teaching them how to play.

That's getting them to use their brain or getting their vision up and thinking about the game.

Those guys at the top know how to do that, but it's sort of just getting that synergy and making it work at the top.

Yeah and it can bounce around you know what I mean touring is an enjoyable time but it can be a tough time depending on if you're getting named in that 22 or 23 and you're sort of your life changes week to week you know what I mean you can be top of the mountain named in the team gonna start you're on the blower ringing the family make sure you're tuning I'm getting some minutes here or you could be named out of the team which is always tough doesn't matter if you're

People might think, oh it's the All Blacks, why is it tough?

You're there to play, everyone wants to play, and if you miss the team, it's still cutting, it's still, you're gut-wrenching.

Because it's not, they still, well it might change now, but it's still the old school, you go into the team meeting, there's no sort of tap on the shoulder beforehand, they read the names out, and you're there, in the team or not in the team, so you're sort of just there like, sweet, sweet.

don't let it show that i'm gutted but you know you've got a job to do after that which is prepare the team and get them ready for the weekend so i think that sort of adds a lot to it um and then you know team culture is the big one so um i only can sort of talk about my experience when we're in the team but you know it's very a very good team and obviously we had good results but

If there was a seat left on the table and you had your dinner, you wouldn't start a new seat.