DSPN - Devlin Sports Podcast Network
Murray Mexted: Chiefs vs Hurricanes, All Blacks Loosies, And NZ Rugby’s Future
21 Apr 2026
Transcript generated automatically by AI and may contain errors.
Chapter 1: What are the current challenges facing New Zealand rugby?
The demise of rugby is real and I don't think it's been well managed in the last couple of leaders of our New Zealand rugby and that's where the focus should be.
Not everyone wants to go and live in Japan or Europe, but what about living in Sydney or living in Brisbane? They're beautiful cities to live in. Why can't our guys play for those teams? I call it the game that got away for the Hurricanes.
I mean, they should have won that game. I agree. But they didn't win that game. And there were some changes towards the end, weren't there? Welcome to the DSPN John Walker wins the 1,500 metres gold medal at the Olympic Games. The Devlin Sports Podcast Network.
DSPN, Murray Mexton, the All Black icon legend, about to join us again. We're going to have a good old nut about loose forwards after watching the Chiefs versus the Hurricanes battle away in Hamilton on the weekend.
And a couple of weeks ago, Mexton named a whole lot of players who he says should be in the mix for the All Blacks this year for loose forwards, and they were only Chiefs and Hurricanes players. Well, we got virtually a possibles versus probables trial to look at on the weekend, didn't we? So Murray, with all of that. A couple of quick things. 2.30, Loft Bar, Saturday afternoon in Christchurch.
We will be there ahead of the Super Rugby round that day, going down to broadcast right across the weekend. We'll be at all of the games, but inviting you along as a DSPN listener and supporter of ours to come along and join us and have a couple with us before we go to the game on Saturday. If you can make it in Christchurch, click the subscribe button as always, DSPN YouTube channel.
We love you for that. Well, here's a man who played consecutively for the All Blacks, well over 70 games, and is an absolute expert at loose forwards. He ran IRNs for many, many years. This is the positions that he loves most on the field and loves talking about. So welcome back, Mix.
And it was a fascinating, intense, combative struggle, but really keen to get your thoughts on what you saw in Hamilton between those players and all of those players. Well... Yeah, g'day, how are you?
Good, mate. Good. Yeah, I'm on a lot of coaches. I don't want to be critical of coaches, but, you know, if you play as a fullback, you're not expected to know what the –
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Chapter 2: How do the Chiefs and Hurricanes compare in loose forward play?
It's got to be attacking wherever that ball is or wherever that open side flanker is. If the open side flanker's on the money, then that number eight from scrums particularly, doesn't matter whether it's left or right, should be within about three metres of where that, and because he's, you know, they talk about, the lone ranger in Tonto, well, he's buddy Tonto. There's no doubt about it.
He's got to support that open side flanker. Blind side flanker's miles away. You know, there's going to be a lot get to the action before then on about two or three backs. So the blind side flanker often hangs on the blind side and the play comes back to him. So he doesn't have to cover as much ground, generally speaking, but we need him to be robust defensively
and abrasive in defence and attack. So when he is in play, He's really in play. But the guy that should be in play most is the seven and the eight, particularly the eight. So that eight's got to have the ability to roam. So the days of an eight playing within five metres of the scrum are long gone, quite frankly. The eight's got to be able to roam and he's got to be an athlete.
And when you watch Artie Sevier playing at eight, for example, or Kieran Reid playing at eight, you've got athletes who are really good with the ball. They can support the ball carrier. And they're dangerous with the ball in hand and they know when and how to pass. You know, so it's not like a... It's not like a tight forward. It's more like a back.
So they've got to have that interactive ability. So I see the Chiefs changing all of a sudden because in the Chiefs, I've got about six or seven loose forwards who are outstanding. A whole lot are outstanding. In fact, I look at the Hurricanes and there's a whole bunch of loose forwards in the Hurricanes that are outstanding as well. And then I look at
the whole of New Zealand rugby and super rugby. And really, the all-black loose forward trio is going to be selected from the Chiefs and the Hurricanes. You think so? Yeah, I think so. They've got oodles of them. I mean, I watched the game in the weekend and I thought, you know, I watched the Blues in the weekend. I think that...
what's his name Anton Segner yeah I think he's a very very good footballer and he's bigger than I thought while I was watching the game I actually went into Google and had a little look just to see and sometimes those things are accurate sometimes they over inflate the height but it said he's six foot four he came into the studio he's a lot taller than what I thought he was yeah he is he is six four no question
Yeah. Actually, it's funny that I saw that ad with the Barrett boys on TV just recently. And Smiley, I know Smiley because he's obviously my generation, but he was a big man and he used to play lock. And I saw him with his son standing next to him and it made him look like a, you know, small player. And he's not, he's about six foot four, six foot five.
But, you know, he's, and of course he's older now, his spine is, is getting closer and closer together, compacting, so he's getting shorter. So he's probably an inch shorter than he was when he played, like me, like all of us.
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Chapter 3: What roles do the six, seven, and eight positions play in rugby?
He's not quite big enough for that. I'd like to see him playing open side more than anything. But when he played at number eight, he's a bloody good rugby player. And, you know, he's got to be in the picture somewhere, but I'm not quite sure whether he's big enough to play against the Springboks in South Africa at number eight. But he is at number seven at open side flanker.
So, you know, it's super rugby level at the moment because you've got to understand that super rugby is not as strong as it was. Super, super rugby is, is a bloody good level of rugby, but it's not as strong as it was when we had more competitive teams playing.
Sure.
Yep.
I'm talking about the South Africans more than anything because, you know, they really, you know, they stand you up, don't they? You've got to be in or out against the South Africans. There's no halfway measure. You can mix it against the Australians and sometimes if you have an ordinary day, you can do okay. But against the Springboks, you've got to nail it.
You've got to get your ball and it's got to be two hands, you know, and you've got to have a good game. So selectors these days, and it was interesting that with the Chiefs, because when I saw the loose forward trio change, I thought, oh, this is going to be interesting. This will be interesting. I think the Hurricanes will have a bit of an edge.
And because I'm a bit worried about the Hurricanes, because as I say, Lakai, you know, it's bloody hard when you've got two guys that aren't really big. Karifi and Lakai aren't really big enough to play six or eight. They're both really a seven. But they're good rugby players. They're great rugby players.
And at super rugby level, which is one step down than when the box were involved, when the South African teams were involved, you can get away with it. But you go that next step and you can't get away with it. You get exposed. You don't get the ball and everybody cries until Sunday morning.
Yeah, we know we've had that. So just in terms of the physicality that they all brought, what you saw on the ground, what you saw in terms of support, what you saw in terms of their positioning and in terms of how you explained it before, was the six playing six, was the eight playing eight. Did you see enough of that to please you?
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Chapter 4: Which players are contenders for the All Blacks loose forward trio?
But when you're in your prime, like the winger for the Hurricanes at the moment who's going off to play. Yeah. Yeah. And he's going off to play in Newcastle. Now, I don't know whether anybody's told him, but it's bloody cold in Newcastle. You know, you would never wear shorts in Newcastle.
And if you were going for a surf, you'd have to have a 4-3 thick wetsuit, you know, and you could hardly paddle it because it's 4-3. Four centimetres, but millimetres, is it?
Yeah, four millimetres. It doesn't matter. It's bloody cold. You wouldn't float, yeah. But no, you're right. I mean, this is what I mean. It's a different environment. That's why I raised the Australia thing. But it just seems that a lot of people are geared towards that now.
So you're not a favour of just carte blanche saying, hey, all of the All Blacks can go and play overseas and we'll select a team from overseas like the Springboks seem to be.
No, no. Other countries have to do that because they never had the players in the internal competition. Other things happen in the South African situation. England, of course, and Europe is a lot closer and it's easier for them to go. There's so many rugby players. The more they give an opportunity, the bigger the talent pool is going to become.
And that's what Rusty's done over the last few years. For us, we need that too. We need to keep our talent pool up so that there's real competition. So instead of having six foot two loose forwards, we have six foot four and six foot five loose forwards. So that's my belief is keep the game strong.
And unfortunately, if you want to play for the All Blacks, which of course is not only a great honour because it's the top of rugby throughout the world, the All Black team is in that top two or three players year in, year out for 100 years. And it's a great honour to play at that level and it makes your brand worth a lot more as an individual.
So when you do either get dropped or you want to move off overseas after giving it a good whack here, you can go away and you can get a lot more money because you've got that AB behind your name. And I think that... People probably forget about that. To see a guy going in his prime to Newcastle, I can't see the benefit. He's not going to get much ball. They'll kick the hell out of the ball.
The team will kick the ball all day long. It'll be cold and wet. His fingers will be shivering. I reckon after one year he'll be going, I'm not sure I made the right choice here, but we'll see. Let's see.
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