Richie Mo’unga All Blacks ban must be addressed before Springboks rugby challenge – Gregor Paul
THE FACTS
- Scott Robertson criticised New Zealand Rugby’s eligibility policy, highlighting its limitations compared with South Africa’s approach.
- Robertson’s comments led to a PR exercise where he retracted his statements, emphasising unity with NZR.
- The handling of Richie Mo’unga’s eligibility underscores inconsistencies in NZR’s policy, sparking widespread criticism.
At the end of his first year in charge of the All Blacks, former head coach Scott Robertson started to push a narrative that he was being set up to fail because of New Zealand’s archaic and arbitrary eligibility policy that was no longer fit for purpose.
Having seen his All Blacks suffer two bruising defeats to a savvy Springboks side that was able to select from players signed to clubs all over the world, Robertson publicly lamented the restrictions he was under to confine his picks to domestically contracted talent.
The South Africans, he felt, had access to experienced, test-hardened veterans, whereas the All Blacks were unable to pick seasoned campaigners such as Sam Cane (who was leaving for Japan), Shannon Frizell and Richie Mo’unga (both of whom were already in Japan).
Robertson’s points were valid, worthy of discussion at least, but it was apparent that the incoming New Zealand Rugby (NZR) board – a new group had been confirmed in late 2024 but didn’t take over until February 2025 – were not impressed that the issue was being played out in the media.
That much became clear when, in early March, Robertson and former NZR chief executive Mark Robinson appeared on ZB’s Rugby Direct podcast in what was effectively a PR exercise where the head coach walked back his previous comments and reinforced that he was on board with the existing eligibility policies.
It was a show of unity, but the contrived nature of it merely illustrated that when it comes to All Blacks eligibility, NZR’s executive and board seem more interested in flexing their authority and controlling the narrative than they are in having a sensible discussion about the roadworthiness of their policy.
That sense that NZR’s decision-making is driven by a need to project control and power was intensified in August last year when Mo’unga agreed to come home.
He wouldn’t agree to a three-year deal (he has signed until the end of 2027), so he was told he wouldn’t be All Blacks eligible until the Bledisloe Cup series in October, despite the fact he’ll finish with his current club, Toshiba, in May.
If he’d agreed to a three-year deal, he’d have had his eligibility brought forward to have been available for the Greatest Rivalry Tour in August-September.
NZR argues that it has flexibility in the system to reward loyalty, but it seems to be more like a sliding scale of leniency built around the perceived level of acquiescence.
Why a professional sport thinks that it makes high-performance sense to have a player of Mo’unga’s calibre lighting up the NPC while the All Blacks play the Springboks in four consecutive weekends is unfathomable.
It doesn’t validate itself on any level. At the heart of NZR’s policy is a strong element of protectionism to prevent players from spending three years of a four-year cycle overseas and then coming home for 12 months, hoping to crack the World Cup squad and disappear again.
But Mo’unga is doing exactly what the system was set up to prevent, and the decision to keep him off limits to the All Blacks through the first rounds of the Nations Championship and for the South African tour seems to be driven more by pettiness and spite than good high-performance planning.
NZR’s executive and board probably need to lie on the couch and be asked, “Who are you really mad at? Richie or yourselves?” – because if they were so against Mo’unga signing a short-term contract, why did they offer him one?
Did board members feel they had to give Robertson a win – he had chased Mo’unga with such intent – and so sanctioned the short-term deal, but then had to flex with the power play of saying no test rugby until October?
Restricting his involvement this year only amplifies that Mo’unga is on a smash and grab mission to have a crack at a World Cup and then head back to Japan, and NZR’s eligibility policy is so riddled with inconsistency, arbitrary judgments and contradictions that it makes sense to no one.
NZR’s leaders need to understand that they have lost the support of their constituents when it comes to eligibility decisions, and players, agents, media and fans all agree it is nonsensical and punitive to the All Blacks that Mo’unga will have to be integrated into the team two-thirds of the way through the season rather than from the start.
No other country would make this decision, and so there is, surely, a valid case for the incoming All Blacks coach to make a case to review the Mo’unga situation and make him eligible from July?
The new coach will be on an 18-month mission to put the All Blacks on a better trajectory – whatever that means – and while there is no certainty that having early access to Mo’unga will transform performance, it’s undeniable that the likelihood of integrating him more effectively and keeping harmony in the team dynamic will be higher if he joins the team in July as opposed to October.
And while Mo’unga, whose last test was the World Cup final in 2023, can’t be portrayed as a panacea to the All Blacks’ attacking woes, NZR needs to acknowledge that the country is not awash with playmaking options.
Beauden Barrett, having brought some calm and steadiness to the No 10 role in the first 10 tests of last year, faded down the stretch and was a shadow of his true self by the time the All Blacks played England at Twickenham.
Damian McKenzie has been tried enough at No 10 to know he is not the answer to start there consistently, and while Ruben Love is a promising all-round talent, he’s never played a test at first-five.
Mo’unga, if nothing else, deepens the options and the new coach has a strong, readymade argument to say they will take the job on the condition there is a rethink on when the man many believe is the country’s best playmaker can resume his test career.
Gregor Paul is one of New Zealand’s most respected rugby writers and columnists. He has won multiple awards for journalism and written several books about sport.