{"id":345629,"date":"2026-03-24T17:02:15","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T17:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/345629\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T17:02:15","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T17:02:15","slug":"all-blacks-captain-scott-barrett-on-new-coach-dave-rennie-crusaders-return-and-rugby-world-cup-push","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/345629\/","title":{"rendered":"All Blacks captain Scott Barrett on new coach Dave Rennie, Crusaders return and Rugby World Cup push"},"content":{"rendered":"

The 31-year-old says he\u2019s not had much to do with Rennie \u2013 but he has experienced playing against his sides. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou can sort of see the way previous teams have played. The Chiefs team, the style and the DNA that they want to bring out in their game, that\u2019s sort of unique to his style of coaching and obviously being influenced by [Sir] Wayne Smith. He\u2019s a sharp coach and I think he\u2019ll have a positive influence on the group as well.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"AllAll Blacks coach Dave Rennie and New Zealand Rugby Chair David Kirk. Photo \/ Photosport<\/p>\n

One of the key players in that Chiefs side was Barrett\u2019s former All Blacks locking partner Brodie Retallick<\/a>. The veteran was rumoured to be considering a return to the black jersey after his current stint in Japan. Barrett says he hasn\u2019t heard from Retallick \u2013 but he\u2019s aware of his form.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he has been playing some good rugby up there. You probably wouldn\u2019t rule him out coming back. Knowing Brodie, he\u2019s a hell of a competitor and he might just want to have one last crack at a World Cup. Who knows?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BrodieBrodie Retallick (left) in discussion with Scott Barrett during their time together for the All Blacks. Photo \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

Barrett, the incumbent All Blacks captain, says there was no chat with Rennie yet about retaining the leadership job.<\/p>\n

\u201cNo, nothing yet. I think he\u2019s still working through his coaching team<\/a> and management from what I understand. I\u2019ll sort of wait for that conversation, I guess, and until then I think I\u2019ll just keep chipping away with my rehab and pre-season and look forward to getting back and playing some rugby soon.\u201d<\/p>\n

That looks likely to be in early May. Though on sabbatical, Barrett is also in the throes of rehabilitating after surgery in December on a troublesome ankle and Achilles.<\/p>\n

\u201cTrying to get that right \u2013 or better than what it has been in the last couple of years. That\u2019s probably the number one priority at the moment for me and looking to get back for the Crusaders the tail end of the season.\u201d<\/p>\n

That will mean he misses out on making history at the first game under the roof at Christchurch\u2019s new One NZ Stadium.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou would love to be out there, but I think the timing for me being ready isn\u2019t quite there. I\u2019ll happily be a fan in the first round of games there. It\u2019ll actually be quite nice to sit in the stands.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"InsideInside Christchurch’s new One NZ Stadium in December, 2025. Photo \/ Mike Thorpe<\/p>\n

Aside from his rehab programme, Barrett says he has been busy away from the professional rugby environment.<\/p>\n

\u201cA bit of time with family, doing a governance course through Fonterra, so a bit of learning, a bit of leadership stuff with that. And I have been doing a little bit of fishing and hopefully going fishing tomorrow as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Champions.Champions. George Bower, James O’Connor and Scott Barrett celebrate winning the Super Rugby Pacific title for the Crusaders in 2025. Photo \/ Photosport<\/p>\n

Barrett debuted for the Crusaders in 2014 against a touring England side. He\u2019s played well over 100 matches for the franchise since, winning eight titles (including the Covid-era New Zealand-only championships). This is the first time he\u2019s had an extended break from the game.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt does feel a little bit odd because you see the boys are running out every week and you try to distance yourself in a way that you don\u2019t get too keen and come back too early.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe purpose of this was to refresh me, mentally and physically, so I could hopefully charge on and go to the World Cup next year and go one better than we have.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mike Thorpe<\/a> is a senior multimedia journalist for the Herald, based in Christchurch. He has been a broadcast journalist across television and radio for 20 years and joined the Herald in August 2024.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The 31-year-old says he\u2019s not had much to do with Rennie \u2013 but he has experienced playing against…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":345630,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[5263,95,20437,8136,4463,13381,4487,1320,56380,10542,9635,58508,117,111,139,69,90,15400,138234,1527,18833,6327,8139,213,16674,313,2044,14443,377],"class_list":["post-345629","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-all","tag-and","tag-barrett","tag-blacks","tag-brand","tag-captain","tag-christchurch","tag-coach","tag-crusaders","tag-cup","tag-dave","tag-eyeing","tag-new","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-on","tag-push","tag-rennie","tag-return","tag-round","tag-rugby","tag-scott","tag-sports","tag-stadium","tag-super","tag-time","tag-wont","tag-world"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345629","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=345629"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345629\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/345630"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=345629"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=345629"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=345629"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}