![\"Rob](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/4KSJVHK_240329_CrusadersChiefs_07_jpg.jpeg\")
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\nRob Penney has had an at times tense relationship with media during his tenure at the Crusaders.
\nPhoto: PHOTOSPORT\n<\/p>\n
Rob Penney made little effort to hide his frustration after news of his Crusaders exit leaked prematurely as he fronted media on Wednesday.<\/p>\n
The outgoing Crusaders coach endured an awkward two-minute stand-up dominated by terse, one-word answers after the franchise confirmed he would step down at the end of the Super Rugby season.<\/p>\n
The Crusaders announced on Wednesday Penney would leave the role at season’s end<\/a>, with former All Blacks assistant Scott Hansen<\/a> set to take over as head coach.<\/p>\n The confirmation came after the NZ Herald published a report on Tuesday signalling Hansen’s appointment before the franchise had formally announced the move.<\/p>\n Speaking ahead of this weekend’s clash against the table-topping Hurricanes, Penney made it clear he was unhappy his departure had become the focus.<\/p>\n Clearly disappointed the news surfaced before the end of the season, Penney set the tone early.<\/p>\n “Oh, a bit disappointed the news is out, but it’s just the reality of the situation.”<\/p>\n From there, reporters battled to get anything of substance out of Penney.<\/p>\n “How much of a distraction is what’s happened in the last 24 hours to the group?”<\/p>\n “None.”<\/p>\n “Are you sure?”<\/p>\n “Yeah.”<\/p>\n “You seem quite frustrated by this?”<\/p>\n “Not frustrated, but it’s just part of the process, I guess.”<\/p>\n Penney grew even more irritated when asked to comment on his successor.<\/p>\n “Oh, no comment. That’s inappropriate for me to talk about that. We’ve got a season to finish off here and that’s the focus.”<\/p>\n Getting little in return, reporters asked Penney when he would have preferred the announcement to be made.<\/p>\n “I would have liked the announcement to be at the end of the competition.”<\/p>\n “How disappointing is it then that it has been leaked by someone obviously very close to either side of this party?”<\/p>\n “Look, it happens. It’s the reality of the game we’re in, I guess. People love a headline and this is another one of those.”<\/p>\n \nFormer All Blacks assistant coach Scott Hansen will take over the Crusaders next season. Penney has often appeared to have a strained relationship with the media during his tenure as Crusaders coach.<\/p>\n In 2024, he was memorably caught on a hot mic referring to a television reporter as a “c***”<\/p>\n Penney replaced Scott Robertson as Crusaders coach in 2024 and has had mixed results in his three seasons in charge.<\/p>\n The Crusaders finished ninth in the Super Rugby competition in his first season in charge, failing to make the play-offs, before rebounding spectacularly the following season as Penney guided the side to its 13th Super Rugby title.<\/p>\n The Crusaders currently sit fourth on the table ahead of their final round clash against the Hurricanes.<\/p>\n Hansen returns to the franchise after serving as an All Blacks’ assistant coach under Robertson, who was sacked from the top job earlier this year. Hansen was previously an assistant coach with the Crusaders between 2020 and 2022.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rob Penney has had an at times tense relationship with media during his tenure at the Crusaders. Photo:…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":447269,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[48,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45,213],"class_list":["post-447268","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-audio","tag-current-affairs","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447268","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=447268"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/447268\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/447269"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=447268"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=447268"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=447268"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Former](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/4K0IR36_250925_AllBlacksTraining_005_JPG.jpeg\")
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\nPhoto: Andrew Cornaga\/www.photosport.nz\n<\/p>\n