{"id":498279,"date":"2026-03-27T12:47:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-27T12:47:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/498279\/"},"modified":"2026-03-27T12:47:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-27T12:47:08","slug":"all-blacks-coachs-hilarious-cow-story-after-meeting-with-neil-barnes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/498279\/","title":{"rendered":"All Blacks coach’s hilarious cow story after meeting with Neil Barnes"},"content":{"rendered":"

Respected coach Jason Ryan has already met up with new assistant Neil Barnes as they discuss their plans for the All Blacks forwards, but revealed that their time together resulted in a rather embarrassing moment.<\/p>\n

The set-piece guru is the only survivor from the Scott Robertson regime, with the former Crusaders assistant one of the few to emerge from the 2025 end-of-season review with credit.<\/p>\n

Dave Rennie<\/a> has taken over from Robertson<\/a>, and he has brought in his trusted lieutenant, Barnes, who is also a renowned forwards coach.<\/p>\n

According to Ryan, he visited Barnes on his farm, mainly to talk about rugby and the All Blacks<\/a>, but he also gave him a helping hand. However, it did not go entirely to plan.<\/p>\n

Ryan\u2019s cow milking story<\/p>\n

\u201cI spent a couple of days with Barnesy on his farm and stayed the night with him, and milked the cow in the morning which was an absolute shambles \u2013 I learned a lesson there,\u201d he told Sport Nation.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a certain place you should stand and there\u2019s a certain place you shouldn\u2019t stand, and I stood where you shouldn\u2019t and when a cow coughs when it\u2019s milking, it\u2019s not nice!\u201d<\/p>\n

New All Blacks coach reveals the Sonny Bill Williams revelation that changed him<\/a><\/p>\n

Given that two people will now have responsibility for the forwards, that could cause friction in some coaching circles.<\/p>\n

You get the sense that will not be the case for Ryan and Barnes, though, who always had great respect for each other when they were priming their respective packs for the Crusaders v Chiefs clashes in Super Rugby.<\/p>\n

Barnes has a \u2018sharp mind\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was actually a really special couple of days. Barnes and I, we\u2019ve always had a massive mutual respect. We\u2019ve coached a lot against each other for the Chiefs and Crusaders in the Super days, and then he coached Fiji for a few years before I coached Fiji a few years after him,\u201d Ryan said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot of mutual respect, we had a good conversation about the game in general and went through some clips.<\/p>\n

\u201cI sort of said where I think we\u2019re at as a forward pack and he shared a couple of things as well that he\u2019s seen, which was really good. There was some good robust convos.<\/p>\n

\u201cBarnesy\u2019s got a big heart and I\u2019m really looking forward to working with him, and I know he is with me. I\u2019m pretty excited about it. He\u2019s got a good sharp mind about the game and I think we will be good for each other.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE: NZ Rugby bigwig: Scott Robertson sacking was a \u2018very good outcome\u2019 and the \u2018right thing to do\u2019 for the All Blacks<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Respected coach Jason Ryan has already met up with new assistant Neil Barnes as they discuss their plans…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":498280,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[5903,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-498279","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-rugby","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498279","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=498279"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/498279\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/498280"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=498279"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=498279"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=498279"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}