{"id":503275,"date":"2026-03-30T10:43:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-30T10:43:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/503275\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T10:43:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-30T10:43:08","slug":"rieko-ioane-hails-priceless-jacques-nienaber-and-opens-up-on-all-blacks-axe","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/503275\/","title":{"rendered":"Rieko Ioane hails ‘priceless’ Jacques Nienaber and opens up on All Blacks axe"},"content":{"rendered":"

Experienced All Black Rieko Ioane has praised the influence of Jacques Nienaber, while the back also opened up on his disappointing 2025 Test season.<\/p>\n

The 29-year-old is currently working with the former Springboks head coach at Leinster and has enjoyed their time together at the Irish province.<\/p>\n

Although Ioane<\/a> hasn\u2019t quite found his best form since moving to Dublin, that is evidently not because of poor coaching with one of the best in the business passing over his knowledge to the 88-times capped centre.<\/p>\n

There has been some criticism of Nienaber<\/a> with Leinster not quite as free-flowing as they were when Stuart Lancaster was at the helm, but the All Black<\/a> has nothing but good to say about the South African,<\/a> even if he has struggled with the strong accent.<\/p>\n

Willingness to make you better<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s my first time being coached by a South African and I\u2019ve enjoyed Jacques, although some of the stuff he says I can\u2019t really understand,\u201d he told the Irish Times<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve loved having him as a coach, and he\u2019s priceless in this environment, his passion for defence, something I pride myself on.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe just loves it, and honestly, you\u2019d get him in a room and he could talk for two hours about one instance, and how willing he is to make the players and the team better is awesome.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Playing South Africans regularly\u2019 a big carrot in Rieko Ioane\u2019s move to Leinster as All Black exposes possible north-south misconception<\/a><\/p>\n

Ioane joined Nienaber at Leinster after a frustrating 2025, which saw him struggle for form throughout and eventually get dropped by Scott Robertson.<\/p>\n

The former All Blacks head coach moved him to wing at the start of the season after an equally underwhelming 2024 at centre, but he lost his place after their victory over the Springboks at Eden Park.<\/p>\n

\u2018Always kept an open mind\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cIt sucks not playing, but I always kept an open mind. I was confident in my ability to cover wing and I was super confident in my ability to cover midfield,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThat\u2019s where I want to play. That\u2019s where I want to be while having the ability to cover both, but things in that championship played out that way.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was disappointing, but you can\u2019t drop your lip. You\u2019re still an All Black, whether you\u2019re in the 23 or not. So, prepping the boys and making sure we had the best prepared team come Saturday ended up being my job. That\u2019s just footy. Selection\u2019s not up to you in a way.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Bernard Jackman: The \u2018reality\u2019 of Rieko Ioane\u2019s form as RG Snyman \u2018rumour\u2019 could put \u2018even more pressure\u2019 on All Blacks star<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Experienced All Black Rieko Ioane has praised the influence of Jacques Nienaber, while the back also opened up…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":503276,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[348,3482,65320,620,50,45239,5903,4247,101,56,54,16296,55],"class_list":["post-503275","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-home-page","tag-internationals","tag-leinster","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-rieko-ioane","tag-rugby","tag-south-africa","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-united-rugby-championship","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503275","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=503275"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/503275\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/503276"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=503275"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=503275"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=503275"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}