A Close Shave with Sir Ted

Sir Graham Henry or ‘Ted’ as he is affectionately known by his close friends (and nearly all the rugby loving world), now a legend in his own country, a knight even, was once just a humble rugby coach striving to make his way in the competitive world of international sport. As we now all know Sir Ted is the guy who finally broke the spell, the gallant knight who withstood the weight of expectation and worked out how to defeat the dragon, the man that let us win the cup once again. Yes New Zealand is a rugby mad nation, even the people who do not like the game set their watches by it and so the need for our national team to be number one in the world is both irrational and extremely intense.

The pressure of multiple failures at world cup tournaments and a 25 year drought of winning the damn thing can only be described as enormous. So the day that on home soil the All Blacks were able to, as Ted puts it ‘Smash the French’ by 8 points to 7, well that was a tremendous day for New Zealand and the makings of a legend called Sir Ted. In this short interview we celebrate that occasion and all the work and effort that built towards it, as Ted explains his own take on Triumph & Disaster and what it all means to heap all of your winnings and risk it all on one roll of the dice. We hope you enjoy watching it as much as we did making it. A massive thank you to Sir Graham for his time, openness and insights, he is indeed one of Aoteoroa’s finest, long live Sir Ted.