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Zip it Wales, say All Blacks

NZPA - November 5, 2009, 4:08 pm

The All Blacks are clearly tiring of Wales' trash-talking, as the tourists' newest rugby international offered them a humble piece of advice today.

From coach Warren Gatland to young winger Leigh Halfpenny, Wales have talked a great game all week and hinted the aura-less All Blacks are ripe for the picking at Millennium Stadium on Sunday (NZT).

All this has been observed with some amusement by All Blacks debutant Zac Guildford, who will mark his former age-group international foe Halfpenny on the left wing.

"I don't really get that. They do talk it up quite a bit, the Welsh, but I prefer to save our talking for the field which the All Blacks usually do," Guildford said.

"I have a bit of a laugh about it when the opposition talks it up. You can do all the talking you want, but the real talking will happen on Saturday when the teams clash.

"I don't make much of it, it just brushes over me. They can say what they want to say."

Halfpenny, 20, boldly chimed into the debate of the week, about whether the All Blacks retained that air of invincibility.

He said while that aura existed in the past, it had vanished in recent years despite the All Blacks having won the past 20 tests between the sides spread over 56 years.

"I think the time where players were in awe of them has gone and it's definitely about us and not them this year," he told the Western Mail newspaper.

"We are quietly confident that it could be a good time to get a win after 50-plus years. We have moved on as a team."

The clear intention to talk themselves up and chip the All Blacks had slightly irked the tourists' coaches, who refused to buy into it today.

Graham Henry, a former Wales coach, was not biting at the cheerfully delivered question from the floor: "How's your aura?"

"I don't think that's for me to describe, it's for all you other people to do that. All we do is coach to the best of our ability and the guys try to play well," Henry responded.

"The judgment around those mystical things is for other people, not for us."

Assistant coach Steve Hansen, another former Wales coach, noted the Welsh players were "obviously pretty confident", while captain Richie McCaw played the deadest of dead bats to any verbal jousting.

"To be honest I don't read too much into it at all," McCaw said.

"The guys that were here last year remember it as a tough test match, probably the toughest on tour, and we realise it's going to be the same on Saturday. What's said before means absolutely nothing."

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fordgtfalcoon 11:47am Friday 06th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
g1frm2007 more like we are getting to you guys, coz you know you will be embarrassed.
Peter 07:50am Friday 06th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
Come down in the last shower Len, or have you only recently learned to read?" Gone are the days..." WTF! The northern unions spout the same tripe every time we land there. Henry and Co have been in the real world for longer than you seem to have been, if you're here yet at ...
daithemeat 04:40am Friday 06th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
I'm a Welshman living in New Zealand & I'm rooting for the ABs as I have done each time the teams have played each other since I arrived here over six years ago. My desire for the ABs to do well against the WRU has been heightened after the way my cousin was treated by them.
Tom 02:12am Friday 06th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
as a kiwi living in wales, they have been doing bad in the magners league, the welsh teams. Wales have no depth, as your union keeps splashing out big money on southern guys at the end of their game, but they still match up, and most times own any leek that takes the feild.You guys made the aura. We ...
coreychoat 11:57pm Thursday 05th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
McCaw is god and thats all we need to know. they can talk all they want want. go zac, go ben smith....put our mighty BOP boy on next week and we are laughing. get out new faces amongst it
May 11:54pm Thursday 05th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
Gatland & his team are dreamers.....they're gonna get a hiding......Go the A.B's
g1frm2007 10:48pm Thursday 05th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
Looks like the welsh team is getting to you all blacks ,the weekend will show how is right
fordgtfalcoon 10:10pm Thursday 05th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
This is a gift from whales now we can give them a hiding they will never forget and not feel sorry for them!.
Graham 09:41pm Thursday 05th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
they sould stick to there 7 team they do well and they wont run into themselfs score abs45 wales 15 //
crush_sader 09:30pm Thursday 05th November 2009 EST Report Abuse
. . . their 1 (which we hear about ad infinitum). Will be a tough, close game v Wales, having said that.