Joe Marler drops haka bomb days before England vs All Blacks

England prop Joe Marler has thrown a hand grenade into the build-up to England’s Test with New Zealand with a controversial post on X about the Haka.

Marler’s team-mates will face down the ceremonial Maori war dance at Allianz Stadium, Twickenham, this Saturday but the loose-head prop is seemingly not a fan.

“The Haka needs binning. It’s ridiculous,” he wrote on the social media platform, formerly known as Twitter, before adding: “It’s only any good when teams actually front it with some sort of reply. Like the league boys did last week.”

The Haka needs binning. It’s ridiculous.

— Joe Marler (@JoeMarler) October 29, 2024

Marler was referring to the eyeball-to-eyeball, nose-to-nose incident when the Samoan RL team performed the Siva Tau ahead of their international against England RL in Wigan last weekend.

INJECT IT.

Serious tension between England and Samoa in the League earlier on.

Bring back haka face offs in Union. pic.twitter.com/cSX14kXPLM

— Tight Five Rugby (@TightFive_Rugby) October 27, 2024

Predictably, some of his 160,000 followers have taken the bait, leading to some forceful replies from those of an All Black persuasion.

One user wrote: “An Englishman saying this is f****** hilarious; worry about winning some games first, aye?”

What approach England take when confronted by the Haka remains to be seen but Owen Farrell’s cheeky grinned response before the Rugby World Cup 2019 semi-final did his team no harm. England won 19-7.

Another X user, though, questioned the wisdom of his comment so close to the big game. “You just lost the Game for your team! Congratulations!”

Always the prankster, it would have been fascinating to see how Marler would have reacted had he been in England’s 23-man squad.