'Knots in your gut': Beauden Barrett opens up on emotional All Blacks moment

Even in your 149th Test match, All Blacks first-five Beauden Barrett experiences butterflies before heading out to represent his country.

This week in Cardiff, though, feels extra special in more ways than one, as Barrett will lead the All Blacks out in a Test match for the first time in his career.

The experienced playmaker will have his brother, Scott, who has captained the All Blacks on several occasions, alongside him in the leadership group as Dave Rennie’s side prepares to take on Wales in the Nations Championship.

With Barrett often far away from the action at fullback, leaders in the group like Scott, first-five Richie Mo’unga, and Anton Lienert-Brown will lead the way in their respective roles.

Rennie made ten changes to that All Blacks side that convincingly beat Scotland last weekend at Murrayfield in Edinburgh, but has retained seven starters, including the Barrett brothers, Fletcher Newell, Peter Lakai, Wallace Sititi, Quinn Tupaea, and Josh Moorby.

After running through some light drills at the Principality Stadium alongside his All Blacks teammates, Barrett opened up about how he feels heading into Saturday’s Test match.

“It’s a great honour. I’ve had the honour before in a game, a match against the Barbarians at Twickenham, but doing it in a Test match in a stadium like this in Wales, such a proud nation,” Barrett told reporters.

“It’s, yeah, a great opportunity for me, but yeah, one that I’m very proud of.”

The versatile playmaker said he won’t do anything special while leading the team, other than leading from the front.

“It’s more of the same, really. I’m not going to try and do anything that I haven’t already. It’s about having that relationship with the referee at 15.

“There’s a bit of distance there, so how I manage that, I might be doing a few more extra shuttles. But I’ve got great support around me.

“So yeah, we’ve got a good structure around who will lead the forwards, and with Richie Mo’unga being a bit closer to things and so on, as I said, we’ve got a good plan.”

After learning on Sunday evening, Barrett described his reaction to Rennie’s decision.

“Yeah, I straight away had one of those knots in your gut when you get told something that puts you on the edge of your seat.

“But straight away, it was mixed emotions, excitement, nerves, but yeah, what an opportunity.

“He’s [Scott] super, super stoked [for me]. He’s really enjoying the role that he’s playing on this team at the moment, and so is Jordie.”