What is 'New Zealand rugby' nowadays?

“That’s not New Zealand rugby.’’

It’s a good quote, and I thank former All Black Jeff Wilson for it.

The former Highlanders outside back was talking in his role as a television analyst, following the first round of the 2026 Super Rugby Pacific season.

Wilson was rather taken aback by the volume of kicking on display, suggesting it wasn’t in keeping with how we do or should play our rugby in this country.

The comment made me think, though, not so much about whether to kick or not to kick, but about what “New Zealand rugby’’ actually is anymore.

To me, it’s not kicking the ball 83 times in a match that’s the problem; it’s that we don’t have a rugby identity.

The Otago, Highlanders and All Blacks teams Wilson played in definitely had a method. Men such as Laurie Mains, Gordon Hunter, Tony Gilbert and John Hart opted for running rugby, partly for philosophical reasons but mostly because it suited the skillset of their players.

Wilson’s teams at NPC and Super level were often undersized upfront, but had a great fetcher in Josh Kronfeld and skilful, enterprising backs, of which Wilson was as good as any.

Auckland and the Blues played quite different rugby, with the Waikato NPC team of that era different again. We were told to expect the unexpected from the Hurricanes, which invariably meant giving the ball to Christian Cullen and Tana Umaga and hoping for the best.

North Harbour weren’t dissimilar to Otago, with guys like Walter Little, Frank Bunce, and Eric Rush cutting defences to shreds.

The point is that teams had distinct playing styles, where they cut their cloth according to their personnel. Positive intent was a staple of most teams, but the methods differed.

I think that’s largely been lost from our game at every level, including the All Blacks. I think teams run the same rehearsed moves and shapes, kick in the same situations, and defend in a similar manner.

It’s all so predictable and so choreographed and so bland, quite frankly.

I mentioned Cullen, Umaga and Wilson, but cast your mind back to other players from that era, such as Joeli Vidiri, Jonah Lomu and Carlos Spencer.

Wilson graced Carisbrook with guys like Stephen Bachop, John Leslie, Marc Ellis and John Timu. They weren’t the best, biggest and fastest backs of all time, but they were good enough to beat the British & Irish Lions and Springboks in their time.

There was an endeavour, even a mischief, about their rugby. Most of all, there was an individuality.

Rugby in New Zealand is different now. The athletes are bigger, and the level of information they have on opponents is far greater.

We can’t go back to the last days of shamateurism and the early days of professionalism, but we can surely come up with ways of playing the game that accentuate our strengths rather than just playing the same way everyone else does.

For my sins, I’ve become a regular listener of Irish rugby podcasts. They’re talking about Ireland in the Six Nations, but it could just as easily be the All Blacks.

The laments are much the same: struggles under the high ball, lack of direction from first five-eighth, constantly carrying the ball into contact and a nostalgia – much like I expressed for Wilson’s era – for the Ireland team of 2022.

Necessity is always the mother of invention, and it’s time for people in New Zealand to try and reimagine our rugby. Never mind what the team analysts say and what the spreadsheet suggests about tactics and territory.

New Zealand is blessed with so much natural talent, but I don’t think we’re utilising it.

There’s nothing unique about our game, no matter how dynamic our athletes are and how thorough their rugby education.

The All Blacks are losing to teams at their own game, rather than playing the New Zealand one Wilson and the rest of us remember so fondly.

What is New Zealand rugby? I’m not sure those at the coalface know anymore.