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Aaron Smith's proudest Highlanders moment isn't the championship
By Ned Lester
Aaron Smith will be remembered as the greatest Highlander in the club's history to date. He's played more games for the team than anyone else and brought the Super Rugby trophy to Dunedin for the first time.
It was in 2015 that Smith, along with a number of fellow club legends, hoisted the Super Rugby trophy for the first time in the club's history. Smith went on to win the Rugby World Cup in the same year.
Smith now owns the titles of most capped Highlander ever with 183 games to his name, and most capped All Black back of all time, with 114 caps.
None of those feats rank as Smith's proudest Highlanders moment though. That came in 2018. Surprisingly, in a black jersey.
"Obviously, the championship was huge and my greatest rugby achievement, I think.
"But, my proudest moment would be in 2018, we had eight All Blacks in the team and it was just special because it was like, you can come down here and you can make the All Blacks from the south, as Highlanders players that genuinely deserve to be there.
"Playing a Test match with seven or eight of my brothers from the south, that was awesome."
A fitting sentiment from the definition of a team-first player.
The 34-year-old has signed a multi-year deal with Japan's Toyota Verblitz from 2024, vacating the Dundein shores following the World Cup.
Smith and his young family will utilise a batch in the Coromandel for their return visits, but Smith admits the love for Dunedin persists and won't rule out a return, perhaps even on the field.
"It doesn't feel real it's coming to an end. I'll support this team forever and hey, who knows, I'd love to come back and chase down Crocky (Wyatt Crockett)."
Former Crusaders prop Wyatt Crockett currently holds the Super Rugby record for most games played with 202 appearances.
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I’m all for speeding up the game. But can we be certain that the slowness of the game contributed to fans walking out? I’m not so sure. Super rugby largely suffered from most fans only being able to, really, follow the games played in their own time zone. So at least a third of the fan base wasn’t engaged at any point in time. As a Saffer following SA teams in the URC - I now watch virtually every European game played on the weekend. In SR, I wouldn’t be bothered to follow the games being played on the other side of the world, at weird hours, if my team wasn’t playing. I now follow the whole tournament and not just the games in my time zone. Second, with New Zealand teams always winning. It’s like formula one. When one team dominates, people lose interest. After COVID, with SA leaving and Australia dipping in form, SR became an even greater one horse race. Thats why I think Japan’s league needs to get in the mix. The international flavor of those teams could make for a great spectacle. But surely if we believe that shaving seconds off lost time events in rugby is going to draw fans back, we should be shown some figures that supports this idea before we draw any major conclusions. Where are the stats that shows these changes have made that sort of impact? We’ve measured down to the average no. Of seconds per game. Where the measurement of the impact on the fanbase? Does a rugby “fan” who lost interest because of ball in play time suddenly have a revived interest because we’ve saved or brought back into play a matter of seconds or a few minutes each game? I doubt it. I don’t thinks it’s even a noticeable difference to be impactful. The 20 min red card idea. Agreed. Let’s give it a go. But I think it’s fairer that the player sent off is substituted and plays no further part in the game as a consequence.
Go to commentsThose are pretty good draws for the two top Aussie teams. I certainly wouldn't want my Chiefs to have a quarter final in Brisbane. None of the top teams will want the Crusaders.
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