A weekly podcast hosted by two of Rugby’s most decorated legends, GEORGE GREGAN & JOHN SMIT.
I Love Rugby blends forensic match analysis, unfiltered banter, and personal stories that no journalist can access, from inside international dressing rooms, Test camp hotels, and the hardest conversations in the game.
19 Turnovers: How the Wallabies Gave Away the Bledisloe | Will Genia
36-7 at half-time. Six All Blacks tries in forty minutes. In front of 73,399 people at Stadium Australia.
Here’s the number that explains it: Australia lost the ball 19 times and won it back 3. New Zealand lost it 10 and won it back 6 — and turned almost every one of those into points. A missed lineout became a Fabian Holland steal became a Rieko Ioane try. A loose Max Jorgensen pass became Beauden Barrett running 70 metres on the half-time hooter. A dropped restart became Josh Moorby, two minutes into the second half.
43-21. The Bledisloe swept 2-0. Australia’s 13th straight loss to New Zealand, and a trophy that hasn’t crossed the Tasman since 2003.
Will Genia — 110 Tests, three World Cups, a Super Rugby title and one of the great tries in a final — joins George Gregan and John Smit. And with the two most-capped halfbacks Australia has ever produced in the same room, we spend proper time on Cam Roigard, Damian McKenzie, and what the modern number nine is actually asked to do.
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1 Oct 2026
I LOVE RUGBY EP06 - Rob Kafer
Australia led the world champions by 25 points with twelve minutes to go. Then four Wallabies were sent to the bin in six minutes. Harry Wilson on seventy. Ryan Lonergan a minute later, with a penalty try against him. Then Sua'ali'i.
Then Paisami on seventy-six. Eleven men in gold, defending their own line, against a full-strength Bomb Squad. South Africa scored 21 unanswered points in the last twelve minutes. Australia held. 42-38. But here's the thing we want to talk about: the ending is not why they won. For sixty minutes Australia were simply the better rugby team — and the way they got there says more about where this side is heading than any goal-line stand. Rod Kafer — 12 Tests for the Wallabies, a World Cup winner in 1999, and a side that won ten of the twelve matches he played in — joins George Gregan and John Smit to break it down. Oh, and the referee finished the Test match borrowing a mobile phone.
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17 Sept 2026
The Best Team in Rankings History | Andrew Mehrtens on the Boks' 3-1 Series Win
South Africa came out of this series on 95.09 rating points — the highest any team has ever recorded, in 23 years of world rankings. Higher than any of their three World Cup wins.
And yet across four Tests the All Blacks scored more tries than they did.
43-28 in Baltimore, ten tries in a series decider, and a record American crowd of 68,173. Andrew Mehrtens — 70 Tests and 967 points for the All Blacks, and a man who played in a World Cup final against the Springboks — joins George Gregan and John Smit.
We get into the pattern everyone missed: one Springbok try in the first Test, three in the second, four in the third, six in the fourth. Same opponent, four weeks, better every time. Plus the All Blacks shape that finally cracked the blitz, and the try that turned the match and is still being argued about.
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8 Sept 2026
Jim Hamilton - Boks Go 2-1 Up! 29-24 in Soweto, Savea Injured + Wallabies Make History
Before a ball was kicked in this series, Jim Hamilton said the All Blacks could beat South Africa in one Test — but they would not win a series. Three Tests later, that is precisely what has happened.
South Africa beat New Zealand 29-24 at a packed FNB Stadium in Soweto to go 2-1 up in Rugby's Greatest Rivalry. They lost Cheslin Kolbe to a broken jaw inside ten minutes, went 12-5 down, and still found a way — through a penalty try from a scrum that settled a week of arguing between two coaches, and through Malcolm Marx, who was rated 9 out of 10 and was the man who cleaned Ardie Savea out of the Test match.
George Gregan and John Smit are joined by Jim Hamilton — 63 Tests in the second row for Scotland, and co-host of The Rugby Pod — to go through all of it.
Plus: the Wallabies draw 28-28 in freezing Mendoza to win their first ever Test series in Argentina, and Les Kiss is still unbeaten.
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1 Sept 2026
Jean de Villiers on Cape Town and the Scrum War
Last week South Africa got 0.9 points every time they entered the All Blacks' 22. In Cape Town they got four. That's the whole Test match. The Springboks won 33-26 to level Rugby's Greatest Rivalry at 1-1 — while scoring fewer tries than New Zealand. Kolbe kicked seven from seven. Kolisi returned, captained and scored.
And then Rassie Erasmus and Dave Rennie went to war over the scrum. George Gregan and John Smit are joined by Jean de Villiers — 109 Springbok Tests, 37 as captain, 2007 World Cup winner — to break down how the series turned, what the All Blacks do about their lineout, and who wins at FNB Stadium on Saturday. Plus the Wallabies hold off Argentina 27-21 in Jujuy, and Les Kiss stays unbeaten.
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25 Aug 2026
How The AB's Took First Blood w/Justin Marshall
Welcome to the first episode of I Love Rugby hosted by George Gregen and John Smit. South Africa 16, New Zealand 33 — and almost none of it made sense.
The Springboks won the scrum, the possession and the carries at Ellis Park, and lost by 17. Hosts George Gregen and John Smit are joined by Justin Marshall — 81 Tests for the All Blacks, the most try-scoring halfback in New Zealand history with 24, and one of the most recognisable voices in world rugby commentary — to unpack the first Test of Rugby's Greatest Rivalry and work out how a game that lopsided in the stats ended up that one-sided on the scoreboard.
Together they break the Test into big moments: the ten minutes before half-time where the All Blacks absorbed everything and walked off one point down; the 22-entry numbers that explain the whole result (South Africa 0.9 points per visit, New Zealand 3.6); the breakdown tactic Rassie Erasmus admitted he never saw coming; how New Zealand lost the scrum battle and won the Test anyway; and what the Springboks must fix in seven days in Cape Town. Will Jordan's two tries, Jasper Wiese's best Test in a Bok jersey, a 12-Test winning streak gone, and a new world number one. Test 2 is at DHL Stadium on Saturday.
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12 Aug 2026
WELCOME TO I LOVE RUGBY
A weekly podcast hosted by two of the Rugby’ smost decorated rugby legends GEORGE GREGAN & JOHN SMIT. I Love Rugby blends forensic match analysis, unfiltered banter, and personal stories that no journalist can access, from inside international dressing rooms, Test camp hotels, and the hardest conversations in the game
See omnystudio.com/listener (https://omnystudio.com/listener) for privacy information.
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