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If the All Blacks are really role models, then Matching fit On Three is one of the most important things they have done for men their age, men with weight problems, joint problems, heart problems and even mental problems.
There were many gasps when Matching fit screened Tuesday at 7.30pm, not just from a group of 40-somethings All Blacks, but certainly from those who looked at their televisions and remembered them in their sleek, swift and powerful pomp.
Supplied
The Match Fit Team (from left): Frank Bunce, Charlie Riechelmann, Troy Flavell, Kees Meeuws, Sir Graham Henry, Piri Weepu, Ron Cribb, Pita Alatini, Craig Dowd, Wayne â ???? Buckâ ???? Shelford, Eroni Clarke and Eric Rush.
In this “how do they look now?” reality show, a group that includes Eroni Clarke (now known as ‘Caleb Clarke’s Father’) Frank Bunce, Kees Meeuws, Troy Flavell, Pita Alatini, Piri Weepu, Craig Dowd and Eric Rush prepare for a comeback match, with Sir Graham Henry and Buck Shelford as mentors.
You fear for them as they limp. Alatini, Rush, and Bunce look like sleek gray versions of the sleek dark-haired models viewers remember from days gone by. Rush has a steel hip and knee replacement, but he still looks deadly fast at 55.
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“I’m fit enough for what I’m doing and I’m not doing anything,” jokes 58-year-old Bunce upon arrival.
“I’m really just a walking corpse,” Cribb says at the meeting, citing spinal injuries that ended his career.
Phil Walter / Getty Images
Caleb Clarke reunites with his father and former All Black Eroni Clarke (left) after the Bledisloe Cup game against the Wallabies on Sunday.
Body fat and muscle composition tests aren’t such good news for some. Clarke, 51, is found to have the body of a 66-year-old. Intensely religious, he left rugby early to start a family.
The mighty supporter Meeuws is now a 145kg family man, with a body that is metabolically 15 years older than him. Weepu isn’t doing much better, he’s a 37-year-old sports genius trapped in the body of a 51-year-old.
Phil Walter
Kees Meeuws in action against England in 2004.
They both fight (read For real wrestling) in the Bronco fitness test, won in 6 minutes 14 seconds by Alatini.
“I’m not shy about accepting that I let go a bit,” admits 2011 Rugby World Cup hero Weepu.
All Black Beauden Barrett holds the New Zealand Bronco record at 4 minutes 12 seconds, more than twice as fast as some of the Matching fit boys. When they play touch football they are competitive, skilled … and exhausted.
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Famous ex All Blacks abound among the Match Fit team.
The game remembers the lyrics “and you know you’re over the hill, when your mind makes a promise your body can’t fulfill”, from Old Folks Boogie, by American band Little Feat.
Many balls are dropped or are approached by a player who no longer has the pace to get there.
A round of injuries when the old men reunite takes what seems like a decade or two. He broke this and that. Damaged here and there. Big bellies, although with a lot of muscle left.
And then come many reasons why adding weight around the “puku” is bad for your health. So many reasons, with too many medical terms to list here.
Lawrence Smith
Piri Weepu was a national icon at the 2011 Rugby World Cup.
When Shelford points out that Polynesians and Maori live an average of 10 years less than Pākehā, Henry breaks a grim silence and mutters “I’m sorry.”
If you still feel like the All Blacks lead haunted and pampered lives for all eternity in that moment, then Henry pops that particular balloon by raising mental health, which players are quick to blame on “you” (selectors and coaches).
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Many balls are dropped or shown to a player who no longer has the pace to get there.
It is funny. But not really; when Meeuws recalls the trauma of his mother’s death when he was 10, then his father when he was 20 and after they left him, he talks about going to a “dark place.”
“He was fit, he was strong. Give me the ball in my hands and I would go through a brick wall for you, ”he said.
But the rejection hurt, and the black jersey didn’t stop that pain.
“Just because we’re All Blacks and stuff… we’re human too. There have been moments, I have had doubts about myself “.
