Field of dreams
Sam Cane’s journey to the top
Everyone has their Steve Hansen impersonation. Even Sam Cane, new All Blacks captain and son of a Reporoa deer farmer, when retelling the congratulatory call from his former coach a week or so back.
‘‘Everyone will be watching you now, son,’’ Hansen told Cane, who recalls the conversation with a chuckle in the coach’s distinctive tone. ‘‘It was good to hear from him . . . [there was] plenty of advice.’’
Much like his predecessors Kieran Read and Richie McCaw, Cane’s public persona is squeaky clean as he assumes the highest office among New Zealand sporting teams at age 28. But he knows the gaze will intensify when he and wife Harriet venture out in Hamilton (they moved into their newly built semi-rural property in September and were married in Wanaka in December).
‘‘Most people are pretty good. As long as they use their manners there are no dramas. I’ll probably expect a bit more attention,’’ Cane says.
He completed plenty of Zoom interviews in his first week or so, and remains polite and engaging throughout. He talks at length about what shaped him into the No 1 target of new All Blacks coach Ian Foster in a surprise house call in February, which he kept secret from all bar his wife and family until the big announcement on May 6.
Family and his idyllic rural upbringing in Reporoa, half way between Taupo¯ and Rotorua on State Highway 5, are central to this story. It stretches back to World War II when Cane’s maternal grandfather, Dirk, and four brothers fled the Netherlands and the horrors of Europe for a fresh start in New Zealand.
Opa, as he was affectionately known to Cane and younger sisters Sjaan and Lia, set up a dairy farm in Reporoa and now lives in comfortable retirement at Mt Maunganui.
Cane recalls: ‘‘He was 12 when he came to New Zealand on a boat and couldn’t speak a word of English. He only lasted in school for a couple of years.
‘‘We’re pretty proud of him and his brothers to come to New Zealand with nothing and work their way to all being pretty successful, with good lives and families.
‘‘I thank him for a wee bit of size, too, he’s a fairly well-built guy. I’d probably be a bit skinny if it wasn’t for that.’’
Father Malcolm grew up on a dairy farm, too, and met Cane’s mother, Kathy, at Reporoa College. Childhood sweethearts, their son describes them.
On the farm, Malcolm Cane made a successful switch from cattle to deer nearly 30 years ago and specialises in growing trophy stags. ‘‘His two greatest passions are probably deer farming and rugby,’’ Cane says.
Like All Blacks greats Colin Meads, Brian Lochore and McCaw, Cane learned his life skills and rugby craft on the farm. He recalls his younger years fondly – ‘‘awesome memories’’ building huts in the barn and sleeping overnight in them; working for his father, first unpaid then for a wage, and learning valuable parental lessons which serve him well in rugby leadership.
‘‘Dad gave me a lot of responsibility on the farm and we were taught if you ever made a mistake or mucked up, the consequences were yours to deal with. My parents would never come to the rescue, they’d make us find a way around them.
‘‘I once got kicked off the school bus for three or four days and Mum was like, ‘OK, find your own way to school’. I thought ‘what?’’. So I had to bike to school, which was 20km each way.
‘‘It was all good getting there because we were at the top of a hill and Reporoa’s a bit of a valley, but on the way home in the afternoon it was horrible. They made us work things out, and we didn’t make the same mistakes twice.’’
And there was rugby. Malcolm Cane coached his son through his junior teams at
Reporoa Rugby Club until young Sam made the college’s first XV at age 14.
Down the road lived Scott Curry, future New Zealand Sevens captain, and his three brothers who had their own field of dreams.
‘‘I played all my rugby with his younger brother Shaun, right from the age of five. They only lived 5km around the corner and they had their own rugby field,’’ says Cane. ‘‘I grew up with two sisters so I spent quite a bit of time around there playing rugby in the backyard.’’
Curry’s father, Phil, and Steve Axtens – father of Carl, who made New Zealand Secondary Schools out of Reporoa College in year 12 – coached the first XV. For a smallish country school they punched well above their weight and Cane recalls them being third best in Bay of Plenty, behind the powerhouses Rotorua Boys’ and Tauranga Boys’. C ane also learned from his rugby setbacks, and didn’t stroll into every rep lineup. ‘‘I remember when I missed out on my first rep side, a junior Bay of Plenty team, I sat in the car after the trial very disappointed. Dad told me to bide my time, and I remember not even knowing what ‘bide’ meant. He thought back then I had a bit of go about me as a rugby player and I just had to keep working away and be patient.’’
BOP Rugby Union wanted Cane and Axtens closer to headquarters so they both switched to Tauranga Boys’ for their final year in 2009. Both made NZ Schools.
Tauranga Boys’ principal Robert Mangan recalls of Cane: ‘‘He was the standout. Exceptional, it was written all over him that he was going to go places, without any doubt.’’
Cane considered a builder’s apprenticeship but decided it was too tough fitting in the long hours with rugby training. He set himself two years to ‘‘make it’’ in rugby and studied for a business diploma instead.
Sure enough the tough flanker cracked the Chiefs and made his All Blacks debut at 20, against Ireland in Christchurch in 2012 when they sneaked a three-point win. He wasn’t flashy with ball in hand but relished the hard collisions, rolling the sleeves up in McCaw style to bash his opponents and wrestle possession for his team.
Cane was soon part of the leadership group and Hansen handed him the captaincy for the first time at the 2015 World Cup, against Namibia. He notched 60 tests before his biggest setback – one that left him unsure if he’d walk, let alone play rugby again.
After another one of those brutal collisions, Cane lay prone on Pretoria’s Loftus Versfeld on October 6, 2018, as his horrified family and friends watched from New Zealand.
‘‘At the time rugby was just completely out of my mind. Particularly when you hear the term ‘broken neck’ and doctors are running their fingers over your feet and you start to get a bit worried. I was in a lot of pain by that stage so I knew something wasn’t right.
‘‘Once they said the surgery went really well – better than expected – they said there was a very good chance I’d be back playing rugby.
‘‘Not for a moment did I not want to get back playing, I just thought there was a bit of a journey ahead and I took it step by step. I had the neck brace on for six weeks, then got told I needed it for another six weeks. That was a bit challenging. Then it was about taking baby steps.’’
Father Malcolm brought around a La-Z-Boy chair for his son to sleep in if he was sore, and his concerned family supported him and discussed his future.
‘‘It wasn’t until after I got back playing that they told me they’d had a conversation among themselves that if I had chosen to hang up the boots then, they would have been pretty happy with that decision too.
‘‘They realised how lucky I was. Other people have had more or less exactly the same injury and not been so lucky. We tried not to think that way because it’s a little bit scary.’’
In Cane’s next test, in July last year against Argentina in Buenos Aires, he was captain again as the undermanned All Blacks pulled off a 20-16 win. Fast forward to February, and Cane was officially captain.
Foster described him as ‘‘really comfortable in his own skin about who he is, and not afraid to challenge and question’’.
The man himself got to tell his biggest supporters – including his Opa – well in advance. ‘‘They were really stoked, obviously, hugely proud. It felt a little bit surreal and Mum likened it to me getting named for the first time as an All Black. My younger sister – she won’t like this – but she almost started crying.
‘‘When you get named for the first time it’s the realisation of a dream as long as you can remember. To achieve that dream seems amazing. You don’t really dream of being an All Black captain, but at the same time they’re both a massive honour and both big achievements.’’
‘‘Not for a moment did I not want to get back playing.’’
Cane on his journey back from a broken neck, suffered against South Africa in October 2018