What mahi of Black Ferns can teach us about national identity

One of the most perilous messages for the online industry is found in the classic Kevin Costner movie Field of Dreams. The 1989 film features an Iowa wheat farmer who hears a voice saying ‘‘if you build it, they will come’’. In his case it means chopping down his wheatfield and building a baseball pitch to lure back a team of ghost ballplayers from the 1930s.

Sadly, ‘‘if you build it, they will come’’ tends to be the mantra of many a (failed) internet entrepreneur. Bereft of actual data or empirical insights, they risk everything on a hare-brained scheme which they think will be so irresistible that everyone will use it.

In 99.99% of times it isn’t, and they don’t, and the entrepreneur goes down the gurgler.

From early days at Trade Me, through to later stints at Timely, Serato and vWork, I’ve leaned the other way. I’ve always found data-based is the key to progress. Give me fact, not opinion.

Or as Amy Webb, futurist guru, phrases it – it’s about identifying signals and patterns of facts in the white noise of the market.

All of this came to mind last weekend as I watched the incredible finish to the 2022 Women’s Rugby World Cup final. An event held against a background of tremendous white noise.

Standing back a bit, I couldn’t help but notice what I reckon were some pretty interesting datapoints surrounding what was easily the best game of rugger we’ve seen in the last decade.

The first datapoint was the spontaneous waiata that Black Fern Ruby Tui kicked off following a post-match interview at Eden Park. Sensing the mood of the crowd, she grabbed the microphone from the reporter and jumped into a spine-tingling rendition of Tūtira Mai Ngā Iwi, the waiata that mokopuna learn at primary school.

What was palpable, though, was not just her chutzpah in leading the stadium of 42,000, but rather the way they responded. It was truly a magical moment as the crowd (which tended towards the older and whiter) responded en masse and in volume to Tui.

Hell, it wasn’t that long ago that the only waiata that most Kiwis knew was the title of the Split Enz album and the best they could haltingly manage was a bedraggled version of God Defend New Zealand.

But here was a Mt Eden crowd whose te reo was pitch perfect.

The second datapoint was how the event managed to smash all the behavioural myths surrounding women’s sport. You know, the ones saying no-one wants to watch it live or onscreen, or has any interest in following women’s sport online.

The pool play for the event had around three times the live attendance of the 2017 Women’s Rugby World Cup. The opening weekend viewership of the Kiwi game was around 600,000 domestically. Meanwhile, the number of online followers was more than double that of the previous tournament.

The third datapoint was Tui gifting her Rugby World Cup medal to Lucia, a young leukaemia survivor whom she had met the week before, and was in the crowd.

But unlike All Black Sonny Bill Williams’ medal gesture at the 2015 Rugby World Cup, her generosity was off-camera.

Such altruism in the glare of world-class competitive sport is as alarming as it is welcome.

The last datapoint for me occurred when I stopped in a small village not far out of Helensville. I popped in on Sunday morning to buy the paper and a pie, and a rather grizzled old Pākehā fellow was sitting behind the counter re-watching the highlights of the previous evening’s game.

‘‘By Christ those women could teach the All Blacks a thing or two about rugby – look at how they pulled off that try from a rolling maul,’’ he said as he rubbed his snow-white short back and sides.

I tried to nod sagely, not really knowing a rolling maul from my elbow.

‘‘And check out that final score from Leti-I’iga and Fluhler, I must have replayed it a dozen times now, and it just gets better every time.’’

Hearing the praise and the passion for women’s rugby and our winning side coming from an old white male in the boonies, got me thinking about the evolution of our national identity.

Way back in 1939, Frank Sargeson wrote The making of a New Zealander, an awkward story of a migrant trying to pin down exactly what made up the New Zealand psyche, and the result being brutish and awkward.

A few decades later, Gordon McLauchlan wrote The Passionless People, where he opines that Kiwis are smiling zombies who are lazy, smug, racist and prone to moaning.

To me, the four datapoints surrounding last Saturday’s game point to a different national identity. One that is multicultural, passionate and generous. The sort of place I’d like my kids to grow up in.

Meanwhile, I can’t help but think the path to last Saturday’s victory would make a great movie.

But unlike Field of Dreams, it wouldn’t be about a bunch of ghosts living in a wheatfield.

This one would be based on fact, flesh and bone. And a women’s rugby team who changed the way we looked at ourselves.