TJ Perenara would ‘play for free’ if All Blacks came calling, admitting he’d ‘jump’ at opportunity

2015 Rugby World Cup winner TJ Perenara has insisted he would “play for free” if the All Blacks approached him during their Rugby Championship run-in and beyond.

The 33-year-old, who is currently plying his trade in Japan for Black Rams Tokyo, has been an interested spectator as New Zealand have fought it out in the tournament.

The All Blacks currently sit in third place in the Rugby Championship with all four teams having won two and lost two of their matches thus far in an even four rounds.

Biggest ever loss

New Zealand though enter this week’s break on a sour note after the Springboks inflicted a biggest ever loss on Scott Robertson’s men, which leaves them under pressure.

The Wallabies are the pace-setters in the competition on 11 points with the Boks and All Blacks on 10 and Argentina sitting on nine ahead of facing South Africa twice.

Australia and New Zealand are set to collide in the Bledisloe Cup opener on September 27 at Eden Park in Auckland before the teams meet again one week later in Perth.

Speaking on Instagram as he fields questions from his followers, experienced scrum-half Perenara declared himself available for action if the call from Robertson came.

“If given the opportunity to come back and play for the All Blacks I would jump at it,” he said in his post.

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“I know the rules don’t allow it at the moment – which is fine – but it’s the team I love, it’s the team I still admire, I’d just about play for free if given the opportunity to go back and play with the boys.”

Perenara had kicked off his video by being sympathetic of the injured number nines in camp, this after Noah Hotham broke his leg in the Round Four clash with the Boks.

“I want to acknowledge the boys who are injured at the moment, especially Noah, seeing him go down the other night was disheartening. You don’t want to see anyone get injured but someone whose just come back from injury to go down like that is just not nice. You don’t wish that upon anyone,” he stressed.

“I wish all of those boys a speedy recovery and I can’t want to see them back at their best again.”

Jump at the call

Furthermore, the 89-cap All Black believes the stocks at scrum-half are healthy despite the injuries before returning to his original point that he is ready to go if asked.

“We’ve got some really good young nines in the country at the moment such as Finlay (Christie) and KP (Kyle Preston), Xavier (Roe) who got called in and a few more boys playing ITM Cup at the moment who are killing it so I have faith in the depth of nines we have in the country, wish all our boys a speedy recovery,” he said.

“Saying that if ever given the opportunity to go back I would jump at it.”

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