Richie McCaw backs Sam Whitelock as All Blacks captain

Legendary New Zealand captain Richie McCaw believes Crusaders second-row Sam Whitelock is the right man to lead the All Blacks during the early stages of their 2021 Test campaign.

With the team’s regular captain, Sam Cane, ruled out due to a torn pectoral tendon, All Blacks head coach Ian Foster will pick a new skipper for their Tests against Tonga and Fiji in July.

And McCaw, who captained the All Blacks during triumphant World Cup campaigns in 2011 and 2015, is confident Whitelock will do a good job as the team’s leader until Cane returns.

“I don’t want to be saying too much, and there’s obviously a few candidates, but there’s no doubt Sam Whitelock, who has done it before, has done a good job over the years,” McCaw told Stuff.

The 40-year-old, who retired after the 2015 World Cup in England, feels the All Blacks are lucky to have a player of Whitelock’s calibre to call on for the leadership role.

“There’s other guys as well, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he’s the man to do the job,” added McCaw.

“I think he just leads by example and people want to follow him. He fronts up every week.”

He also had special praise for former All Blacks number eight Kieran Read, who announced his retirement earlier this month.

Read played a plethora of his 128 Tests alongside McCaw in the All Blacks’ back-row and captained the team from 2016 to 2019.

The duo were also team-mates at the Crusaders for several years and McCaw said Read should be proud of his achievements as he left a huge mark on the game in New Zealand as a player and a leader.

“It was pretty cool to play alongside a guy like that.”