THE Old Rectory Hotel in conjunction with Crickhowell RFC recently welcomed former All Blacks captain Sean Fitzpatrick to join them as a special guest speaker for a memorable dinner.

Everyone present enjoyed an excellent evening, with the good food complemented by the guest's interesting and sometime controversial after dinner remarks.

Fitzpatrick revealed that the New Zealanders remained such a focused outfit because most players are introduced to rugby at four to five years of age with the sole purpose of becoming an All Black.

Fitzpatrick left nobody in the room in any doubt how important representing New Zealand had been to him when he explained that even when injured he refused to leave the field of play just in case the replacement player proved to be better than him.

Since retiring from playing, Fitzpatrick has taken up a career in management business and has a seat on the board of Harlequins RFC.

He explained that with only 4,000,000 residents in New Zealand there was very little money to support rugby in that country and to counter this the New Zealand RFU had made the decision to sell the 'All Black' brand worldwide.

The subsequent finance was used mainly to support the levels below the national side thus ensuring a continual supply of quality 'All Blacks'.

Fitzpatrick also revealed that compared with their European counterparts, internationals in New Zealand earned comparatively small salaries but their true allegiance was to the Silver Fern on the breast of their jersey and that's why so many continue to play their rugby in New Zealand.

His surprise and intense rendition of the Haka at the end of his speech was a timely reminder that you can take the man out of the All Blacks but you cannot take the All Blacks out of the man.