‘‘It’s a wonder they can find anyone to be prime minister or All Blacks coach given leadership means abuse, i

Assuming you have the required skills, would you want to be prime minister or All Blacks rugby coach? Really? It’s a wonder they can find anyone to do either job, given leadership means abuse, insinuations, and accusations. Opposition leader is said to be even worse.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and Ian Foster must wonder what they were thinking when they stuck their heads above the parapet; two Waikato kids now being widely compared with a byproduct from the back end of cows.

Neither will be having a great time, both are likely to be cursing Covid. OK, Ardern had Whakaari/White Island and the mosque shootings to deal with as well, but for two years Covid has stalked their every move.

Public doubts are rising. Ardern is maintaining her smile as she slips in the polls, and a potpourri of disaffected Kiwis protest in the streets.

Foster has never won a popularity poll, even before consecutive losses to Ireland and France. You wouldn’t rule out an anti-Fozzie march, the way things are going in Aotearoa.

Why lump Ardern and Foster together, you ask? Stints as a Press Gallery and sports reporter have revealed they have more parallels, than differences.

In Australia, it’s said the cricket captain is the second-most important person, after prime minister. Former PM John Howard even put it the other way around.

And so it is in Godzone, where rugby is the national game and politics has five sides on the Parliamentary pitch at the same time.