Giving a bit back before he packs it in

 Anton Oliver interview: Gerry Thornley finds the cultured Kiwi hooker interested in much beyond the rugby pitch.

Anton Oliver has always been, and remains, a dream interviewee. Plonk a recording device in front of him, switch it and him on, and away he goes. He has always done a pretty good job playing for New Zealand and he could talk for them as well. About anything.

As a 30-year-old whose career has straddled the amateur and professional eras, Oliver is part of a dying breed. He's grateful for that, wouldn't swap places with a 20-year-old now, and muses aloud about his first year post-rugby, perhaps studying arts/history or sociology in Cambridge or Oxford, in tandem with pursuing his green tendencies, taking a van around New Zealand and/or simply reading for a year.

"People think you're absurd if you want to read, but I'm not sure. I don't want to think too far ahead."

The son of a former All Black captain Frank, who became the first player to emulate his father in also captaining the All Blacks, he is a proud Kiwi from Invercargill, hewn out of the southern Alps, and is clearly content with the demands now placed on him, physically and mentally, in the twilight of his career.

Oliver was among a 24-man All Blacks squad which trained on the main Waikato Stadium pitch yesterday in what is deemed unseasonably brilliant sunshine in Hamilton, about an hour and a half's drive from Auckland. Hosting its fifth Test match, and anticipating a fifth 30,000-plus sell-out in its push to host a Tri-Nations game next year, as is usual hereabouts the pitch is a proudly manicured, pristine, sand-based billiard table, although it could well rain come the Saturday night kick-off (7.30pm local time, 8.30am Irish).

Bank holiday or not, a strong media presence is granted daily briefings or interviews, and Oliver is the first of the three players made available after a two-hour work-out to happily wander over and chew the fat.

He toes the party line about Ireland being a tougher proposition than the Lions last year, maintaining he was saying this a year ago. "And I was saying that principally because a) they would have been united, whereas the Lions clearly weren't, and b) they would have had a go.

"I felt the Lions were also caught in between what kind of gameplan they really should be playing. Ireland don't have that problem, they all live in Ireland and care about their country, and they want to have a go. You're not going to win many test matches just kicking it out," says Oliver, also pointing to the various international and provincial successes, not to mention the return of "the world-class" Paul O'Connell and Brian O'Driscoll, who have what he calls "mana" in the local lexicon.

By contrast, the All Blacks have to deal with a relative lack of preparation in their first Test since November, and the massive expectations of the New Zealand public.

"That's something All Blacks' sides always have to deal with, what we should be doing, how many points we should be scoring and how we should be scoring them. But I think this team, at the moment, just wants to worry about winning and that would be a very nice way to start the season as far as I'm concerned."

As sure as night follows day, alas about 5.30 at this time of year over here, you'd presume somebody would remind all this week's All Blacks that none of their predecessors have ever lost to Ireland in 18 meetings.

"Those kind of things are just waiting to be done and you just hope like hell it's just not on your watch," he says, laughing. "That could almost be seen as a hindrance, because it's quite a negative form of emotion, like protecting a lead and that just makes players go into their shells."

The first New Zealander to play a century of Super 14 games, he has won 45 caps since his debut in 1997 but injuries and non-selections have limited him to just seven caps since 2001. Unlike the European game, he also admits a 30-year-old tight five forward is a veteran in New Zealand especially, and in pointing out that all five NZ Super 14 hookers have played for the All Blacks, "these coaches clearly pick on form".

Even so, he was dissuaded from retirement in 2004 by Graham Henry, who values his experience, leadership, ruggedness and renowned scrummaging. Having endured the frustrations of being sidelined from the Lions' series - "character building", he describes it, slightly whimsically - he reckons the older a player becomes, the more phlegmatic he gets.

"I think when you're younger you waste a lot of energy on things you can't control. Age is a great thing," before mocking the utterings of a wily veteran.

He has targeted next year's World Cup as his swansong, albeit with a rider. "I've signed through until the end of next year and that will probably be it for me in New Zealand, but the nature of the rugby climate is such in New Zealand you don't want to look too far ahead, because there are so many good players in your position."

He admits he's a completely different person now from the 21-year-old who broke into the All Blacks. Aside from taking the game's slings and arrows more phlegmatically, and not "stewing in a sulk" for a month, he realises he has had to become less selfish and more selfless. "You realise it's your time to add to the collective."

Not that he'd wish to be starting out again. "God no, I wouldn't want to go back to all those fraught years. I'm very lucky to have played when it was amateur, and I played in the genesis of professional football, so my nostalgic and halcyon images or thoughts about the game are when it was amateur.

"You trained on Tuesdays and Thursdays, and had some beers in the changing shed after the game, but of course as soon as you introduce money everything changes. It's neither right nor wrong, but things just change, and for rugby to survive it really had to turn professional. But that brings all sorts of accoutrements and a few of them aren't that palatable. When rugby finishes for me, and it will finish soon, that chapter in my life will be well and truly shut."

Then who knows? The damage to the environment so angers him that "interest is turning into activism. So if I could go and educate myself, that would give me some credibility. It's sad that you have to have credibility instead of just being a concerned citizen of the planet. You have to have some kind of letters after your name to justify your ability to say something."

His lengthy and articulate discourse completed, Oliver counsels us on his favourite Sauvignon Blanc and Pinor Noir, not to mention beer. One ventures had we got around to Tony Blair, he'd have an opinion on him too, and world politics in general. Time is the only thing against him, but he has some unfinished business still.