Like many Black Ferns and All Blacks, Ruahei Demant is from small-town NZ. Adam Julian finds out how Ōmāio is celebrating its famous daughter, who leads the Ferns into today's Rugby World Cup final.
Ōmāio – which translates as ‘place of peace, quiet and tranquillity’ - is a coastal village in the Ōpōtiki district of the Bay of Plenty. The area code is 07 and the population is approximately 100 on a good day. Farming of sheep, dairy and kiwifruit have fed locals and sustained much of the local economy.
It’s well documented Black Ferns co-captain Ruahei Demant (Te Whānau-ā-Apanui, Te Whakatōhea, Ngāti Awa) and her sister, fellow Black Fern Kiritapu Demant, are from Ōmāio, or more precisely LA.
Sarah Henry - Hākota Kōhanga Reo whāea, marae leader and ringatū practitioner - is an aunt close to the Demant family, and she explains where LA is.
“Little Awanui or ‘LA, bro’ is what locals call the stretch of boundary in Ōmāio where Ruahei and Kiritapu were raised,” Henry says.
“The Demants lived not too far from the Hāparapara River and moana at Little Awanui. The Hāparapara Awa is like our Bath of Babylon. It sustains, cleanses, and purifies us. We swim in it, wash ourselves in it, and sleep beside it.
“LA is bound by community. The village raises you together with the Ōmāio and Ōtūwhare Marae, an important source of knowledge and wisdom.”
The Demants were raised collectively by their grandparents Molly and Dave Demant, ‘Red Nana’ Winika Tuira, and many other community stalwarts and uncles and aunties in their formative years.
Pumau (loyalty), pakari (strength), whakapono (faith), māia (courage) and humaria (humility) were the core values instilled in the Demant family.
Ōmāio was isolated without electricity and sealed roads until 1969. However, the elders were strong, loving and often from considerable pedigree.
The Māori Battalion received more individual bravery decorations than any other New Zealand battalion in World War II. The Demant family can trace some of their ancestry back to those proud warriors. C Company was drawn from the Tairāwhiti/East Coast region (Ngāti Porou, Rongowhakaata and sub-tribes) and lost more troops than any of the four companies.
The Black Ferns haka, Ko Uhia Mai, was composed by Ruahei’s relative Whetū Tipiwai of Te Whānau ā Rūtāia. He was kaumatua of the Māori All Blacks from 2001 to 2010.
"We're not even a town. We’re in the wops,” Ruahei Demant, now a lawyer, once said of Ōmāio.
When she was selected in representative football sides as a kid, travel soon became an overwhelming burden; it was not uncommon to embark on four-hour journeys – one-way – to meet sporting obligations.
Ruahei running down State Highway 35 or using the resources of the land to boost fitness in the absence of a “flash” gym, wasn’t an unfamiliar site either.
So the World Cup final is a huge deal in Ōmāio. There are pictures of Ruahei, and signs supporting the team have also been placed in areas important to her pepeha (mountain, river, marae, hapū): Ko Rangipoua te maunga, Ko Hāparapara te awa, Ko Ōtuwhare te marae, Ko te Whānau-ā-Rūtāia te hapu, Ko Te Whānau-ā-Apanui te iwi.
The kōhanga reo where her aunty Sarah works has been renamed Mamaku (Fern) o Aotearoa this week. The kids have enjoyed face painting and watching and preforming the haka.
Some of the ‘cuzzies’ have sold tickets from the gargantuan SIX60 concert in Rotorua on Saturday night to try and get a ticket to Eden Park for the World Cup final played at the same time.
The Te Kaha Pub, the only one in the district, is decked out in Black Ferns colours and will be packed to the rafters. If the Black Ferns win it might go off just as hard as the Waverly Tavern did in 1983 when Kiwi won, the Melbourne Cup from last on the last corner.
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All the Demant children attended the Tokamaii Kohanga Reo at the foot of Nanny Emma and Aunty Blythe, and later graduated onto Te Kura Mana Māori o Maraenui.
Ruahei was about to turn 12 when the family relocated north to Warkworth, selling a family crayfish quota. The sisters - immersed in te reo - were challenged by enrolling into Mahurangi Christian School, a curriculum school in Snells Beach.
Ruahei was soon selected as the Year 8 head prefect. The sisters then went onto Mahurangi College, and in 2010, Ruahei won the coveted Dame Whina Cooper Trophy at the annual Ngā Manu Kōrero national secondary schools speech contest. Once again she was head prefect in 2013.
The girls flourished in various sporting codes including hockey, netball, football, sevens, touch and rugby, where they had the great fortune to be coached by former All Black Glen Osborne (Te Ati Haunui-a-Pāpārang) and his wife, Kylee.
In 2014, Ruahei was awarded the Moana Ngarimu VC Scholarship, presented in the Grand Hall of Parliament by Minister of Education the Honourable Hekia Parata and Willie Apiata, VC.
She made the Auckland rugby team as a 17-year-old, helping the Storm win the Farah Palmer Cup. Soon injury threatened to derail her career.
“In 2013, I ruptured my left knee and got my first ACL reconstruction. The following season I got some good minutes, and we won the NPC again," she recalls.
“In 2015, I played a sevens tournament in Mt Manganui a week before nationals, and I did my right ACL. I came back again, and we won the NPC again. I played the first sevens tournament of the summer and did my first ACL again.”
Demant finally made her Black Ferns test debut in 2018 - a 31-11 win over Australia in Sydney (a match where hooker and captain Fiao'o Fa’amausili led the haka with laryngitis). Kiritapu Demant had debuted for New Zealand three years earlier.
The Demants were the first Māori sisters to play for the Black Ferns – and one of only six pairs of Black Ferns siblings. The Richards, Broughton, Itunu, Lavea and Bremner sisters are the others.
In July 2019, Ruahei was part of the Super Series-winning Black Ferns side, a campaign that included a 28-13 victory over England. It was the first meeting of the two sides since they played in the 2017 World Cup final, and it would be the last time the Red Roses were defeated in their current streak of 30 test victories.
A Renee Wickliffe (Hauraki) hat-trick sealed the deal. In August the quickly growing stature of Demant was underlined by a 40-metre individual try in a 47-10 win against Australia in Perth. In 2020 Ruahei graduated from the University of Auckland with a conjoint Law /Arts Degree.
Although she was subdued on the bleak Northern Tour in 2021, Black Ferns director of rugby Wayne Smith recognised the special qualities imbued in Demant in LA. Ruahei has captained her country to 10 consecutive victories since June 6. The first-five has made a tournament-leading 12 offloads at this Rugby World Cup, keeping the ball alive crucial to the success of the up-tempo Black Ferns.
Following her player of the match award in the 56-12 group win against Wales, Ruahei remarked: “I’m always looking for the space and we have so many genuine threats and options and we play to our strengths and know each other’s strengths. It’s amazing to be able to trust the players on my outside and have clear, specific communication. And getting lightning quick ball from rucks and good delivery from my halfbacks gives us such a good platform to attack off.”
The magic woven by Black Ferns first five Ruahei Demant
The Black Ferns squeaked into the World Cup final with a 25-24 escape over France at Eden Park. Ironically, Demant’s gifted opposite, Caroline Drouin, missed a penalty kick to win the game.
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A quintessential New Zealand rugby story is little boys with big dreams making the All Blacks from small towns. Think, champion Invincibles fullback George Nepia (Ngāti Rākaipaaka, Nūhaka, Māhia) buried in Rangitukia, not far away from where he grew up on the East Cape. Richie McCaw was raised in the Hakataramea Valley (population 920) in South Canterbury. He wasn’t too shabby either.
Ruahei Demant is the same story except she’s a little girl and there are plenty of other examples.
Carol Hayes changed the course of New Zealand’s first ever game in 1989 with her powerful scrummaging against the larger more experienced California Grizzlies. The primary school teacher and Black Ferns prop grew up in Tokanui (Big Rock), 55km east of Invercargill.
Regina Sheck used the passing of her mum before the 1998 World Cup to drive herself to greater heights. The prop from Tokoroa (also home of Chelsea Semple, Ngāti Maru) scored a try in the 44-12 final win against the USA in Amsterdam.
Her replacement, Emma Thomas, ‘The Te Teko Titian,’ was a rigger and single mother of three so redoubtable she was converted into a prop by scrum guru Mike ‘Machine’ Casey. She demolished opponents, nudging 40.
English centre Emily Scarratt (107 tests) is the leading points scorer at the 2021 World Cup and was player of the match when the Red Roses last won in 2014. She identified Black Fern Casey Caldwell (nee Roberston) as one of her most respected opponents. The ‘Wyndham Warrior’, from Southland, won the World Cup three times playing all around the forward pack.
Remarkably, whenever Shakira Baker (Ngāti Kahungunu) ran out onto the field for the Black Ferns 15s or sevens, there was a defibrillator on the sideline with her name on it. She suffers from Long QT syndrome, a rare disorder of the heart's electrical system. She’s from Eketāhuna, a small rural settlement in the Tararua district. Baker now inspires the next generation as a teacher and rugby coach at Hamilton Girls’ High School, one of the leading teams in the country.
The Bremner sisters grew up in Little River, and are the backbone of the all-conquering Canterbury Farah Palmer Cup team. Chelsea hasn’t lost in 41 appearances in red and black; Alana is often the captain. The pair are workhorses in the increasingly resilient Black Ferns pack.
Stacey Fluhler (Ngāi Tūhoe), the Olympic gold medallist with a smile that could melt margarine, is from Ruatoki. In 2011 as a 15-year-old she suffered severe leg lacerations when a logging truck ploughed into the back of her school bus, shunting it into a paddock, leaving children bleeding and broken. She helped some of the injured children off the bus, including her niece and nephew, before walking to a nearby childcare centre to phone her mum. Twenty-eight children were taken to hospitals when emergency services arrived.
Ruby Tui, possibly rugby’s most charismatic player and author of the first full-scale New Zealand women’s rugby autobiography, spent much of her youth on the soggy West Coast of the South Island.
Kendra Cocksedge, the most capped Black Fern, is from Ōkato in Taranaki. She’s related to the Barrett brothers through their great grandad Mick Goodin, whose brother Harry was Cocksedge's grandad. Kendra was often the only girl playing in New Plymouth and always made sure parents of boys knew when they were being an “egg.”
‘The Professor’ Wayne Smith is staunchly proud of Putāruru. Fellow World Cup winning All Black Grant Fox was from there as are Black Ferns Honey Hireme-Smiler (Ngāti Raukawa, Ngāti Haua, Waikato-Tainui) and pioneer Sue Garden-Bachop (Ngāti Awa), the late wife of All Black Stephen Bachop and mother of two Māori All Blacks, Jackson and Connor.
“My mum will be there [in Putaruru],” Smith said this week. “She’s going to be 92 in January, she’ll have a cushion up around her face just in case we make a mistake.
“My feeling is the rugby club will have the TV going, and I think they will probably reflect what will be going on all around the country.”
Farah Palmer (Ngāti Maniapoto) is in the World Rugby Hall of Fame. The first woman to be appointed deputy chair of NZ Rugby, she grew up in the farming community of Piopio, just a few kilometres down the road from the legendary All Black Colin Meads. Palmer captained the Black Ferns to three consecutive World Cup wins.
Can Demant join Palmer in hoisting the World Cup tonight? The village of Ōmāio will be right behind her.
A lyric composed by iwi doyenne Hiri Tāwhai to commemorate the century of the Ōmāio School speaks to the aspiration’s community leaders place in their faith in future generations to lead the people. It goes like this:
He tumanakotanga hai ara mo te iwi - There is hope for the people.
* The Black Ferns v England Rugby World Cup final kicks off at Eden Park at 7.30pm; the play-off for bronze starts at 4.30pm. Both games are live on Spark Sport and Three.
