The Real Pod
Remember When: Abstain for the Game was the century’s most bizarre ad campaign
We look back on the time All Black captain Sean Fitzpatrick got in a hand-shaped dodgem to tell the country to refrain from rooting.
10 Oct 2023
More about the episode
Ahead of the incredibly tense 2011 Rugby World Cup, Abstain for the Game was a Telecom (now Spark) ad campagin using former All Black captain Sean Fitzpatrick, in a tuxedo, driving a pink dodgem, asking a tightly wound nation to keep it in their pants. It was an extremely odd ad, and created a furious response from a humourless public. Within days it was withdrawn with heavy apologies. But the ad has aged well, and as The Real Pod remembers when, they also ask – did we get this one wrong?