If you think Brian Moore’s occasional insults are bad, you ain’t heard nothin’ yet.

Jed Thian makes the Pitbull look like a Poodle.

The mountainous Kiwi has made quite a name for himself delivering his unique brand of commentary from a Wellington pub in New Zealand since 2005.

Just as popular as his live commentaries are his near-the-knuckle cartoon videos that regularly see him label Australians everything from ‘The Criminal Element’ to ‘The Shackle-draggers’.

Last year he branched out to turn the air blue at the Clapham Grand in London during the World Cup and this autumn he has returned to our shores to take up residence in the Barley Mow in Chiswick to bring punters each of New Zealand’s tour matches.

IRN caught up with him to get his thoughts on this weekend’s England v New Zealand clash.

Jed, how are you?
I’m good mate.

Tell us where the idea for the Alternative Rugby Commentary came from
I swear to God I thought there were blokes in the football field that did it in some back of nowhere pub - some local guy there took out the microphone and had a bit of fun. So we started doing it in the San Francisco Bath House in Wellington for the Lions tour in 2005.
The usual places to watch the game were overrun and the popularity grew locally, then only since June last year we’ve been providing it on the internet and the growth’s been phenomenal.
New Zealand is only fifth in terms of the audience size now. The bulk is shared between the UK and US.

You give the Australians a fair bit of stick during commentary, has it ever gotten ugly?
They try but I’ve got a fair bit of experience dealing with Aussies at all levels mate. We were in Hong Kong for the last Bledisloe Cup game and I wandered into some Chinese restaurant and there were three Wallabies there and they were fine. All the players take it in the manner it’s meant. If you’re going to get huffy about it you’re a bit of a f*ckin’ idiot.

Fair enough. What have you made of the All Blacks’ opposition so far?
Well I’ve always been a Welsh fan and I’m firmly a Munster fan now, they were fantastic. Scotland were a bit rubbish and I thought Ireland’s tactics were more about spoiling and damage control than actually trying to win the game.
I think a lot of people thought the game would be evened up was the variations in the rules but the Southern Hemisphere has done better adapting to them.

Any sympathy for Danny Cipriani?
England are in all sorts of trouble. The South Africans absolutely climbed into them but Cipriani shouldn’t have borne most of the heat. No.10s need time to get their thing done but the English tight five should be the ones to be lined up and given a crack round the head.
You’ve got a rookie like that behind them in the pocket who doesn’t mind having all the focus and limelight on him - so he’s already a reasonably brave soul - but if you let a team like the South Africans get on top of him you’re always in trouble, so the front five need to front up.

Has all New Zealand recovered one year one from another World Cup choke?
Mate, I was in London and I stayed away. I’ve been amongst it so many times so I know how it goes. But the public reaction in New Zealand is always over the top because they over-hype the All Blacks going into it – it’s the same equation for English football.

Let’s have a score prediction for this weekend
What other predictions have you had?

Er, well before the autumn series started Martin Corry told us England should win three out of four
He he he he he

Then before the Australia game, Andy Gomarsall told Tap and Go England would win by 10, so we’ve been cursing our tipsters a bit so far.
He he he he he he. I think the All Blacks will put some younger guys in the mix so, er…. I’m backing New Zealand to win but I’m also backing England to score the first try against the All Blacks on the tour, so I’ll say 13 points to England and 35 points to New Zealand. Can’t ask fairer than that mate.

Indeed not. Cheers Jed.
Good to talk to you mate.

To listen to the Alternative Rugby Commentary and watch more of Jed’s videos, visit www.arcrugby.co.nz