Editorial: Brazen acts for field only

In a few years Aaron Smith has made the All Black halfback spot his own and this season he confirmed that, without doubt, he is the best in the world in his position.

Smith showed his class right from the start and it was a very successful 2012 season with the Highlanders that propelled him into the All Blacks for the match against Ireland on June 9 that year.

By 2013, he was the starting halfback and was one of the reasons the team retained the Rugby World Cup in 2015.

There is no doubt Smith is a talented rugby player with an ability to pass and make the right decisions on the field.

It is probably because he possesses that self-belief, even call it arrogance, that many top sportsmen have. It is what makes him a great rugby player.

That arrogance is what makes him believe that he can take the risks in life as he does on the field.

Smith's decision to have sex with a female friend in a disabled toilet cubicle in the middle of the day at a crowded Christchurch airport, while he was travelling with his team, was wrong on so many levels.

It does make one question the guidelines these young sportsmen are given. Whether they or we like it, they are role models to thousands of children and one has to wonder - Is he the only one who does this sort of thing, or is it a regular occurrence? Are his teammates sitting around laughing that he was the idiot who got caught doing what is commonplace?

One would hope not, and looking at the captain and some of the senior players, it does not appear so.

While not condoning this sort of behaviour as "boys will be boys", one could have had a smidgen of sympathy for him if this had happened on a night out when, uncharacteristically, he had one too many and found himself making the wrong decision.

But it was not an indiscretion under the cover of darkness.

It was a brazen act that showed that his only thoughts were for himself and what he wanted.

The tears and remorse afterwards are because he was caught and not because he did wrong.

And that is the problem.