Premiership’s ‘most valuable player’ crucial to Bristol play-off push
Steven Luatua is regarded as one of Bristol Bears’ best players of recent years – Getty Images/Bob Bradford
There are several ways to interrogate the worth of a player, as Premiership bosses will have been doing over recent months ahead of a season in which the salary cap is due to rise again.
You can dig into data, even immerse yourself in algorithms and artificial intelligence. You can gather testimonies of teammates, to find out about less tangible qualities like calm leadership. Whatever the metrics, Pat Lam knows he has a gem in Steven Luatua.
Even as Bristol Bears reset their spending strategy, bidding farewell to stalwarts such as Ed Holmes, Dan Thomas, Callum Sheedy and Piers O’Conor, it was easy to justify a contract extension. Seven years after Lam embarked on his current role and made Luatua his “number one” signing, the latter has been among the most valuable players in the Premiership this season.
Of the 10 league matches that Luatua has featured in, Bristol have won nine. Eroni Mawi, the bopping Saracens loosehead prop, boasts the same record, though he has only two starts to Luatua’s nine. And while AJ MacGinty is another influential Bear, recording seven wins from his seven Premiership appearances in 2024-25, Luatua is undoubtedly vital. Without him, as they were between mid-September and early December due to a calf issue, Bears lost five out of six in the Premiership.
“His biggest value is that I’ve never, ever seen Stevie go below a 7/10 performance,” explains Lam, whose charges continue their play-off push by hosting Saracens on Saturday afternoon. “Joe Joyce [the ex-Bristol lock now with Connacht] summed it up when he said that Stevie has all the southern hemisphere skills and all the northern hemisphere skills.
“He is constantly highlighted for what he does at the breakdown, the detail in the way he carries and cleans out. And then he’s got the flashy stuff, the one-handed offloads. He ticks all the boxes. There’s more chance of us winning a game if he’s on the field.”
Lam and Luatua first met while the latter was progressing through the Auckland Blues set-up, on the way to 15 Tests for the All Blacks. Well over a decade on, Luatua still sends texts to Lam after each game, proposing plans or plays. “The problem is that Stevie’s brain can be a bit ahead of the others at times,” Lam laughs. “We have to temper that and ease in [his suggestions] somehow.” Despite his pedigree, and that intuition, Luatua exudes an easy-going humility.
“If you had a group of six to eight leaders, Stevie would probably be the last guy to speak,” Lam continues. “He’s the first to listen to what others have, then he’ll come in. And when he speaks, everyone listens. You get some people who do all the talking. He makes others feel as though their opinion is important and, generally, there is a lot of wisdom about what he says.”
Fitz Harding succeeded Luatua as Bears captain for this campaign; another deliberate ploy to futureproof the side. Lam sounded out Luatua beforehand, finding him “100 per cent behind” the idea. Subsequently, Luatua has been “a great mentor”. Listening to the man himself, that comes as little surprise.
“Sometimes it’s cool, sometimes it’s not,” says a chuckling Luatua of his role as a reassuring figurehead at Bristol. “When we’re on the field getting it right, it’s a joy to be part of. When things aren’t going so well, it’s about steering the ship, giving the boys belief.
“During that time off in the Six Nations, that’s what we did; build the belief back up. It’s my job just to remind the boys. We’ve been showing the past few weeks that we can execute and we can do our jobs.”
While negotiating his new deal, Luatua and his wife Olivia reminisced about settling in the West Country. Bristol had been relegated to the Championship prior to Lam’s arrival. In Luatua’s first competitive appearance at Ashton Gate, in September 2017, they ended the first half trailing Hartpury College 8-7 before coming through to win.
“Those were rough, those days,” Luatua admits. “I enjoyed playing for the Bears but, as a team, we just weren’t functioning well and I was pretty frustrated. I think the second game was down at Cornish Pirates. That was an experience. I had mud up to my knees and, I’m not going to lie, it’d been a couple of years since I’d gotten dirty. Most fields in New Zealand and Australia were like Ashton Gate. It was really humbling, but cool.”
Blindside flankers are resourceful facilitators who contribute across the board, from carrying in heavy traffic to jumping in the line-out. Courtney Lawes has shown it is possible to keep developing. At 33, having added a World Cup with Samoa to his resume last year, Luatua continues to target improvements.
“Definitely in the set piece,” he says, without a pause. “Defensive mauls are a tough thing to train – a terrible thing to train. But that’s a big part of the Premiership, stopping those. I’ve definitely grown in that aspect, putting my head into dark places.”
Leaving New Zealand for Bristol, having just helped the Blues beat the 2017 British and Irish Lions, was a step into the dark as well. Luatua had turned 27 and was ending any prospect of furthering his All Blacks career. Lam needed to lobby hard, but feels vindicated.
“We were going to inspire the community, get promoted,” he says of his sales pitch. “I talked about my experiences coming up here as a Samoan as well, and the impact he could have on and off the field; the lifestyle and how he could see Europe as well. He thought it through, decided to jump in. The rest is history.”
By ousting Saracens this weekend, Luatua and his Bristol colleagues would be on the cusp of a top-four finish.
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