George Gregan has testified he still believes a man suing him over an $11m sportswear business is a grub, a cockroach and a parasite.
The former Wallabies captain entered the witness box for cross-examination on Friday, in a case brought by PTP Fitness part-owner and former managing director Alexander Goldberg.
In messages with another part-owner in 2018 and 2019, Gregan referred to Mr Goldberg as a parasite, grub and cockroach, documents before the Federal Court show.
"Is that a view you still hold," Mr Goldberg's barrister Robert Stitt QC asked.
"Yes," Gregan replied.
Australia's most-capped rugby union international also denied a message mentioning "blitzkrieg" was related to Mr Goldberg's Jewish faith.
Mr Goldberg - who co-founded PTP in 2010 with his brother-in-law, former NSW Waratahs player Matthew Dixon - claims he was unlawfully dismissed while on carer's leave by Dixon and Gregan and then shut out of his business.
In a counter-claim, Gregan and Dixon allege Mr Goldberg stole intellectual property by registering trademarks in his name and his mother's, and they took appropriate action for the company's good.
In 2020, the company was valued between $11m and $13.2m by one consultant and about $6.9m by another.
Gregan was due to enter the witness box on Thursday before the court was adjourned for settlement talks.
Despite objections from Gregan and Dixon, further time was given on Friday morning before Justice John Halley ordered the nine-day trial resume.
The court was told a month before Mr Goldberg's sacking, Gregan texted Dixon: "When we strike, it's going to be an avalanche, a blitzkrieg."
"It's a war technique blitzkrieg, which was used by the German army and it had nothing to do with Alex being Jewish," the former footballer said.
But Gregan accepted he was seeking to put pressure on his co-owner to leave the role as managing director.
He denied that meant getting rid of Mr Goldberg completely, despite another text saying: "Removing him as a director of our business when the time is right we will drop the hammer."
"In 2019, we removed him from his position, his employment for what he had done... we had removed that aspect," he said.
"We were moving from a direction of a growing start-up to growing and evolving ... that was part of our strategy."
Justice Halley asked what strategy would lead to, as Gregan had put it, Mr Goldberg "on his knees".
Gregan said the former PTP boss had no employment and had filed suits in the NSW Supreme Court and Federal Court.
"We felt that (his position) - where he was getting paid and not doing his role and then taking to court us and our company - was wrong."
Gregan's evidence-in-chief has been procured by five signed statements tendered in court.
Earlier, Gregan's barrister Robert Newlinds SC hosed down any suggestion there was an ulterior motive to the settlement talks.
"In the public arena, this (settlement talks) is somehow my client escaping cross-examination," Mr Newlinds said.
"Mr Gregan is here, he is ready to be cross-examined, he is most anxious to clear his name."
Mr Goldberg and Dixon each hold 40 per cent of PTP while Gregan has the remaining 20 per cent.
The hearing continues.
