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Chiefs v Brumbies LIVE | Super Rugby

Chiefs v Brumbies Live Match Centre

Follow all the action on the RugbyPass live blog from the Super Rugby match between the Chiefs and the Brumbies at FMG Stadium Waikato.

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Keep up to date with the latest score, stats and join the conversation from anywhere in the world in our Live Match Centre (click here).

In a bid to maintain an unbeaten start to the new season, Chiefs head coach Warren Gatland has wrung a total of nine changes to the starting team that blitzed the Sunwolves in Tokyo last week.

Continue reading below…

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Canadian lock Tyler Ardron is replaced by Mitchell Brown in the engine room, while there is an entirely new loose forward trio from the one that took to the field in the Japanese capital.

Fan favourite Adam Thomson, early All Blacks contender Lachlan Boshier and barnstorming rookie Dylan Nel have all made way to accomodate for concussion returnee Luke Jacobson, skipper Sam Cane and Fijian No. 8 Pita Sowakula.

There is a further five changes in the backline, with Brad Weber again demoted to the bench in place of fellow Kiwi international Te Toiroa Tahuriorangi, who resumes his halves partnership with Aaron Cruden after Kaleb Trask undertook the playmaking duties at Prince Chichibu Memorial Stadium.

Promising midfielder Quinn Tupaea drops to the bench as Anton Lienert-Brown returns from a rest week, and two new wings will come into the fray in the form of Sam McNicol and Sean Wainui, who have usurped Solomon Alaimalo and Shaun Stevenson for starting roles.

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All those alterations has called for some changes on the bench, with Mitch Karpik and potential debutant Lisati Milo-Harris joining Trask and Tupaea as the new faces in the reserves.

The Brumbies, meanwhile, have sprung three changes of their own to their starting team following last week’s late defeat at the hands of the Highlanders in Canberra.

Head coach Dan McKellar has called on the services of hooker Connal McInerney, who comes into the side in the place of hat-trick hero Folau Fainga’a as a result of a toe injury.

The Wallabies rake is one of two casualties in the Brumbies’ camp this week, as wing Tom Wright has fallen victim to a mumps outbreak that has broken within the squad.

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Consequently, he misses out to Andy Muirhead on the left wing, while midfielder Irae Simone returns at second-five in place of Len Ikitau.

Three further switches have been made on the bench, as McInerney’s promotion to the starting team has resulted in a reserves spot for Lachlan Lonergan.

Elsewhere, exciting teenage prospect Reesjan Pasitoa has been dropped as the back-up playmaker in favour of Bayley Kuenzle, and former Chiefs speedster Toni Pulu fills the void left by Muirhead on the pine.

In other news:

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J
JW 6 hours ago
Does South Africa have a future in European competition?

I rated Lowe well enough to be an AB. Remember we were picking the likes of George Bridge above such players so theres no disputing a lot of bad decisions have been made by those last two coaches. Does a team like the ABs need a finicky winger who you have to adapt and change a lot of your style with to get benefit from? No, not really. But he still would have been a basic improvement on players like even Savea at the tail of his career, Bridge, and could even have converted into the answer of replacing Beauden at the back. Instead we persisted with NMS, Naholo, Havili, Reece, all players we would have cared even less about losing and all because Rieko had Lowe's number 11 jersey nailed down.


He was of course only 23 when he decided to leave, it was back in the beggining of the period they had started retaining players (from 2018 onwards I think, they came out saying theyre going to be more aggressive at some point). So he might, all of them, only just missed out.


The main point that Ed made is that situations like Lowe's, Aki's, JGP's, aren't going to happen in future. That's a bit of a "NZ" only problem, because those players need to reach such a high standard to be chosen by the All Blacks, were as a country like Ireland wants them a lot earlier like that. This is basically the 'ready in 3 years' concept Ireland relied on, versus the '5 years and they've left' concept' were that player is now ready to be chosen by the All Blacks (given a contract to play Super, ala SBW, and hopefully Manu).


The 'mercenary' thing that will take longer to expire, and which I was referring to, is the grandparents rule. The new kids coming through now aren't going to have as many gp born overseas, so the amount of players that can leave with a prospect of International rugby offer are going to drop dramatically at some point. All these kiwi fellas playing for a PI, is going to stop sadly.


The new era problem that will replace those old concerns is now French and Japanese clubs (doing the same as NRL teams have done for decades by) picking kids out of school. The problem here is not so much a national identity one, than it is a farm system where 9 in 10 players are left with nothing. A stunted education and no support in a foreign country (well they'll get kicked out of those countries were they don't in Australia).


It's the same sort of situation were NZ would be the big guy, but there weren't many downsides with it. The only one I can think was brought up but a poster on this site, I can't recall who it was, but he seemed to know a lot of kids coming from the Islands weren't really given the capability to fly back home during school xms holidays etc. That is probably something that should be fixed by the union. Otherwise getting someone like Fakatava over here for his last year of school definitely results in NZ being able to pick the cherries off the top but it also allows that player to develop and be able to represent Tonga and under age and possibly even later in his career. Where as a kid being taken from NZ is arguably going to be worse off in every respect other than perhaps money. Not going to develop as a person, not going to develop as a player as much, so I have a lotof sympathy for NZs case that I don't include them in that group but I certainly see where you're coming from and it encourages other countries to think they can do the same while not realising they're making a much worse experience/situation.

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