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Highlanders' All Blacks return home as team prepares to bounce back against Jaguares

Aaron Smith. (Photo by Teaukura Moetaua/Getty Images)

The Highlanders’ loss to the Bulls over the weekend has officially consigned the franchise to their worse start to a Super Rugby season since 2013.

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Their one win from five matches played doesn’t quite compare to the eight losses they started the 2013 year with but it also doesn’t bode well for the rest of the season.

Yes, once the Highlanders get their match against the Jaguares in Buenos Aires out of the way this weekend they will play all but one of their remaining fixtures in New Zealand, but that also means they have a slew of derbies still to play – which are arguably the toughest matches in the competition.

The coming week isn’t going to be any easier for the Highlanders either, with the Jaguares looking to bounce back from a fairly comprehensive defeat to the Sharks.

Continue reading below…

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The Highlanders will also be forced to overcome last year’s finalists without the help of their two most experienced players, Liam Coltman and Aaron Smith, who have returned home to New Zealand as part of their All Blacks rest agreement.

Coltman’s and Smith’s absences will cleave the side of over 240 Super Rugby caps – a little under half of the caps that the starting XV possessed in last week’s loss to the Bulls.

Alongside Coltman and Smith, Jona Nareki, Jesse Parete and Ayden Johnstone will return to Dunedin after taking on heavy workloads in the season to date.

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The five absentees have been replaced by Sio Tomkinson, Josh Dickson, Ethan De Groot, Folau Fakatava and Conan O’Donnell.

This weekend’s game between the 7th placed Jaguares and 13th placed Highlanders will kick off at 8PM on Saturday evening in Argentina, or midday on Sunday for New Zealand viewers.

WATCH: Highlights from the Highlanders’ loss to the Bulls.

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Flankly 1 hour ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


Borthwick has been in the job for nearly two years, a period that includes two 6N programs and an RWC campaign. So where are the solid foundations that he has been building?

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