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Hurricanes name surprising lineup for Chiefs clash

The Hurricanes have made minimal changes to their starting team for their last Super Rugby round-robin match against the Chiefs in Hamilton on Friday night, deciding to name a full-strength team.

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Head coach Chris Boyd has made just three changes to the team that will run on to FMG Waikato Stadium from the one which faced the Blues last round.

Prop Jeff Toomaga-Allen is promoted from the bench along with lock Michael Fatialofa in changes to the pack while competition leading try scorer Ben Lam also returns and Julian Savea moves to the bench.

Lam is the only change to a back line which produced six tries against the Blues, including a club record-equaling four for second five-eighth Ngani Laumape who will again form a midfield combination with Wes Goosen.

Boyd has also made a few tweaks to the bench where Chris Eves, Reed Prinsep and Finlay Christie all return after a week away.

The Hurricanes need to win, get a bonus point or avoid a heavy defeat against the Chiefs to guarantee a home quarterfinal the following week.

Boyd said there was a real determination in the squad to perform in Hamilton, not only to maintain momentum heading into the playoffs, but to ensure they had a home quarterfinal in front of their fans.

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The Hurricanes squad to face the Chiefs is:

15 Jordie Barrett
14 Nehe Milner-Skudder
13 Wes Goosen
12 Ngani Laumape
11 Ben Lam
10 Beauden Barrett
9 TJ Perenara
8 Blade Thomson
7 Sam Henwood
6 Brad Shields (c)
5 Sam Lousi
4 Michael Fatialofa
3 Jeff Toomaga-Allen
2 Ricky Riccitelli
1 Toby Smith

Reserves

16 James O’Reilly
17 Chris Eves
18 Ben May
19 Gareth Evans
20 Reed Prinsep
21 Finlay Christie
22 Ihaia West
23 Julian Savea

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J
JW 1 hour ago
'They smelt it': Scott Robertson says Italy sensed All Blacks' vulnerability

Even the 20/30 cappers did too I reckon.


IDK, I think Jordan has a limited life span in this side unless he can develop more to his game. Like you go on to mention, I think theyres more important things to worry about than the effectiveness of someone's extra strings, or secondary components to their game.


Bash backs are Fosters thing, and to a large part they've made it work. Theyre now one of the best teams in the world.


They boy's trucked it up a bit against Italy in the redzone, and against France, wasn't that effective without the right players probably.


Try and take a look at it this way. Dissapointed Havili and Blackadder were in the side? Havili despite clearly shown that he can't do what the team needs at 12 was kept on for the RWC. Back goes down and he brings in Blackadder who doesn't play. Refuses to drop Christie when he should and look who starts this season. Beauden Barret not playing well enough to keep his 10 jersey but we gotta keep him in the side. Weve only got one 8, we stuff developing another I'll just play Ardie every game.


This years team wasn't burdened overly with injuries but they were in every position Razor might have wanted to try and development, severely limiting options. I'm not defending Razor as there was also plenty of other opportunity to make up for it and he was a little gunshy, but I'm also not going to overly criticise him because he chose cohesion over a black slate.

How long are we going to keep blaming All Black failings on Ian Foster.

I think more and more people are on board with it being time to try alternatives, but then again, how would they have reacted to a loss against Italy? 😉

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