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Hurricanes without three internationals for Brumbies clash

Experienced halfback TJ Perenara will lead the Hurricanes on Saturday night in their crucial Super Rugby match against the Brumbies at GIO Stadium in Canberra.

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Perenara takes over the captaincy from Brad Shields who has been afforded a rest following his involvement in England’s test series against South Africa.

Hurricanes head coach Chris Boyd has made a number of changes to the squad which lost 30-14 to the Highlanders in Dunedin prior to the June international window.

Beauden Barrett, who continues to make good progress following his concussion in the second test against France, will have the second of his All Black stand-down matches and is replaced by Jackson Garden-Bachop.

Boyd was pleased with how Garden-Bachop performed in the Hurricanes practice match against the Chiefs in Hawera last week and believed he deserved an opportunity to start given the work he had put in throughout the season.

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With Shields absent, Reed Prinsep comes on to the side of the scrum while a high ankle sprain to Ardie Savea has seen Sam Henwood selected to start.

Henwood, who came into the starting side earlier in the season when Savea suffered a rib injury, showed he could have a real influence on a match as he showed in his first start against the Rebels in Melbourne.

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The bench also sees a number of changes from the one that was named against the Highlanders with lock Isaia Walker-Leawere set to make his Hurricanes debut.

Walker-Leawere, originally from Ruatoria, has worked his way back from a knee injury which curtailed his participation earlier in the season but showed in Hawera that he was ready to play his part in the campaign.

Prop Marcel Renata, who was drafted in as injury cover earlier this season, has also been named in the reserves where he will be joined by the experienced Blade Thomson and Ihaia West.

HURRICANES

15. Nehe Milner-Skudder, 14. Julian Savea, 13. Jordie Barrett, 12. Ngani Laumape, 11. Ben Lam, 10. Jackson Garden-Bachop, 9. TJ Perenara (C), 8. Gareth Evans, 7. Sam Henwood, 6. Reed Prinsep, 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. Marcel Renata, 19. Isaia Walker-Leawere, 20. Blade Thomson, 21. Jamie Booth, 22. Ihaia West, 23. Wes Goosen.

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Flankly 1 minute 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?

4 Go to comments
N
Nickers 11 minutes ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

Very poor understanding of what's going on and 0 ability to read. When I say playing behind the gain line you take this to mean all off-loads and site times we are playing in front of the gain line???


Every time we play a lot of rugby behind the gain line (for clarity, meaning trying to build an attack and use width without front foot ball 5m+ behind the most recent breakdown) we go backwards and turn the ball over in some way. Every time a player is tackled behind the most recent breakdown you need more and more people to clear out because your forwards have to go back around the corner, whereas opposition players can keep moving forward. Eventually you run out of either players to clear out or players to pass to and the result in a big net loss of territory and often a turnover. You may have witnessed that 20+ times in the game against England. This is a particularly dumb idea inside your own 40m which is where, for some reason, we are most likely to employ it.


The very best ABs teams never built an identity around attacking from poor positions. The DC era team was known for being the team that kicked the most. To engineer field position and apply pressure, and create broken play to counter attack. This current team is not differentiating between when a defence has lost it's structure and there are opportunities, and when they are completely set and there is nothing on. The reason they are going for 30 minute + periods in every game without scoring a single point, even against Japan and a poor Australian team, is because they are playing most of their rugby on the back foot in the wrong half.

43 Go to comments
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Nickers 40 minutes ago
Scott Robertson responds to criticism over All Blacks' handling errors

I thought we made a lot of progress against that type of defence by the WC last year. Lots of direct running and punching holes rather than using width. Against that type of defence I think you have to be looking to kick on first phase when you have front foot ball which we did relatively successfully. We are playing a lot of rugby behind the gain line at the moment. They are looking for those little interchanges for soft shoulders and fast ball or off loads but it regularly turns into them battering away with slow ball and going backwards, then putting in a very rushed kick under huge pressure.


JB brought that dimension when he first moved into 12 a couple of years ago but he's definitely not been at his best this year. I don't know if it is because he is being asked to play a narrow role, or carrying a niggle or two, but he does not look confident to me. He had that clean break on the weekend and stood there like he was a prop who found himself in open space and didn't know what to do with the ball. He is still a good first phase ball carrier though, they use him a lot off the line out to set up fast clean ball, but I don't think anyone is particularly clear on what they are supposed to do at that point. He was used really successfully as a second playmaker last year but I don't think he's been at that role once this year. He is a triple threat player but playing a very 1 dimensional role at the moment. He and Reiko have been absolutely rock solid on defence which is why I don't think there will be too much experimentation or changes there.

43 Go to comments
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