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Luke Jacobson hoping to pick up where he left off with Chiefs

Chiefs loose forward Luke Jacobson will be trying to pick up where he left off when the 2019 Super Rugby season gets underway.

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The 21-year-old is gearing up for his second Super Rugby season and is thankful to be involved after missing a large part of 2018 through concussion.

“It’s been going good,” Jacobson told RugbyPass when asked how the preseason is going.

“I’ve personally had a little bit of a different journey to everyone else coming back from injury but I’ve been able to get back into it over the last couple of weeks, it’s been good to throw the footy ball around and get amongst it with the boys.”

After a promising start to his professional career, the former New Zealand U20 captain took an elbow to the head during the final regular season fixture of the season and has spent the last six months recovering, missing the entire Mitre 10 Cup season for Waikato.

“She’s a pretty slow couple of months there for a while but things are looking pretty good now,” he said. “I just got cleared for contact yesterday so should be looking to get back in the thick of things within the next three weeks.”

“We’re probably looking at about three weeks from now to be able to start playing, I don’t know how that’ll look – me returning – I might be playing a little bit of club [rugby[ or whatever, just trying to get back into the swing of things.”

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As for personal aspirations in 2019, Jacobson has his eyes fixated on one goal in particular.

“I’d like to get back into footy for starters,” he said.

“I’d be really keen to try and push for a starting spot. There’s definitely some good competition. If I was able to do that I’d be pretty happy with that.”

Jacobson primarily operates at blindside and number eight, and has a good chance to get some more reps under his belt following the departure of longtime Chief Liam Messam, who largely occupied the No. 6 jersey during his 179-match tenure with the side.

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As for how the team is preparing as a whole for the new season, Jacobson is optimistic that the Chiefs can improve after making the quarterfinals last year in Colin Cooper’s first year in charge.

“There’s a few new faces, a couple of boys are first years and a couple of boys coming in from different places but I think everyone’s starting to gel together pretty well.

“Having the All Blacks back in definitely lifts up everything in regards to the level, also they bring good culture to the team as well.

“Everybody looks up to them, they come in and they’re the friendliest guys there. There’s no chip on anybody’s shoulder and everyone’s on the same playing field.”

2019 will also be star first five-eighth Damian McKenzie’s second full season in the No. 10 jersey, something Jacobson is excited for.

“He brings a pretty electric style to our game,” he said.

“A lot of our play comes off the back of him obviously being first five. I think he’ll be better for it this year, I mean he was pretty good last year but with another year in the saddle he’ll be much better for it.”

Jacobson also shed light on a potential future Chief, Waikato midfielder Quinn Tupaea.

The 19-year-old starred for Waikato in 2018 and was tipped by many to take a place on a Super Rugby squad. That hasn’t materialised yet but Tupaea has been with the Chiefs during the preseason on an Interim Training Contract, where he has impressed.

“He’s in there as an ITC at the moment but the numbers he pushes out in the gym, I think he’s on of the PBers for almost every lift at his position,” Jacobson said. “He’s a bit of a man child but he definitely fits right in out there, as do quite a lot of the ITC boys in there.

“I think he’s been hard done by a little bit not being amongst that sort of thing [Super Rugby] but he’ll do really well with the U20s.

“I’m unsure what his plans are after that but I’m sure he’ll be in and around.”

The Chiefs continue their preseason in Queensland on Friday with a match against the Reds, where Tupaea features among the reserves.

Should Jacobson hit his three-week target, he should be on track for a Super Rugby return for his side’s home hitout against the Sunwolves on March 2, dependent on whether he jumps straight back into Super Rugby action.

The regular season will kick off for the Chiefs next Friday when they host the Highlanders at FMG Stadium Waikato.

Rugby World Cup City Guides – Oita:

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Flankly 2 minutes 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
N
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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