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Match Highlights: Kuridrani prompts Wallabies calls with hat-trick as Brumbies beat Bulls

Brumbies coach Dan McKellar says Tevita Kuridrani has a stranglehold on the Wallabies No.13 jersey after scoring a hat-trick in a 22-10 bonus-point win against the Bulls in Canberra on Friday.

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The victory extends the Brumbies lead at the top of the Australian conference and moves them into second on the Super Rugby ladder.

Kuridrani hasn’t played a Test since 2017 after he was dropped and then injured last year, but is in career-best form and will almost certainly start for the Wallabies at the World Cup in September.

“Tevita is in a good place at the moment, he’s playing well. He’s seeing a lot more footy and getting a lot more opportunity and his confidence is high at the moment,” McKellar said.

“He’s benefiting off the good work on the inside of him with Christian (Lealiifano) and Irae (SImone) giving him good ball and the forwards turning up at set piece.

“The last six or seven weeks of last year before he got injured, Tevita was very good. He’s going to be there or there abouts with the Wallabies, there’s no doubt he’d be my 13.”

McKellar said the emphasis against the Bulls on Friday was discipline but his men were penalised inside 30 seconds and the visitors went ahead 3-0.

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The Brumbies crossed for the first try when fullback Tom Banks drew two defenders and off-loaded to Kuridrani who scored in the corner after five minutes.

Three collapsed mauls led to Brumbies flanker Tom Cusack being sin-binned on 14 minutes and a Bulls try came next when they pushed over at scrum time.

The Brumbies turned down four kickable penalties in the first half but their second try didn’t arrive until just before the break.

The Bulls nullified the Brumbies’ usually reliable maul so they called on Kuridrani to break the line and the star outside centre delivered to make it 12-10 at half-time.

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The Brumbies have scored some sensational set-piece tries this season and added another from the scrum on 44 minutes.

Lealiifano ran at the line and found Henry Speight with an inside ball who then sent it back outside for Simone to score his first Super Rugby try.

The Brumbies had the wind in their sails and went back on the attack with Kuridrani scoring his third from an overlap just before the hour mark.

The scores remained unchanged for the final 20 minutes as the Brumbies made it six successive wins at home.

Bulls centre Burger Odendaal said: “They’re a class side, last we week we played the best team in Australia (Melbourne) and this week it changed because we played the best team again.”

AAP

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J
JW 1 hour ago
'Passionate reunion of France and New Zealand shows Fabien Galthie is wrong to rest his stars'

Where? I remember saying "unders"? The LNR was formed by the FFR, if I said that in a way that meant the 'pro' side of the game didn't have an equal representation/say as the 'amateur' side (FFR remit) that was not my intent.


But also, as it is the governing body, it also has more responsibility. As long as WR looks at FFR as the running body for rugby in France, that 'power' will remain. If the LNR refuses to govern their clubs use of players to enable a request by FFR (from WR) to ensure it's players are able to compete in International rugby takes place they will simply remove their participation. If the players complain to the France's body, either of their health and safety concerns (through playing too many 'minutes' etc) or that they are not allowed to be part in matches of national interest, my understanding is action can be taken against the LNR like it could be any other body/business. I see where you're coming from now re EPCR and the shake up they gave it, yes, that wasn't meant to be a separate statement to say that FFR can threaten them with EPCR expulsion by itself, simply that it would be a strong repercussion for those teams to be removed (no one would want them after the above).


You keep bringing up these other things I cannot understand why. Again, do you think if the LNR were not acting responsibly they would be able to get away with whatever they want (the attitude of these posters saying "they pay the players")? You may deem what theyre doing currently as being irresponsible but most do not. Countries like New Zealand have not even complained about it because they've never had it different, never got things like windfall TV contracts from France, so they can't complain because theyre not missing out on anything. Sure, if the French kept doing things like withholding million dollar game payments, or causing millions of dollars of devaluation in rights, they these things I'm outlining would be taking place. That's not the case currently however, no one here really cares what the French do. It's upto them to sort themselves out if they're not happy. Now, that said, if they did make it obvious to World Rugby that they were never going to send the French side away (like they possibly did stating their intent to exclude 20 targeted players) in July, well then they would simply be given XV fixtures against tier 2 sides during that window and the FFR would need to do things like the 50/50 revenue split to get big teams visiting in Nov.

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