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Sale reach decision on recruitment after latest Tom Curry injury

(Photo by Dan Mullan/Getty Images)

Alex Sanderson has come to a decision on whether or not Sale will dip into the short-term recruitment market to replace Tom Curry, the England back-rower whose hip surgery will see him miss the remainder of the 2023/24 season.

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Curry hasn’t played for the Sharks since his return from helping his country to finish third at the recent Rugby World Cup in France. He seized up on the training ground and specialist medical opinion recommended he go for an operation that would sideline him for quite some time but future-proof the 25-year-old’s career in the longer run.

This frustrating loss of their talisman left director of rugby Sanderson with the dilemma of bringing in a fresh signing to make up for Curry’s unavailability or else stick with the back row players they currently have at a club who are seeking to go one better than last season’s final loss to Saracens and win the Gallagher Premiership title.

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Sale are currently top of the table after six wins in seven ahead of Friday’s trip to Harlequins, matches in which Ernst van Rhyn and Dan du Preez have been ever-present starters in the back row with Ben Curry and Sam Dugdale starting three each and Rouben Birch starting once.

Sanderson has now confirmed that Sale have called time on bringing in a replacement for Tom Curry, believing they wouldn’t get sufficient value from a new recruit. “Do we get another player and warehouse of him to the detriment of the lads we want to come through and bring through?’ pondered the Sharks boss at his latest midweek media briefing.

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“We have looked at the loading of all the lads so far and we have a few to come back a little bit later through injury, JL (du Preez) has been injured, Tom Ellis is out for the next three, four weeks, Ben came back a little bit later.

“The reality is that we are probably looking for a player to help us out in December, because they are starting to fatigue seven games in, through to the end of January and then we have a break. So then would be looking for someone for two months before we freshen them up and go again.

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“Like, this player has to be better than a Ben Curry, an Ernst van Rhyn, a JL du Preez and a Dan du Preez, it’s quite a high bar. I don’t think there are that many, so unless we are going to get someone to add to those four that we couldn’t rotate… bear in mind we have Ben Bamber coming through and Rouben Birch and Sam Dudgale, all really good guys who are young and coming through.

“Like, we’d block their pathway and we would have to rotate a really good player with those four who need the game time anyway and we have only got two months to do it. So you’d be getting someone in for six months, we need them for two. It didn’t make sense financially or by way of loading or warehousing players so we are not on the search – we have called time on that.”

Tom Curry will be one of eight Sale players who will meet with England boss Steve Borthwick next Tuesday at the club’s training ground in Manchester. Manu Tuilagi, Ben Curry, Bevan Rodd, George Ford, Jonny Hill, Joe Carpenter and Tom Roebuck are the others involved in that gathering.

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1 Comment
j
john 357 days ago

Surprised Guss Warr does not interest Borthwick

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J
JW 3 hours ago
'Passionate reunion of France and New Zealand shows Fabien Galthie is wrong to rest his stars'

Ok, managed to read the full article..

... New Zealand’s has only 14 and the professional season is all over within four months. In France, club governance is the responsibility of an independent organisation [the Ligue Nationale de Rugby or LNR] which is entirely separate from the host union [the Fédération Française de Rugby or FFR]. Down south New Zealand Rugby runs the provincial and the national game.

That is the National Provincial Championship, a competition of 14 representative union based teams run through the SH international window and only semi professional (paid only during it's running). It is run by NZR and goes for two and a half months.


Super Rugby is a competition involving 12 fully professional teams, of which 5 are of New Zealand eligibility, and another joint administered team of Pacific Island eligibility, with NZR involvement. It was a 18 week competition this year, so involved (randomly chosen I believe) extra return fixtures (2 or 3 home and away derbys), and is run by Super Rugby Pacific's own independent Board (or organisation). The teams may or may not be independently run and owned (note, this does not necessarily mean what you think of as 'privately owned').


LNR was setup by FFR and the French Government to administer the professional game in France. In New Zealand, the Players Association and Super Rugby franchises agreed last month to not setup their own governance structure for professional rugby and re-aligned themselves with New Zealand Rugby. They had been proposing to do something like the English model, I'm not sure how closely that would have been aligned to the French system but it did not sound like it would have French union executive representation on it like the LNR does.

In the shaky isles the professional pyramid tapers to a point with the almighty All Blacks. In France the feeling for country is no more important than the sense of fierce local identity spawned at myriad clubs concentrated in the southwest. Progress is achieved by a nonchalant shrug and the wide sweep of nuanced negotiation, rather than driven from the top by a single intense focus.

Yes, it is pretty much a 'representative' selection system at every level, but these union's are having to fight for their existence against the regime that is NZR, and are currently going through their own battle, just as France has recently as I understand it. A single focus, ala the French game, might not be the best outcome for rugby as a whole.


For pure theatre, it is a wonderful article so far. I prefer 'Ntamack New Zealand 2022' though.

The young Crusader still struggles to solve the puzzle posed by the shorter, more compact tight-heads at this level but he had no problem at all with Colombe.

It was interesting to listen to Manny during an interview on Maul or Nothing, he citied that after a bit of banter with the All Black's he no longer wanted one of their jersey's after the game. One of those talks was an eye to eye chat with Tamaiti Williams, there appear to be nothing between the lock and prop, just a lot of give and take. I thought TW angled in and caused Taylor to pop a few times, and that NZ were lucky to be rewarded.

f you have a forward of 6ft 8ins and 145kg, and he is not at all disturbed by a dysfunctional set-piece, you are in business.

He talked about the clarity of the leadership that helped alleviate any need for anxiety at the predicaments unfolding before him. The same cannot be said for New Zealand when they had 5 minutes left to retrieve a match winning penalty, I don't believe. Did the team in black have much of a plan at any point in the game? I don't really call an autonomous 10 vehicle they had as innovative. I think Razor needs to go back to the dealer and get a new game driver on that one.

Vaa’i is no match for his power on the ground. Even in reverse, Meafou is like a tractor motoring backwards in low gear, trampling all in its path.

Vaa'i actually stops him in his tracks. He gets what could have been a dubious 'tackle' on him?

A high-level offence will often try to identify and exploit big forwards who can be slower to reload, and therefore vulnerable to two quick plays run at them consecutively.

Yes he was just standing on his haunches wasn't he? He mentioned that in the interview, saying that not only did you just get up and back into the line to find the opposition was already set and running at you they also hit harder than anything he'd experienced in the Top 14. He was referring to New Zealands ultra-physical, burst-based Super style of course, which he was more than a bit surprised about. I don't blame him for being caught out.


He still sent the obstruction back to the repair yard though!

What wouldn’t the New Zealand rugby public give to see the likes of Mauvaka and Meafou up front..

Common now Nick, don't go there! Meafou showed his Toulouse shirt and promptly got his citizenship, New Zealand can't have him, surely?!?


As I have said before with these subjects, really enjoy your enthusiasm for their contribution on the field and I'd love to see more of their shapes running out for Vern Cotter and the like styled teams.

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