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What has happened to the Hurricanes?

Chris Boyd summed it up as ‘the worst 40 minutes of football we’ve played in four years’ after the Hurricanes had just lost their third straight match, the first time under his watch that has happened.

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‘I don’t think there is any excuse, we just gave away too many penalties, allowed them territory. They would just kick to the corner and drive and we didn’t deal with that particularly well,’ he said.

‘It was a tough day at the office.’

The side that was flying high on a ten-game winning streak and perched atop the New Zealand conference is now looking to the drawing board after last night’s 24-12 loss to the Brumbies in Canberra. They are guaranteed playoff qualification but now face pressure from the rising Chiefs for a home quarterfinal.

That could prove material given the impracticality of the Super Rugby seeding process, which sees the fourth (Hurricanes) and fifth (Chiefs) seeds placed against each other, despite both having more wins and competition points than the second and third seeds.

Home ground advantage in that match is important, given how tough it is to win on the road in Kiwi derbies. The Hurricanes three-game skid has, in part, been because of this element. A trip to Christchurch to face the Crusaders was a wet weather nightmare and a visit to Dunedin against the high-octane Highlanders was too tall of an ask on the fast surface of Forsyth Barr.

The team’s ten-game winning streak was built on home soil, as they put away the Crusaders, Highlanders and Chiefs in convincing fashion. In fact, the Hurricanes are undefeated at home this season going 7-0, while on the road they are 3-4.

‘I’m sure if we look at the attitude, skills and the decisions it will be a combination of those three things but we just have to find some fire again,’ Boyd suggested as reasons for the form slump.

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The return of internationals Brad Shields, Beauden Barrett and Vaea Fifita next week should help, as well as a return to the familiarity of the Caketin for a clash against the Blues before a quarter-final preview against the Chiefs in Hamilton. That away derby will likely determine home ground advantage in the first edition of two back-to-back clashes against the Chiefs.

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Captain TJ Perenara offered no excuses for the run of losses, but believes the side can improve by taking care of the ‘controllables’.

‘I just think we’re not playing great footy at the moment. We can control a lot of things out on the field that we aren’t doing well,” he said post-match.

That extends to off the field preparations, as Perenara proposed ‘stripping it back’ to how each individual, positional group and the team as a whole prepared during the week.

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They won’t have long to find an answer as destiny calls for a do-or-die finals clash against another high-powered Kiwi team. Whether they play that at home or away will be a big factor in whether this Hurricanes team will challenge for another title.

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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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