Just starting an early thread as there’s injury news that will impact the weekend.
Confirmation that Sam Cane is out under concussion protocols after that nasty gash to the head, plus Tele’a is out with an injury as well. Sam Darry is also injured from training and is or has already gone home.
Du Plessis Kirifi and Chay Fihaki have been called in from the All Blacks XV squad as cover.
After earlier confirmation that Luke Jacobson wouldn’t make the tour, its now been confirmed that Ethan Blackadder and Daltan Papali’i are also not travelling north at all now as well.
So with Cane out injured it will be very interesting to see how Razor selects the team and bench. There’s a few options.
- Call Peter Lakai or Kirifi in at 7 and keep Finau on the bench, with Sititi & Savea staying at 6 & 8
- Shift Sititi and Savea to 8 & 7 then bring Finau into the starting team with Lakai onto the bench (is already in the squad and covers more positions than Kirifi.
- Do the same shift but move Barrett to 6, leaving Finau on the bench and starting Tuipulotu at lock with Lord coming in as cover on the bench.
With Tele’a out there’s also lots of possible permutations for the backline - particularly with McKenzie playing so well against Ireland.
- Shift Jordan back to 14 where he is playing better and bring Barrett into the 15 jersey
- Reece back in at 14
- Bring Reuben Love in at 14 or 15, and then McKenzie or Barrett cover from the bench.
Should make for an interesting team announcement in a day or two.
This is what Razor & the coaches have gone with:
1. Tamaiti Williams (17)
2. Codie Taylor (93)
3. Tyrel Lomax (42)
4. Scott Barrett (78) (Captain)
5. Tupou Vaa’i (36)
6. Samipeni Finau (7)
7. Ardie Savea (92) (Vice-Captain)
8. Wallace Sititi (8)
9. Cam Roigard (8)
10. Beauden Barrett (132)
11. Caleb Clarke (27)
12. Jordie Barrett (67) (Vice-Captain)
13. Rieko Ioane (79)
14. Sevu Reece (31)
15. Will Jordan (39)
16. Asafo Aumua (18)
17. Ofa Tu’ungafasi (66)
18. Pasilio Tosi (6)
19. Patrick Tuipulotu (49)
20. Peter Lakai (1)
21. Cortez Ratima (10)
22. Anton Lienert-Brown (82)
23. Damian McKenzie (60)
With Ardie moving to 7 this could well be a sign of the future - particularly as the most balanced loose forward trio would see him at 7 for Moana Pasifika next year as well to ensure Inisi gets plenty of game time at 8. I feel like Ratima is a bit unlucky, he didn’t get much from the forwards against Ireland, and while Roigard definitely got the ball out of the ruck cleaner & faster, the passes were often going quite high so by the time it was in McKenzie’s hands it wasn’t a great deal better than Ratima’s service. Still, Roigard is the future starting 9 - he’s just too good to leave out now he’s fully recovered from injury.
The only things I would have done differently was to play McKenzie at 10 so Beauden could play 15 and give us a good kicking option. As it stands, if i’m France i’m just kicking into Sevu Reece’s side of the back field all game, piling territorial pressure on. Jordan’s kicking game has been very weak from Fullback in the internationals since he returned from injury so that puts the whole responsibility on BB to track back and deal with it.
With that positional switch, i’d have liked to see Jordan at 14, and then Love or Perofeta on the bench. But Razor’s kinda one-track minded on Jordan is our best 15, even though a lot of us kiwis would see that as more of a situational/depending on the opposition type thing and it ignores how incredibly successful he has been at 14 over his time in the jersey.
