Havili remains in hospital following surgery
Crusaders fullback David Havili remains in hospital following abdominal surgery last Friday.
The franchise is releasing few details on the 25-year-old’s status, other than the fact a serious bowel infection led to urgent surgery.
In a statement yesterday, the Crusaders added he was recovering well and would not be available for ‘‘several weeks’’. No further comment would be made because it was a non-rugby related issue, it read.
Assistant coach Jason Ryan later addressed media after training at Rugby Park and gave little away. There was no suggestion of a foreign object being removed from Havili’s stomach, but he did confirm the form player of the competition was continuing his recovery in hospital.
‘‘Disappointed for Davie . . . obviously he was on fire, wasn’t he? But he’s just got to go through the recovery and get everything right,’’ Ryan said.
Havili won’t be the only big gun not to make the trip to Brisbane to play the Sunwolves on Saturday, when the match relocated from Tokyo due to the on-going Covid-19 outbreak is scheduled.
The Crusaders are set to rest a bunch of players when they name their team on Thursday, most notably captain and lock Scott Barrett. He didn’t play against the Highlanders in round four due to a knee injury, but it did not count as one of his two required All Blacks rest weeks.
A host of other All Blacks weren’t on the training paddock yesterday, including pivot Richie Mo’unga, midfielder Jack Goodhue, prop Joe Moody and hooker Codie Taylor.
Pivot Brett Cameron, who didn’t get off the bench in last week’s 24-20 win against the Reds in Christchurch, was running the cutter at training and is likely to start in place of Mo’unga.
Uncapped first-five Fergus Burke played for the Crusaders development team at the weekend and could get his first taste of Super Rugby off the bench.
‘‘Yeah, they are, and it’s good because they’ve been training immensely hard over the last couple of months. So they get an opportunity and we’ve got every confidence in all of them,’’ Ryan said when discussing the raft of inexperienced players set to get a run.
With Goodhue nowhere to be seen, Dallas McLeod, who debuted last week, and Braydon Ennor, fresh off his first All Blacks rest week, are shaping as the midfield pair.
Utility back Will Jordan (groin) trained yesterday and is ‘‘not far away’’, while loose forward Whetukamokamo Douglas is available for selection after breaking two fingers against the Chiefs in round two.
There was a loud cheer at the end of training for flanker Ethan Blackadder, who trained for the first time since undergoing shoulder surgery at the back end of last year’s Mitre 10 Cup.
There is no date for his return to play, but Ryan lit up when discussing his long road back.
‘‘The work Ethan Blackadder has put in off the field has been immense, something he can be really proud of. He has done everything he can with the medical team . . . typical Ethan, he’s worked so hard.’’
Ryan was not so enthusiastic when touching on the team’s film review of their narrow win against the Reds, who forced the Crusaders to attempt 234 tackles, 38 of which were missed.
‘‘It was really physical, especially in the close contact stuff, it was the most tackles we’d made all year,’’ Ryan said. ‘‘We looked at why that was and why we were giving the ball back and so forth, so we’ve had a good review and have a pretty clear plan of where we need to move forward as a team from here.’’