Rebels coach asked to re-apply for position
Habana available for Stormers’ Super 15 tour
SYDNEY, April 15, (Agencies): Melbourne Rebels coach Damien Hill has been asked to re-apply for his Super Rugby position with his contract up at the end of the season, the club said on Monday.
Sweeping changes are under way at the struggling Australian Super Rugby club with the resignation on Monday of chief executive Steve Boland and the appointment of retired Rebels scrum-half Sam Cordingley to a newly-created role of rugby general manager.
Boland will finish up at the end of this month after 18 months in the role following his elevation from deputy CEO.
The Rebels have won only two matches from eight so far this season and there has also been off-field problems resulting in the indefinite suspension of Wallabies fly-half Kurtley Beale.
While Hill said he was interested in staying on at the Rebels, he was yet to make a final decision on his future.
“The players and the whole organisa- tion have worked very hard to date and there’s a lot more to do,” Hill told the Australian Associated Press.
“We lost around 700 caps of combined Super and Test rugby with the roster changes for this year so we knew there were going to be challenges.
“However we’re injecting youth for the long-term development of the club.
“We continue to build in certain areas but we let ourselves down in others and that’s why the performances aren’t leading to those wins.”
The Rebels also confirmed Monday the signing of former Wallabies scrum-
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half Luke Burgess, who will be returning home after the French club season with Toulouse. In Cape Town, South Africa, Bryan Habana will be available for the Stormers’ four-game Super 15 tour of New Zealand and Australia after the Springbok wing was sidelined for more than a month with a knee injury.
Habana will have another two weeks to recover fully from a torn left knee ligament before the Stormers begin the tour against the Hurricanes on April 26 at Wellington, New Zealand.
Stormers coach Allister Coetzee said Habana will “definitely” be available to tour, with the player having initially faced a 10-week layoff after being hurt on March 9. Hooker Scurra Ntubeni and loose forward Rynhardt Elstadt also will be fit enough to travel, as the Stormers emerge from the early-season injury problems that contributed to their poor start in Super Rugby. Deon Fourie is expected to recover from concussion in time for the Hurricanes game.
But Springbok lock Eben Etzebeth, flyhalf Elton Jantjies and wing Gerhard van den Heever are still doubtful for the Cape Town team, which was missing 13 players in Saturday’s victory over the Sharks. Hooker Tiaan Liebenberg (elbow), prop Deon Carstens (back), lock Ruan Botha (ankle) and flyhalf Peter Grant (ankle) are still injured.
Springbok flanker Schalk Burger was released from the hospital last week to recover from bacterial meningitis at home, but it’s unclear if the 30-year-old Stormers captain will play this season having been sidelined for more than a year by knee and calf injuries before he contracted the infection.
The Stormers, last year’s semifinalists, are 11th of 15 teams and just five points ahead of newcomers the Southern Kings, the lowest-placed South African team in Super Rugby. South Africa’s bottom team will face a promotion-relegation playoff, and while that was always expected to be the Kings, their positive tour to Australia and New Zealand has closed the gap on the Stormers.
The Stormers also play New Zealand’s Blues and Australia’s New South Wales and Melbourne on tour following a bye this weekend.
Veteran flanker George Smith may get a longer loan from Japan to the ACT Brumbies, coach Jack White said Monday, but it was unclear if he would be available for Australia during this year’s Lions tour.
White said he met with Smith’s Japanese club coaches in Dunedin after the experienced backrower once again impressed in the Brumbies’ 30-19 Super 15 victory over New Zealand’s Otago Highlanders last Friday.
The 110-Test great forced a a turnover that led to an early penalty goal and scored a try off the back of a rolling maul before half-time.
White said the two Suntory Sungoliath coaches were receptive, adding that their primary concern was that Smith needed to be fresh for the start of the Japanese season on Aug 18. way to get through my first match. My second match was really close. I felt I played better each and every round. I played well yesterday and even better today.”
Even though all 12 of Almagro’s career titles have come on clay, he couldn’t make it 13 on Sunday, failing to overcome four double faults and three service breaks.
“He did a really good job today,” Almagro said of Isner. “He played aggressive.
“He served like normal, but today was tough for me. I want to congratulate him, because he’s a really good player and a good person and I think he did a good job this week.”
Isner, who finished second to Juan Monaco last year, avenged that loss with a three-set win over the Argentine in the semi-finals on Saturday.
The world number 23 Isner had lost both previous matches to Almagro, including a five-set loss in the Davis Cup semi-finals in 2012.
Almagro was seeking to win his first title in 2013 and, like Isner, was appearing in his first final of the year. He fell to a 17-7 season record and a 12-7 mark in Tour finals.
Isner earned $82,000 in first place prize money. In Monaco, Rafael Nadal admitted Monday that his incredible 42-match, 10-year unbeaten run at Monte Carlo will end, but he is in no hurry to see that day.
The 26-year-old Spaniard, who last lost on the clay of Monte Carlo as a fresh-faced 16-year-old when thenclay court king Guillermo Coria defeated him in straight sets in the third round, also claimed he is not the clear favourite he has been in the past.
Nadal is bidding for an unprecedented ninth straight title at the Masters event in the heart of the Cote d’Azur but says his recent sevenmonth injury lay-off means he cannot be treated as the all-conquering clay king of old.
“I cannot say I’m the biggest favourite to win here again,” the Spaniard said on Monday as he prepared for his second-round start after a bye.
“This is not an easy event to win. I don’t want to lose perspective, but I don’t want to lose either.
“Everything in life finishes some- time. Someday the winning will stop, not everything is forever.
“But I’m excited to be here, it is always a high motivation for me to play Monte Carlo.”
Nadal, who won the Indian Wells hardcourt Masters 1000 crown three weeks ago and then rested his troublesome knees on the advice of doctors, remains quietly confident of his abilities on clay, where he has dominated for a decade.
While missing seven months during the last half of 2012 and well into 2013, the 26-year-old knows that he has the skills to step right back into his role as clay court master.
But he is not happy to be continually fielding questions about the state of his knees or his form.
“I want to focus on the tennis day by day,” he said. “I don’t want to talk knees, if I’m here I’m here to compete.
“I will try my best and hope to play better each day. I had a fantastic comeback (two February clay titles in Latin America before winning Indian Wells).”
Nadal said that while standing fifth in the world he is not prepared to complain about his ranking.
“You can’t be in the top four if you did not play for seven months,” he reasoned. “I’ve always gone day by day and just want to try and keep improving. “I’m always excited to be back here and have the chance to work hard and try to win. Now my job is to try and play well.”
On court Nadal’s journeyman compatriot Roberto Bautista Agut pulled off an upset as he defeated French 11th seed Gilles Simon 6-3, 7-6 (8-6).
Another seed Marin Cilic avoided a similar fate but only just as the ninthseeded Croat battled back from a set down to beat Horacio Zeballos 6-2, 67 (6/8), 6-2.
Finn Jarkko Nieminen defeated slumping Serb Viktor Troicki 6-1, 6-2 while Russian veteran Nikolay Davydenko dispatched German qualifier Daniel Brands 6-3, 6-4.
World No.1 Novak Djokovic was testing his injured ankle for another day after vowing to try and regain fitness in time for a Wednesday start at the event which begins the European clay season.
Djokovic hurt the ankle last weekend in a Davis Cup win but has made faster progress than he might have deemed possible and holds out hopes of taking his spot in the draw.