First XV players are now on the radar of Super Rugby teams and the battle for talent is ferocious.
YOUNG PLAYERS THESE DAYS DON’T WANT TO PAY THEIR DUES AND SERVE THEIR APPRENTICESHIP WHICH HAS MEANT FIRST XV PLAYERS ARE BEING TARGETED BY SUPER RUGBY SIDES. CAMPBELL BURNES REPORTS.
There are far more options these days for the elite young rugby playing school leaver.
Gone is the era when a Craig Dowd could leave Liston College and spend two years in the Suburbs Under 21 club side as he mastered the dark arts of the front- row. Now top First XV talent is being shoulder- tapped and offered a pathway, sometimes a full contract, into professional rugby.
We are also in the midst of a generation that is largely impatient, keen to make teams and make money. Where once a player did his time in ITM Cup, now the norm is for a talented schoolboy to be introduced into a Super Rugby set- up. These franchises cannot afford to sit on their hands waiting for a player to mature, not when league scouts are swarming, not when many games First XV games are televised.
That does not mean that every recent NZ Schools player has been snapped up by a Super Rugby team. Far from it. Some are tracking nicely with their development, through the NZ Under 20s and their provinces. Some played in the recent national Under 19 tournament. As a rule, the forwards tend to mature later, and backs, if they are good enough, will be promoted.
In 1988, two schoolboy sensations were assimilated into the greatest provincial rugby team of all time. Craig Innes was about the only player who could consistently tackle Va’aiga Tuigamala at First XV level. Both were not first- choice for Auckland in 1988, but had cracked the All Blacks by the end of 1989. Their 1987 NZ Schools teammate Jasin Goldsmith made it a year earlier, to Australia, sadly his only tour. Jonah Lomu, famously, played in the 1994 All Blacks, just months out of Wesley College. He was a freakish athlete at school, but was not quite ready for the nuances and pressure of test rugby at 19.
Now there is a certain amount of crystal ball- gazing.
Take Daniel Tupou, also known as ‘ The Tongan Thor,’ who exploded into the First XV season with three tries in the opening 20 minutes of Sacred Heart’s first 1A game. No, he’s not a wing, but a tighthead prop, possessed of a unique blend of skill, speed and power. Tupou backed it up the following week with a hat- trick, finishing with 11 tries for the season. Interest in this 18- year- old, 135kg ball of explosive athletic talent has skyrocketed. Every franchise worth its salt was after him, as were league and northern clubs. But he has been lost to the New Zealand game. Tupou was originally ineligible for national schools selection as he did not have a Kiwi passport, but could have been had he signed a loyalty agreement with the NZRU. He opted not to, and told the New Zealand
Herald in September that “if I signed it I wouldn’t be able to go to Australia.”
Tupou had played for the Blues Under 18 this season and also would have considered heading to the Chiefs, where his old First XV coach Dave Dillon is player identification and development manager. Family imperatives were believed to be uppermost in Tupou’s thinking and he also has a Sydney- based agent which is why he signed for the Queensland Reds.
The level of interest in Tupou is an exception rather than the rule, but franchises have to be seen to be acting.
The Blues, who have Auckland’s 1A grade on their doorstep, the nation’s largest and best First XV competition, have not let the grass grow under their feet. According to the Herald on Sunday, they were looking to forward contract three current schoolboys for the 2016 Super Rugby season, one of whom was named as Auckland Grammar centre Rieko Ioane. He is a fine player, in the NZ Schools set- up, and was one of the nominees for the Top 4 player of the year. But there are dangers. Who is to say he will be any better than Francis Saili and TJ Faiane ( another schoolboy star) by 2016? How much ITM Cup time will he have next year? And here is a little known fact. Any contract signed by
anyone under the age of 20 in New Zealand is not fully enforceable. That means if a French club was to open its cheque book to Ioane or others with a contract ( and under 20), the franchise would legally not be able to stand in their way.
New Zealand Rugby, despite the possible loss of Tupou, has a high strike- rate of retaining its prime schoolboy talent. From the 2012- 2013 second- tier NZ Barbarians Schools teams, only four players – Nelson Asofa- Solomona, Jermaine Ainsley, Tallis Karaitiana and Harry Fitzsimons – are not playing rugby here. Asofa- Solomona, a hefty and hard to stop lock/ No 8 from Wellington College, played for the 2012 NZ Barbarians Schools, but ruled himself out of 2013 NZ Schools contention by signing with the Melbourne Storm in the NRL. St Kentigern’s talented fullback Patrick Herbert did the same this year by signing with the Storm.
Ainsley is in Perth with the Western Force academy, while Karaitiana and Fitzsimons are living in the UK, the latter playing some code for London Scottish. The rest are either playing ITM Cup, on the fringes of those squads or playing in the Under 19s, if not injured.
A select few have kicked on to Super Rugby. Tevita Li famously had his first run for the Blues while still at Massey High last year; Damian McKenzie is a fully fledged Chief, while Mitch Drummond is the No 2 halfback in Canterbury and No 3 in the Crusaders.
Some are not being pushed too early. Hooker Liam Smart, a 2013 NZ Schools hooker, for example, is not yet in the ITM Cup mix at Canterbury. Mitch Karpik, an energetic and highly skilled openside for King’s College and NZ Schools last season, has played mainly Under 21 club rugby for Auckland University, not because he is not good enough but because of a logjam in that position at Auckland’s champion club.
So there are relatively few with full professional contracts from the cream of the 2012- 2013 schools crop. But you can bet many of them have been integrated into the provincial and franchise environments, rubbing shoulders with the top players. How good would it be for Waikato’s James Tucker, Bronze Boot winner for 2012 out of St Bede’s College and now with Waikato, to learn about what it takes to be a top lock from training on occasion with Brodie Retallick? Or for young Wellington hookers Leni Apisai and Ezekiel Sopoaga to be like sponges around Dane Coles at the Hurricanes training base?
“It’s blimmin’ hard to confirm good talent at the age of 16 or 17, but we have to adjust to what’s happening,” says Blues high performance manager Tony Hanks. “We want to be a good chance of keeping those we want.”
The Chiefs choose many of their core players from outside the region, Dave Rennie always seeking ‘ good buggers’ who can fit into the culture. That philosophy includes the signing of young talent, be it fresh out of school or the likes of Anton LienertBrown and Jordan Payne, who both played Super Rugby in 2014 before appearing in the ITM Cup.
Chief executive Andrew Flexman makes no apologies for the Chiefs being seen as aggressive in the marketplace, even down to schoolboy level. “We’ve got strong insights and views about
when we see these young boys as being Super Rugby- ready, assuming everything goes to plan,” says Flexman.
McKenzie is the obvious example. The Chiefs think he is ready for 2015.
The Crusaders and Canterbury were previously seen as the main ‘ aggressors’ in the recruiting stakes, but chief executive Hamish Riach is uneasy about the forward contracting model.
“The forward contracting model is not an ideal one because guys who might have stayed at the franchise now can’t because they have commitments to unproven schoolboys,” Riach says.
The Crusaders are still astute enough to know where there are holes in their depth. Take the outside backs. Canterbury have signed no less than four boys of the Auckland and Counties Manukau regions in those positions in the last two seasons. Two of them, Jack Goodhue and Nathaniel Apa, have played ITM Cup. Might they be Crusaders in 2016?
“The market is the market. If that is the way it goes, then we’ll have no choice,” says Riach. “But I would prefer to see kids work hard and earn their stripes. Maybe that’s an outdated model now.”
Nothing is left to chance at the Hurricanes, which draws on three ITM provinces with a good Wellington schools competition and strong individual schools in the region such as Palmerston North Boys’, Feilding High and Gisborne Boys’.
High performance manager Chris Stirling says there are 45- 50 identified at the age of 15- 16 as potential professional players and that there is a succession plan mapped out until 2020.
“I don’t think you have to be a rocket scientist to realise that at the end of the 2015 Super Rugby season, the Hurricanes could lose a few backs, so it’s really important that we look at what we require, not just now, but into the future,” says Stirling.
He says watch out for a surprise or two when the Hurricanes announce their 2015 squad at the end of October.
“One of the guys we are looking to sign might not be able to attend an assembly date because he is still at school.
“New Zealand Rugby do a fantastic job in making sure the franchise is doing the right thing by the player. It’s not in our interests to throw a young guy into an environment that’s going to break him, not necessarily physically but maybe mentally.
“If I want to contract a player who has not played ITM Cup or been through the NZ Under 20s programme, I have to provide a comprehensive three- year development plan,” he says.
The rugby and First XV landscape has altered irrevocably. Now we hope young men don’t get chewed up and spat out. There are solid processes in place to avoid that happening, but the idea of a logical progression into the professional ranks, which has been in vogue for over 15 years, is history.