Big chance for Akira Ioane to stake a claim
All Blacks selectors must find alternatives for captain Kieran Read at No 8, writes Marc Hinton.
OPINION: As Akira Ioane thinks about his looming pre-season training schedule, it might pay to ramp up the reps and throw an extra few kegs on the end of that bar.
A special payoff looms, if the talented Aucklander is willing to put the work in.
As things stand now, All Blacks coach Steve Hansen has to be thinking seriously about developing a viable backup, and occasional alternative, to skipper Kieran Read in the No 8 position. That’s just the reality of the precarious position the captain now finds himself in.
Read had back surgery on a prolapsed lumbar disc yesterday and is expected to undergo a fourmonth recovery and rehab programme, and return to the rugby field round mid-April.
It is the second straight season that Read will have missed the first part of Super Rugby after wrist surgery kept him out for the first six rounds of 2017.
The All Blacks captain, who has already racked up 109 test caps, is hoping to play through until at least the 2019 World Cup when he, and his men, will shoot for a hat-trick of titles.
But clearly the wear and tear of the modern game, and the 10-month season, is proving problematic. At 32, the classy Cantab is also entering a phase of his career when those demands become harder and harder to play through.
Hansen must at the very least be thinking about a plan to help his committed skipper get through the next two seasons and in some sort of optimal condition for the 2019 global tournament.
Part of that will be to lessen his workload at the test level. And to do that he will need a viable alternative at No 8 who can slot in and get the job done in the skipper’s absence.
The more drastic notion, heaven forbid, is that Read might not even make it through to Japan if injury continues to strike at its current rate. To that end the need for an able backup becomes even more vital.
Which brings us to the list of contenders. It is not exactly a long one.
Jerome Kaino has been the pseudo deputy in recent years but his test days now appear over, with a decline in form and a move to France on the horizon.
Luke Whitelock stepped in to fill in at No 8 when Read missed the Wales test at the end of the November tour, and it’s a role he is likely to assume for the Highlanders in Super Rugby.
The hard-working, nononsense loose forward has to be up near the head of the queue. He would certainly not let anyone down with his physicality, consistency and solid all-round game.
But does Whitelock have the qualities to make a mark in a bigtime test at No 8? Does he have the X-factor to slip a gamechanging offload, or break a tackle, or loom up as the key support man, as Read has done so often through his long career?
The jury remains out on that one.
The other two major contenders as it stands now are probably Ioane and Whitelock’s Highlanders team-mate Liam Squire.
Given that Squire has finally emerged in 2017 as the All Blacks’ first-choice No 6, it is unlikely that Hansen would want to use him as anything more than a stopgap No 8 cover. Maybe he goes there in-game. Or steps in at a pinch. He is certainly capable.
But if you are looking for someone with the ability to really make the All Blacks No 8 jersey his own, and even succeed Read post-2019, then Ioane is potentially your man. Potentially. The 22-year-old, unlike his younger brother Rieko, has presented as somewhat of a problem child for Hansen. The Gaffer, like us all, recognises the talent the young man possesses but is not quite so enamoured about his workrate, training habits and attitude.
He’s on their radar, for sure, called in as a replacement on November’s tour, and part of training squads before that. But the national selectors remain unconvinced and it was notable that when push came to shove in Cardiff, Whitelock got the nod.
But Ioane, with all that natural ability, size and power, could be just one standout Super Rugby campaign from making the same step up his younger brother has managed so effortlessly.
It’s there if he really wants it. The Blues present as the ideal platform for him to make his case, and ease a few anxieties at the same time.