Tamed Lions determined to roar in semifinal

WELLINGTON have finished train- ing for the day.

It’s been raining cats and dogs but nothing a hot shower and a bite to eat won’t fix. A round of applause breaks out and the Lions appear from their team room.

It’s three days till their NPC semifinal against Counties Manukau at Westpac Stadium in Wellington.

This time last year Wellington fell at the second-to-last hurdle, when beaten 33-22 by Auckland in the semis. This time last week they suffered a shock 35-24 loss to Hawke’s Bay when chasing 10 wins on the trot.

This time next week everyone expects them to be preparing for a final against Canterbury.

This is fertile ground for Wellington coach Chris Boyd and his assistant, Richard Watt.

Auckland broke their hearts, Hawke’s Bay knocked any com- placency out of the system and now Boyd and Watt must ensure the onestep-at-a-time mentality as they chase the province’s first NPC title since 2000.

‘‘It happened to us last year,’’ Watt says. ‘‘We had a home semi against Auckland and we didn’t win that game and we were off to the beach. The boys know there is no tomorrow after Friday, so you can’t look any further forward than Counties on Friday. It’s the total focus.

‘‘Boydy [coach Chris Boyd] made that quite clear yesterday. There is no next week if we don’t get this right.’’

Hawke’s Bay won the contact area last Wednesday and that will be the blueprint for Fritz Lee and his forward pack on Friday.

Watt talks about ‘‘some good lessons being learned’’ and the loss being ‘‘a timely reminder’’.

‘‘I’ve got this old saying ‘everything happens for a reason’ and there was a reason that happened and a punch on the nose at that time of the season could be a good thing for this team.

‘‘It keeps the boys pretty grounded. They haven’t come in this week, chest puffed out, 10-in-a-row sort of thing. They’ve got to do some punching on the nose.’’

The All Blacks have 29 players in Dunedin this week for a home test. It means Cory Jane and Jeremy Thrush are unavailable for Wellington but not certain to be involved in the Bledisloe test.

Watt stays out of the rugby politics, preferring to worry about what he has rather than what he hasn’t.

He seems to favour a fit again Matt Proctor over Curtis Ambrose for the vacant wing spot and says there are no injury concerns, which suggests Charlie Ngatai’s hamstring niggle is minor. The Wellington team will be named tomorrow.