Red-hot chance for Blues
Robert van Royen
The lack of social media posts featuring Blues great Carlos Spencer torching the Crusaders and flipping the bird at fans is telling.
That 2004 highlight is usually rolled out on repeat when it’s Crusaders-Blues week, but things feel different this time round.
Sure, the Crusaders still own the Blues in the head-to-head stakes, but the red-and-blacks are winless and vulnerable.
If ever there were a golden opportunity for the Blues to get some payback and inflict more misery on the slumping Crusaders, it’s this weekend.
A one-sided rivalry
Once the fiercest rivalry in the competition, it’s long been usurped by Crusaders-Chiefs encounters.
After all, is it really a rivalry when the Crusaders have won 18 of the last 19 matches between the teams, and 31 of the 44 since Super Rugby’s inception in 1996?
That remarkable winning run includes the 52-15 shellacking the Crusaders dealt the Blues in last year’s semifinal in Christchurch, where the hosts produced an almost flawless performance.
In an eerie similarity to this week, the Crusaders’ bulging casualty ward meant it was seen as a prime opportunity for the Blues to end the reigning champions’ quest for seven straight titles.
Now, the Blues can condemn the depleted Crusaders to an 0-5 start, and they’ll get their shot as both teams don heritage jerseys from the late 1990s.
A long-awaited return
Highlanders coach Clarke Dermody should not need to tell his team what to expect when the Chiefs fire up Emoni Narawa off the bench tomorrow.
Robbed of his first World Cup appearance because of a back injury last year, the sizzling wing is finally fit again after a setback in his recovery scratched him for the past four weeks.
A year after the Fiji-born flyer lit up Super Rugby with his speed and ability to evade would-be tacklers, it only injects more of the X factor into an already stacked backline.
Not that the Highlanders, losers of four straight games to the Chiefs, haven’t got plenty of spark of their own.
Look no further than fullback Jacob Ratumaitavuki-Kneepkens, one of the best players in Super Rugby so far, who will line up opposite Shaun Stevenson in what should be a humdinger head to head.
With the Hurricanes looming in Dunedin next week, the next two rounds will provide a good reading on where the Highlanders (2-2) are at.
Hurricane swirling
Kudos to anyone who predicted the Hurricanes would be unbeaten and looking down from atop the standings through four weeks.
It was the Chiefs, Blues and Crusaders tickling most people’s fancy ahead of the season, with the Canes widely considered the fourth best New Zealand team.
From dispatching the Force in Perth, to coming from behind to beat the Reds in golden point, to winning tense derbies against the Blues and Crusaders, they are not a one-trick pony, either.
As dynamite as their backs are, what makes the Clark Laidlaw-coached team so difficult to keep in check is that their forward pack is loaded with big, powerful ball carriers who routinely smash over the advantage line.
They lost Ardie Savea (Japan) for the year, but fellow loose forwards Brayden Iose, Devan Flanders and Peter Lakai have been immense during their unbeaten start to the year.
The Kiss factor
It’s still a little odd not seeing Brad Thorn in the Reds’ coaching box. But what a start Les Kiss has made after replacing the former All Black, who spent six years with the franchise.
Second on the ladder through four weeks, they’ve knocked over the Chiefs, and have only themselves to blame for not putting away the Hurricanes before their round-two game in Melbourne went to golden point.
Having brought in former London Irish colleagues Brad Davis and Jonathan Fisher, as well as Tonga assistant Zane Hilton, Kiss and his staff have morphed the Reds into Australia’s best team.
Encouragingly for the competition, the Brumbies, who host Moana Pasifika tonight, are also 3-1, while the 1-3 Waratahs could easily have beaten both the Highlanders and Blues after already knocking off the Crusaders.
Yes, all signs point to the Australians being much improved overall, but their lack of depth could be exposed as the competition grinds towards winter.