It’s harder to forget about Sotutu anymore
With three minutes remaining at Suncorp Stadium in Brisbane on Saturday night, and the scores locked at 34-34, Blues No 8 Hoskins Sotutu received a kickoff just 10 metres from his line. What happened next was rapid, instinctive and dazzlingly brilliant, and a big reason why new All Blacks coach Scott Robertson could soon be facing a loose forward conundrum.
In the normal course of events, Robertson would not be giving his old playing position of No 8 a heck of a lot of thought ahead of his July introduction to the test arena via twin home tests against England and Fiji in San Diego. He does, after all, have the best player in the world returning from Japan.
That would be Ardie Savea. Even coming off a sabbatical season with the Kobe Steelers, the 30-year-old reigning world player of the year is as close to an automatic selection as it gets for Robertson. That’s a given.
But what’s not set in stone is the balance of the loose trio (Savea, remember, has started all three spots at test level) and the group who will surround Savea in Robertson’s first national squad for 2024. Which is where Sotutu comes in, and that eye-catching run late in the Blues’ come-from-behind 41-34 victory over the Reds that was a microcosm of his body of work this year.
The 25-year-old is putting together a signature season for the 8-1 Blues in Super Rugby Pacific that surely has him on the fast-track back into the national squad.
Last year the All Blacks, and even their feeder XV, didn’t want to know about Sotutu who became the proverbial forgotten man. After three years plugging away in the national setup, the talented loose forward was tabbed surplus to requirements.
That left decisions to be made: he could have taken the rejection personally and cut and run for opportunities elsewhere; or he could stay and fight for the black jersey he values so highly.
That he’s chosen the latter says a lot about the guiding forces of this young man. As he told Stuff just a few weeks back, consistency is the key to him regaining the All Blacks spot he so covets.
“It’s about being able to put out good performances, like I know I can, and then being able to back it up every week,” he said. “I can't be the guy that they talk about one game and then the next game, I have a lesser game. It's about being able to have big moments every game.”
Sotutu is meeting that ambition in ‘24 as arguably the standout Blues player among a crowded field of contenders. He has started eight of nine games thus far – all victories – and came off the bench for the round 3 defeat to the Hurricanes in Wellington.
He has crossed for a competition-leading nine tries and is top-10 league-wide in carries (86), metres made (671) and offloads (11), while leading the Blues in minutes played. He’s also a handy source of lineout ball, gets around the field very well for a big man and is working hard on his defence.
Last Saturday night in Brisbane he went next level. After running for 50-plus metres in five of the previous eight matches, he exploded against the Reds with 128 metres on 10 carries, four defenders beaten, a pair of offloads, a try assist and a crucial second-half score that lit the fuse on a stunning Blues comeback.
If anything personified Sotutu’s work in ‘24 it was the moment in the 77th minute when he received the kickoff deep in the back left corner of the field, 10 metres from his line, scores locked, and this intriguing contest in the balance.
In an explosion of his outrageous talent, Sotutu left multiple defenders in his wake as he surged upfield on a 60-metre run of breathtaking skill, speed and swerve down the left touchline. The Blues didn’t score from it, but it put them in the right part of the field to make the final play – a try to replacement halfback Sam Nock, off some Caleb Clarke brilliance – that decided an epic battle.
“Hoskins saw the space and took it,” noted an ecstatic Cotter. “These guys work on that. They’re proud of identifying opportunities and having a crack. He’s very good at it.”
The job’s far from done for Sotutu, or the Blues who sit one point behind the Hurricanes at the top of the table, and meet the Rebels in Melbourne for round 11. But a continuation of what we’ve seen thus far should have him back in the national mix.