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New Highlanders pre-season winning over young players
By Ned Lester
New Highlanders coach Clarke Dermody is implementing his own take on the Super Rugby Pacific preseason, his tactics have received glowing reviews from one of the team's youngsters as a number of promising talents begin their professional rugby journey in the unfamiliar deep south.
Dermody assumes the head coach role at a time of rebuilding for the Highlanders club, bringing in seven rookies for the 2023 campaign as the team builds around future stars like Falou Fakatava, Ethan de Groot, Marino Mikaele-Tu'u and Thomas Umaga-Jensen.
Aaron Smith's veteran presence will help steer the ship for 2023, but the All Blacks' all-time most-capped back has hinted that the 2023 Rugby World Cup campaign will be his last outing in a black jersey, which often coincides with players of his calibre taking up a higher paying contract overseas.
Nikora Broughton is one of the rookies getting his first taste of life as a Super Rugby player. Earlier in the week, he and the team were in the pool for a stress and pressure training session with Dave Wood. During the session, the players were put through a number of exercises underwater, Wood said the purpose was to better the players' understanding of stress and pressure.
"When you're under the water," Wood explained. "The stress and the pressure comes in really fast and it's what you do with that stress and that pressure in that moment, in that dynamic situation that they can then take and apply to the field.
"All that we're trying to get them to do, is to get them to be able to do more with less, so to be able to prolong what we call the easy phase of the breath hold, and that's all about their ability to shift into a calm state in dynamic situations."
Having learnt how to better deal with the agitation of the body's fear response, the team headed for Te Anau, specifically Burwood Station, where they tried their hand at sheep shearing.
“All that stuff is new to me," Broughton told Stuff. "I’m definitely out of my comfort zone giving stuff like that a crack but I’m a southern man now.
“I even got to go hunting the other night. I shot my first deer, which was bloody amazing.”
The unorthodox training methods were dreamt up with the goal of bringing the team together and promoting trust within the relationships being built in the team. Staff were also included in the activities.
Coming off a strong season with Bay of Plenty in the NPC, the 21-year-old Broughton was lapping up the experience of being in the Super Rugby environment.
“It’s definitely a step up,” Broughton said of Highlanders training. “It's definitely harder.
“But it's been good getting around the boys and learning all this new stuff and new trainings and pushing my body. It’s been bloody awesome.”
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Latest Comments
Ireland have every right to back themselves for a win. But the key variable has little to do with recent record etc.
The reality is that Ireland are a settled team with tons of continuity, an established style, and a good depth chart, whereas NZ are fundamentally rebuilding. The questions are all about what Razor is doing and how far along he is in that program.
NZ are very close to really clicking. Against England all of the chatter is about how England could have closed out a win, but failed to do so. This has obscured the observation that NZ were by far the more creative and effective in attack, beyond the 3-1 try differential and disallowed tries. They gave away a lot of unnecessary penalties, and made many simple errors (including knock-ons and loose kicks). Those things are very fixable, and when they do so we are once again going to be staring at a formidable NZ team.
Last week we heard the England fans talking confidently about their chances against NZ, but England did not end up looking like the better team on the field or the scoreboard. The England defense was impressive enough, but still could not stop the tries.
Ireland certainly has a better chance, of course, but NZ is improving fast, and I would not be surprised at a convincing All Black win this week. It may turn on whether NZ can cut out the simple mistakes.
Go to commentsFair to say that NZ have come to respect Ireland, as have all teams. But it's a bit click-baitey to say that the game is the premier show-down for NZ.
SA has beaten NZ four times in a row, including in the RWC final.
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