2024 NZ Schools Rugby
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@Bovidae Thanks. Should be plenty of available footage then. I see that he played against the Northland U19s for the Māori U18s, but that was a rather one-sided affair. I'll look at some of his games for HBHS.
Speaking of Māori U18s, I've been trying to look at the players of this year's team in order to get a sense of their positions and their potential strengths and weaknesses. But it's been tough to find even team sheets on some occasions, the Wairarapa College 1st XV, for example, seemingly being entered without numbers on the sporty.co.nz draws and results website. In the case of a player like Mako Blackman (great name, by the way), he's mentioned by the Gisborne Herald in 2023 as playing for Gisborne Boys' High in the reserve frontrow, but I haven't found any footage with him actually playing there.
Anyway, this is just to disclaim that I have very little faith in the accuracy of this positional breakdown. I've also only found one halfback - Kah’nal Ngawati - but I suspect a player like Le'Sharn Reiri-Paku, who is usually a first-five, provides cover there. I've grouped halfbacks and first fives for this reason. Again, feel free to add and correct where necessary.
Props: Isireli Qaranivalu; Alex Hewitt; Kane Paranihi;
Hookers: Jericho Wharehinga; Jack McCarthy
Locks: Oliver Church (FL); Clark Sutcliffe; Alex Arnold (FL); Mako Blackman
Loose forwards: Kobe Brownlee; Caleb Woodley; Jayden Broome; Noah Gregory; Cruiz Simpson
Halfbacks/First five-eights: Kah’nal Ngawati; Le'Sharn Reiri-Paku; Dallas Rata-Makene
Midfield/Outside backs: Hiraka Waitai-Haenga; Ethan Mcmanemin; Ryder Crosswell; Charlie Carroll; Kaden Makea; Brayden Neilson; Isaac Turoa (10); Wiremu Brailey
The locks, especially Church and Arnold, also often play as flankers, so the side doesn't possess a whole lot of height. It'll be interesting how they go at set-piece. There is some real quality throughout the side, though: Waitai-Haenga has already been mentioned as being unlucky to not make the top side and Kobe Brownlee was always highly involved in the games I've watched. Mcmanemin is a tall, athletic back who has shown promise for Tauranga.
Edited for correction.
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@Bovidae Good catch. I'll change Blackman to lock. But I'm guessing then there's still a prop somewhere else in the squad list that I've put in the wrong place?
Arnold's a good lineout player, from what I've seen. And I think the Māori U18s can have a strong set-piece, even without genuine tall timber. But in a hypothetical match-up against NZ Schools - where someone like Tevita Tatafu is supposedly over 2 metres - you could see it get into some trouble. But I have no idea about the Fiji and Samoa U18s second row stocks, so I guess the point is moot.
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The Māori U18s often have some future stars in their team, who are Y11 or 12s. I made a comment in 2022 about liking their 1st 5 Rico Simpson. That team also included Raharuhi Palmer, Josh Tengblad, Ben O'Donovan, Josh Whanga, Logan Wallace and King Maxwell. All are in the NZ Schools or NZ U20s in the next year or two. Hopefully this squad is competitive too.
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@Bovidae That 2022 Māori U18 side was phenomenal to watch. I remember Liam McIntosh doing an absolute number on the NZ Schools scrum. Their entire group of props - with Palmer, Seeling, and Wallace - was really good.
I do think that side was somewhat exceptionally loaded with talent though. Looking at last year's Māori squad list, I don't expect a huge number of guys to challenge for NZ U20 spots (and none of them made this year's NZ Schools). That's not to say that there's not some great talent: Stanley Solomon, obviously, has had a great year and there are those, like Dylan Eti and Liam Sturm, who I think have a high ceiling.
As for this year's side, I think they should be competitive, although I don't think they'll quite reach the heights of the 2022 side. I am looking forward to watching this Māori loose forward group, though, I think it's nicely balanced.
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@Bovidae said in 2024 NZ Schools Rugby:
WEDNESDAY 2ND OCTOBER 2024
NZ Māori Under 18 v Fiji Under 18 – 12 midday (St Paul's Collegiate, Hamilton)
NZ Barbarian U18 v Australia Under 18 – 2pm (St Paul's Collegiate, Hamilton)
NZ Schools v Samoa Under 18 – 4pm (St Paul's Collegiate, Hamilton)SUNDAY 6TH OCTOBER 2024
NZ Māori Under 18 v Samoa Under 18 – 12 midday (FMG Stadium, Hamilton)
NZ Barbarian Under 18 v Fiji Under 18 – 2pm (FMG Stadium, Hamilton)
NZ Schools v Australia Under 18 – 4pm (FMG Stadium, Hamilton)THURSDAY 10TH OCTOBER 2024
Chiefs Under 18 v Samoa – 12 midday (St Paul's Collegiate, Hamilton)
NZ Schools v Fiji Under 18 – 2pm (St Paul's Collegiate, Hamilton)I just noticed that the earlier fixture list doesn't match up with the fixture list provided in the recent release by NZR, with Fiji U18 no longer being part of the tournament: https://www.nzrugby.co.nz/news-and-events/latest-news/nz-schools-nz-maori-u18-nga-whatukura-and-nz-barbarians-u18-teams-named
Anyone know what happened there?
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@Bovidae From what I could gather, the Fiji U18s will be playing two matches against the Australian Schoolboys in Fiji on September 27 and the 3rd of October:
Schools U18 side prepares for Aust
The Fiji Schoolboys under-18 team is currently in intense preparation for their upcoming two Test matches against Australia.
This isn't the Australian side that will be playing in New Zealand, as they also play on the 2nd of October in Hamilton against the NZ Barbarians U18. It seems that RA and the ASRU (Australian Schools Rugby Union) have come to an agreement concerning which side can actually call itself "the Australian Schoolboys team". Last year, at the same time as NZ Schools was playing against the Aussie Schools & U18 side, another side called "Australia Schools" played a series against Tonga Schools.
Now, in March of this year, the ASRU and RA have released a joint statement on their intent to "work hand in hand to develop, strengthen, foster, and promote schools' rugby in Australia". The end result is that the RA-backed high-performance side will now just be referred to as the U18 development squad, and the 'Schoolboy'-brand will be reserved for the side put out by the ASRU.
The joint statement can be found here:
About
The Australian Schools Rugby Union (ASRU) is an independent, incorporated, not-for-profit association established in 1971. It is run by volunteer members of the teaching profession and professionals…
I also saw that the two sides (AU U18 and AU Schools) will be playing against each other in preparation for their respective series in New Zealand and Fiji, but I don't think it'll be available to the public, unfortunately.
As for why the Fiji U18 were first part of the tournament in NZ and subsequently weren't: I'd speculate they found the opportunity to play a home test series against Australia Schoolboys too good to turn down. But that's just speculation.
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@Bovidae I'm looking forward to watching some of the 1A guys like Stanley and Pahulu play for NZ Schools, also because there is so little coverage available to those outside of New Zealand (and I presume to those outside Auckland as well).
After watching some more footage this past week of both Van Der Heyden and Thomas Jennings, the Southland Boys' tighthead, I do wonder about how the NZ Schools scrum will fare. I like both players - Van Der Heyden was the lynchpin of a destructive Hamilton Boys' maul and Jennings seems like a typical, hard-nosed Southland prop - but I don't feel they were always that convincing at scrum time. Moore seems solid, although his strengths seem to lie more in the loose (from my very limited viewing). The unknown factor is, again, the 1A Auckland Grammar prop, Charlie Wallis. Perhaps there are some Auckland posters who can shed some more light on Wallis' performances in the scrum for Grammar?
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The 1A schools made a decision to not broadcast any games so you would be relying on parents/students to record any footage and upload. I saw AGS when they played Hamilton BHS, but to be honest I wasn't familiar with their players as it was earlier in the season. With Sky also not showing 1st XV rugby anymore there is little opportunity for the public to see games from across the country. The Super 8 might be the only competition where all games are live streamed.
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@Bovidae That's true, but it has been a lot easier to find material (parent recordings, local streaming services) on teams in the Miles Toyota Championship (CBHS/St. Bede's/Nelson College/St. Thomas of Canterbury) or the Southern Schools Championship (Southland BHS) than the 1A, for some reason. Maybe parents and other spectators are discouraged of recording the matches, I don't know?
I've tried looking for footage of the recently selected rep players and it has actually been surprisingly easy to find one, two or even three full games of First XV teams outside of the Super 8 (St. Bede's, for example, has three relatively complete games on Youtube, which allowed me to see a lot of Bede Giera's play). Only the 1A has been challenging, with only the two games of Kelston Boys' High School at the Top 4 easily available.
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@Bovidae said in 2024 NZ Schools Rugby:
Jamie Viljoen is now in the NZ Barbarians U18s so one of the original 1st 5s must have been replaced.
Any relation to Jordi Vijoen?
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@Canes4life said in 2024 NZ Schools Rugby:
@Bovidae said in 2024 NZ Schools Rugby:
Jamie Viljoen is now in the NZ Barbarians U18s so one of the original 1st 5s must have been replaced.
Any relation to Jordi Vijoen?
Younger brother. Also at PNBHS.
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@Bovidae said in 2024 NZ Schools Rugby:
Jamie Viljoen is now in the NZ Barbarians U18s so one of the original 1st 5s must have been replaced.
Peni Havea from FAHS has moved up into the NZ Schools side to fill the last place that they held open.
Viljoen also plays at Fullback a fair bit.
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Since the announcement of the NZ Schools squad, I’ve watched quite a lot of the different individual players. Some general thoughts on the locks and loosies:
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Positions (1): I’d like to take back my earlier suggestion of Hutchings as a potential openside. I’ll admit, this suggestion was mostly based on a game where he showed good aggressive defence and physicality. Since that time, I’ve seen him being burned in open space slightly too many times to still think that this would be a good option. He’s a lock/6, not really fast and mobile enough to play 7 or 8. Although he has good work-rate and gets around the field, he doesn’t have particularly quick feet. There’s quite a few of these lock/6 players in the squad, with Finn McLeod and Bede Giera having similar profiles (McLeod looked to me to be the fastest of the three).
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Positions (2): Tocker is probably selected as a loosie. He’s tall (I’d say the second tallest player in the squad after Tatafu) and he’s played a lot at lock for Palmerston North Boys but he doesn’t really strike me as a lock-kind of player. He’s very fast and has explosive speed – I saw that he’s the Manawatu Secondary School 100 m sprint champion – but, in the games that I watched (vs. Tauranga, Feilding, Hamilton & Gisborne), he was gassed pretty quickly and mainly positioned himself out wide and in the backline. Not a lot of cleaning rucks, not a lot of pillar defence, probably best as a wide-playing blindside.
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Discipline: There were a lot of penalties given away across the games I’ve seen, a lot of them very avoidable as well. Aio Keith, for example, was really aggressive at the breakdown against Nelson College in the Top 4 semi-final (3 breakdown turnovers, plus plenty of disrupted ball) but he was also penalized 3 times for some really cynical play around the ruck, one leading to a sinbin period during which Nelson College scored 14 points to nil.
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Breakdown: Like Keith, there are multiple players who are able to effectively contest the breakdown in this group, with Giera, and Saumaki, for example, having multiple steals across the games I watched. As it’s a noticeable trait across the different players, it wouldn’t surprise me if it was something the NZ Schools selection panel specifically looked out for. In terms of the attacking rucks, I didn’t really come across a player who really stood out as having a high work-rate through the middle with plenty of cleans (the quality of the clean also varied a lot). Mostly players who stood out with their athleticism and physicality in the carry, and were used in that capacity by their respective teams.
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Lineout: With Tatafu in the squad, there is already one guaranteed good target in the lineout. I also really liked Aio Keith’s work as the Kelston Boys’ lineout operator: he is very quick in the air, both in securing own ball and in contesting opposition throws. The other lineout players – McLeod, Giera, Tocker, Hutchings – were solid in their core roles if somewhat unspectacular.
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Balance loose trio: It’ll be interesting to see how they’ll use Saumaki Saumaki and Aidan Spratley. Probably the two most physical players, neither of them are genuine lineout options, which could make using both of them in a loose forward trio somewhat risky. At the same time, Fale and Mathis played at 6 and 7 last year in the second game against Australia and I don’t remember the lineout being particularly bad in that game (although they had two tall units with Tengblad and Vakasiuola in the second row). The threat of two hard carriers with Saumaki and Spratley might make it worth the risk.
All in all, a lot of fun watching these First XV games with a single-player focus in anticipation of the upcoming matches. I was probably most impressed by Aio Keith: good athlete with a solid skillset and an impressive all-round game, even if he can concede the occasional bad penalty. I think the group as a whole is solid enough, although I still think the strength of the team will more likely be found in the backline rather than in the pack. Apologies for the long post, I’ll try cutting it down a bit more in the future.
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