Faletoi Peni: From four-week trial to Stag Day star
“How good is he? He didn’t last [the game] but look, what a player. Wait until that guy is fit, he is an exceptional footy player."
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As of early Thursday afternoon, Faletoi Peni had plans to watch Saturday’s Southland-Otago Stag Day fixture from the Rugby Park grandstand.
At that point, his next rugby assignment was supposed to be an outing for Southland B against Southland Country this coming Friday.
It all changed at the end of Stags training on Thursday though. Wing Michael Manson pulled his hamstring leaving the coaching staff pondering what to do.
“[Matt Saunders] come up to me after training and said congratulations mate. ‘I said for what?’ He said, ‘you’re going to be sitting on the bench’,” he told The Tribune.
Although Peni didn’t do a lot of sitting on the bench on Saturday.
Matt Whaanga injured his hamstring inside the first minute against Otago while making an important covering tackle. His day was over.
Enter Peni at second five-eighth - the little-known debutant who until a couple of weeks didn’t have an NPC contract.
He had made the move from Auckland to Southland on a four-week trial.
“I had no contract or nothing. I moved out of home, I’ve got a young two-year-old boy back at home [in Auckland] as well. It was such a massive sacrifice for me to come down here and put my job aside to have a crack.”
He previously had preseason stints with both Auckland at NPC level and Moana Pasifika in Super Rugby, although he hadn’t - until Saturday - been able to get a shot at playing at the next level.
“I was the player of the year in Auckland club rugby for two years in a row, but [Auckland] never gave me a chance to showcase what I have.
“Also, I was always out of shape. Back home I guess I was always too comfortable and I also didn’t have the right support and resources around me to help me get in condition.”
Peni still has some work to do around that conditioning to ensure he can compete for long periods in NPC games.
Although that aside, the Stags might have unearthed a star in the making given what he produced on Saturday in the 22-13 victory over Otago.
Peni carries the ball strongly, but it was some of his silky skills, both in passing and general play kicking, that indicated Southland has unveiled someone with a bit of X-factor.
It included a nice crosskick, when the Stags were hot on attack, to set up wing Viliami Fine to score.
One of those that was impressed with what they saw from Peni in his NPC debut on Saturday was Stags coach Matt Saunders.
“How good is he? He didn’t last [the game] but look, what a player. Wait until that guy is fit, he is an exceptional footy player,” Saunders said.
“The courage to have that cross-kick when we were on their line, not many people do that under that sort of pressure.”
Peni’s four-week trial has now been extended to a contract for the remainder of the season.
Beyond the 2024 NPC campaign, Peni isn’t sure what will happen. There were many people from various Southland rugby clubs queuing up soon after Saturday’s game trying to convince him that he should join their club in 2025.
It appears Peni has quickly won over the Southland rugby community.
The rookie Stag said he has already had some discussions with Saunders about next year, as to whether he would make a permanent move south.
“I said we’ll see how this season goes and see how I perform and then we can have that conversation later on, at the back end of the season,” Peni said.
With Manson expected to miss at least the next couple of games, and Whaanga also now sidelined, more NPC game time looms for Peni in the coming weeks.
His planned outing for Southland B on Friday night is likely to be replaced with a trip to Napier for a Ranfurly Shield showdown against Hawke’s Bay on Saturday.