Sav's Sidelines: What role does club rugby play for the Stags?
Sav's Sidelines - the weekly column that looks at all things Southland rugby, from the grassroots to the professional game.
In this week’s Sav’s Sidelines column Logan Savory takes a look at the role that club rugby plays in putting a Stags squad together, and the challenges of working with a six-team premier club competition.
The column outlines the feel-good story attached to a new Stags signing and points to the one spot the Stags decision-makers still have to sort to complete its 2024 squad.
There’s also news of a potential injury returnee for the 2024 Galbraith Shield semifinal, and who remembers when Damian McKenzie lined up at the Les George Oval?
Rugby Southland director of rugby and Stags coach Matt Saunders says they will review the high-performance programme at the end of the year.
Of most interest will be a look at how they can increase the number of Stags that come out of club rugby and its high-performance group, which starts training in November.
There’s an eagerness for the number to rise, but Saunders concedes there aren’t any easy answers to making it happen.
The clear message remains, players who are viewed not up to NPC level won’t be picked for the sake of it.
When the 2024 Stags squad is officially named on July 15 there will probably be two new Stags who have forced their selection on the back of club rugby performances this year - as well as putting in the required off-field work as part of the high-performance group.
One will be lock Woody Kirkwood, a real feel-good story for Southland rugby. (More on that later in this column).
The other looks set to be young Pirates-Old Boys first five-eighth Kaea Nikora-Balloch, who was strong at the start of the club season before picking up an injury.
But few other players have been able to convince the Stags selectors they deserve a shot.
Star outside backs Cole Spinks and Hughan Sharp, along with hookers Jayden Henderson (Star), and Tupou Kaufongonga (Blues) are some of the leading club players who have been deemed not ready for NPC for various reasons.
Others also fall into that bracket.
It should be pointed out that the Stags have retained the bulk of their 2023 squad, so there weren’t a huge number of spots available for club players to snap up.
But we would all be burying our heads in the sand if we ignored the obvious. Propping up an NPC team with six premier club teams - some of which are struggling for player depth - provides challenges.
There appears to be some hesitation around assessing players based on what they do in Southland club rugby each Saturday.
Saunders himself doesn’t shy away from it.
“We try and pick as many (club players) as we can, but they have to be up to it. I don’t care what people say, we are not going to be able to pick our team fully out of our club comp, and no team does that.
“Auckland recruit players. North Harbour has pulled in Tane Edmud from the Waratahs. Morgy Mitchell had to go up and help Wellington last year.”
“Over the last 10 years we have been one of the bottom teams, but I think every [Southland] coach in that time has tried to pick anyone at club level that is up to it.
“I know there are people who think you don’t, but you want to pick as many [club players] as you can, but you’ve also got a job to do to win games.”
The 2024 Southland club competition hasn’t provided the number of high-pressure games as hoped. There have been too many lop-sided fixtures in 2024.
It has made it harder to get a gauge on some fringe players. Although Saunders said they do have other ways to help assess players.
“We’ve had two games this year at a higher level. And to be fair we judge a lot of what happens at [the high performance] training.
“We put them under more pressure than possibly they get in a game and see how quickly they learn. Some guys do play well in club rugby but if you can’t understand game plans and have simple catch-pass, then you see that all at trainings.
“So, there is a lot of judgment made at training.”
One of the two games Saunders mentioned was a trip to Dunedin during the week before King’s Birthday Weekend. A bunch of fringe Stags players lined up against a team made up of fringe Otago players.
Southland was beaten 48-10.
“Half the team walked off the game and realised they weren’t big enough, and physical enough. Physically the game has changed so much, even since I’ve played. You’ve got to be big and strong.”
“We are going to review our high-performance programme at the end of the season and see how we can get more coming through, because that is the goal.
“We would like our conversion rate [from the high-performance programme] to be better.”
It can be done; the feel-good story…
Twenty-five-year-old lock Woody Kirkwood has proved this season that a shot at NPC rugby with the Stags can come via Southland club rugby.
Kirkwood was Southland B player of the year last season, and during the offseason has done enough to convince the selectors that he warrants a shot at NPC level.
“He has made us pick him and it is a great story,” Matt Saunders said.
“He is a bit older, and he has come through the unconventional pathway. But we have to pick him because everything we’ve asked him to do, he’s done. We love it because we want that to happen, but guys need to make us pick them.”
Saunders said Kirkwood was an example of how tough it can be for fringe NPC players to juggle careers with what is required of them training wise.
The former North Otago player, on his way to earning a Stags contract, has carried out his gym commitments in the morning before taking on a full day on the building site.
After that, he heads to field trainings at night as well.
A lot do struggle to handle that and drop out of contention as a result.
“We ask a lot of these guys. Jayden Henderson is another example, he’s not far away. But he has to go to the gym every morning and then sit out in the Stadium Southland reception to work out his work for the day, then jumps in his Alliance truck. It’s the reality for someone like him, it’s bloody hard.
“That’s why someone like Woody has done so well, he goes to the gym and then goes onto the building site for 10 hours. It’s really impressive.
“It’s harder for them to make it than those that have already made it.”
Saunders said Southland rugby’s relationship with Ruru Specialist School had been important. A group of players in the high-performance programme have worked at the school as teacher aides, with the school hours making juggling work with the training a touch easier than those working in physically demanding trades.
Kirkwood will join the likes of Mitchell Dunshea, Josh Bekhuis, and Shneil Singh as locks in the 2024 Stags setup.
The final Stags spot…
It appears Stags coaches Matt Saunders and James Wilson have all but sorted its 2024 squad with just one spot to fill.
It’s understood the Stags still have their third halfback spot to sort to join Connor Collins and Jay Renton.
The third position will likely go to Liam Howley (Woodlands) or Lachlan Albert (Star) who clashed on Saturday in a Southland club rugby semifinal fixture.
Howley has previously played for the Stags and cruelly suffered a season-ending in game one of the No 1 season.
Albert - a one-game former Brumbies Super Rugby player - made the move from Australia to Southland this year to link with the Star club and have a shot at cracking New Zealand’s NPC competition with Southland.
Galbraith Shield final comeback?…
Young first five-eighth Kaea Nikora-Balloch is a chance to return from injury and line up for Pirates-Old Boys in Saturday’s Galbraith Shield final against Star at the Les George Oval.
Nikora-Balloch was one the form players in Southland club rugby during the early rounds of the 2024 competition.
However, in May, while training with Southland’s high-performance programme, Nikora-Balloch suffered a nasty quad injury which has ruled him out of rugby since.
Pirates-Old Boys coach Dayna Cunningham confirmed Nikora-Balloch is a possibility to return for Saturday’s Galbraith Shield final.
“He was doing a bit of running yesterday and I’m sure there will be a decision made on Wednesday or Thursday,” Cunningham said.
That decision will probably lay in the hands of the Stags medical staff rather than anyone else given Nikora-Balloch is set to be part of the 2024 NPC squad.
Nikora-Balloch will join Star’s Byron Smith and a yet-to-be-named third first five-eighth from outside the region as the three No 10s in the Southland squad.
If Nikora-Balloch is cleared to play in the club final it would be a surprise if Greg Dyer was shuffled from the first five-eighth position at this point in the season.
Nikora-Balloch would probably slot in somewhere else in the Pirates-Old Boys backline.
Blast from the past…
The Les Geroge Oval will on Saturday host the 2024 Galbraith Shield final. It’s been the venue of some pretty big rugby occasions over the years, including All Black Damian McKenzie’s Woodlands debut alongside brother Marty in 2022.
Let’s take a trip down memory lane with The Crowd Goes Wild story from that day.