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Fissler Confidential: Bath hunt All Black as Sarries lose another 10
Bath are in the hunt to sign Montpellier’s former All Blacks winger George Bridge, who is also attracting interest from Gallagher Premiership champions Saracens.
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The 28-year-old from Gisborne, who scored 12 tries in 19 appearances for New Zealand, has had a meeting with Bath officials and knows Elliott Stooke well from his time in Montpellier.
Bridge can also play full-back and scored 37 tries in 82 Super Rugby games for the Crusaders before moving to France in 2022. He is one of several players Montpellier are willing to let leave in a clear-out.
Part of the All Blacks’ 2019 Rugby World Cup semi-final defeat to England, Bridge has made 11 appearances this season and touched down twice against the Ospreys in the Challenge Cup in December.
Saracens are sniffing around the highly rated Newcastle Falcons fly-half Louie Johnson, with Manu Vunipola set to follow Owen Farrell out of the North London club this summer.
The Carlisle-born 20-year-old, who was educated at Sedbergh and has played for England U20s, can also play full-back and inside centre. He has made 12 appearances for the Falcons this season and scored one try.
The Newcastle senior academy graduate, who made his debut in the Premiership Cup defeat to Northampton in March 2022, extended his contract for a season last April.
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He is now on Saracens’ radar and a departure would be another blow for the Premiership’s basement club, who are already losing Guy Pepper to rivals Bath this summer.
Ulster are set to sign Olympic sevens bronze medalist Werner Kok when his £160,000-a-year contract with United Rugby Championship rivals the Sharks runs out at the end of the season.
The 31-year-old made over 280 sevens appearances for South Africa and won bronze at the Rio Olympics in 2016, two years after winning gold at the Commonwealth Games in Glasgow.
The winger and outside centre, who has played 15s since 2020, has scored five tries in 12 appearances for the Durban-based Sharks this season. He has played for Western Province and Toulouse.
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England and Lions hooker Luke Cowan-Dickie has agreed to a one-year deal to remain with Premiership title hopefuls Sale Sharks next season.
Alex Sanderson wants him to be the heartbeat of the Sharks front row in 2024/25 after he had two French clubs, Montpellier and Lyon, pull the plug on moves in under a year.
The Truro-born 30-year-old missed the World Cup earlier in the season with a shoulder injury and was injured against La Rochelle in the Champions Cup, causing Lyon to opt out of a move.
Cowan-Dickie has made nine appearances and scored two tries for the Sharks after arriving on a one-year deal last July after playing 154 games for Exeter Chiefs, where he won Premiership and European Cup titles.
Ulster and Ireland inside centre Stuart McCloskey is still thinking about a potential switch from Ravenhill to Bayonne next season after having talks with the Top 14 outfit.
The Bangor-born 31-year-old is due to be under contract to Ulster next season, but bosses desperately need to slash the wage bill at the club to cover losses from last season.
Sources have claimed it would be a massive wrench for Ulster’s player of the year in 2016, who has twice been named in the URC dream team, to leave Ireland and move to France.
Jonny May will have to accept a significant pay cut if he wants to extend his Gloucester career beyond his contract running out at the end of the season.
RugbyPass reported this week that the Cherry and Whites are already weighing up a move for former England international Christian Wade to replace Louis Rees-Zammit, who left the club for the NFL.
May, who turns 34 on April 1, is the sixth-highest try scorer in Premiership history. He started his career with Gloucester in 2009 before spending three years with Leicester Tigers. He returned to Kingsholm in 2020.
The winger, whose 36 international tries put him second on England’s all-time list, announced his Test-level retirement last October and is known to have met with Saracens, who are looking to sign a winger.
Magnus Bradbury is closing in on a return to his former club Edinburgh when his contract with Bristol Bears runs out at the end of the season.
The 28-year-old Glasgow-born back row moved to Ashton Gate in 2002 after making 117 appearances and scoring 15 tries for Edinburgh, but he is unhappy with the deal that they have offered him to stay.
Fissler Confidential understands that talks between the Scotland international, who has played 16 games and scored six tries at No8 for the Bears this season, and Edinburgh have gone well and a deal is close.
Saracens have beaten both Sale and Leicester in the race to land highly-rated former Wasps centre Sam Spink from Super Rugby outfit Western Force.
Spink, who moved to Perth when the former Premiership giants went out of business in October 2022, has started both of the Western Force’s Super Rugby Pacific defeats this season to the Hurricanes and the Rebels.
The 24-year-old, who made 28 appearances for Wasps, could be the answer to England’s problems at outside centre. He would be available for the summer tour of New Zealand after putting pen to paper at Saracens.
Wellington College-educated Spink has become a key player for the Western Force and was a leading target for both the Sharks and Tigers before opting for North London.
Comments on RugbyPass
“Cortez Ratima is light years ahead of anyone on current form, while TJ Perenara has also skyrocketed into contention following the unfortunate injury to the talented Cam Roigard.” At last some sanity. Hitherto so many pundits have been wittering on about Finlay Christie to the point one wondered if they were observing a FC in a parallel universe where the FC they saw wasnt just the mediocre Shayne Philpott project of Fosters hapless AB reign in the real world. Ratima, Perenara and Fakatava are the ONLY logical 9s for Razor now Roigard is crocked.
2 Go to commentsThis game was just as painful as the Hurricanes game. It was real fork-in-the-eye stuff.
2 Go to commentsNow if they could just fire the Crusaders ground PA guy who likes to play his dance music and just loves the sound of his own voice the entire game, even when play is going on. And I thought their brass band thing of a few years ago was bad.
5 Go to commentsUnfortunately when you lose by far the two form players this season in Roigard and Aumua, you're left replacing two game changing Tanks with a couple of pea-shooters. Which is also about the speed of TJs pass.
2 Go to commentsBit rich coming from the guy with zero loyalty to anyone or any team, including happily taking a players place in a league world cup squad because well, SBW wanted to play in it and thus an already named player got told he was no longer going. And airing stuff like this, which may or may not be true, doesn't exactly say you're a stand up guy either SBW. Just looking to keep his name in lights as usual.
37 Go to commentsTamati Tua. …the Taniwha NPC midfielder. Ollie Sapsford, Hawkes Bay NPC midfielder…doing well
2 Go to commentsFiji deserve to be in the rugby championship, fans love seeing the Fijian national team play, the Fijian Drua is a wonderful idea but the players can still be stolen to play for NZ and AUS…
1 Go to commentsThe first concern for this afternoon are wheather forecast…
1 Go to commentsWhy cant I watch Rugby games please?
1 Go to commentsBeautiful shot from Finau, end of story. Gutted for Shaun Stevenson though.
4 Go to commentsThe Chiefs definitely didn’t win ugly. They had the superior scrum, a dominant lineout, and their defence was excellent once the Waratahs scored their two tries (thanks to some lucky refereeing calls mind you). They put pressure on the Waratahs lineout throughout the game, and the mind boggles as to why the referee did not award a yellow card or a penalty try against the Waratahs for repeated scrum infringements on their own try line before Narawa’s first try. And the Chiefs were slick with their passing and running angles on attack. It was a dominant performance all round, even with many questionable refereeing decisions.
1 Go to commentsWasnt late. Ref 2 assistants andTMO all saw it so who are you to say it was?
4 Go to commentsAre the Brumbies playing the Blues twice in a row?
4 Go to commentsBig difference from the Saders. Forwards really muscled up and laid a solid platform. Scooter brought some steel and I liked the loosie combination. Newell has been rather disappointing this season but stepped up big time - happy also to see Franks dot down. He should do that more often! Reihana had a good game and there seems to be more flair and invention with him in the saddle. McNicoll plays well from the back and is reliable plus inventive when he joins the line. Keep it up chaps!
5 Go to comments🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
33 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
4 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusaders , you can keep going.
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