1
Son of sevens legend and current Highlanders fullback key names in New Zealand national sevens selections
Northland’s Brady Rush, son of All Blacks Sevens legend Eric Rush, is set to follow in his father’s footsteps, joining the All Blacks Sevens squad as a contracted player in 2021.
ADVERTISEMENT
Rush, along with North Harbour’s Moses Leo and Waikato’s Manaia Nuku are the newcomers to the All Blacks Sevens and Black Ferns Sevens squads, six months out from the Tokyo Olympics.
All three players impressed at December’s Red Bull Ignite7, Rush was named tournament MVP, Leo picked up the Players’ Player of the Tournament while Nuku was also nominated for the Players’ Player award.
Black Ferns Sevens Coaches Allan Bunting and Cory Sweeney bring Nuku into an established squad, with 20 of 21 players having international experience.
Nuku had an impressive 2020, the Hamilton Girls’ High School student made her Farah Palmer Cup debut for Waikato and captained the New Zealand Condor Schools sevens team at the World School Sevens in December. She replaces Kayla Ahki in the squad, who returned to France to be with her family last year.
She also joins Shiray Kaka, Tenika Willison, Terina Te Tamaki and Jazmin Hotham as Hamilton Girls’ High School alumni in the national team, making up a quarter of the full squad.
“Manaia is a smart young player with exciting talent. She has great instinct and a strong skill set so we are really looking forward to seeing her grow in our team,” said Sweeney.
ADVERTISEMENT
All Blacks Sevens Coach Clark Laidlaw said Rush and Leo have the potential to be sevens specialists going forward.
“Brady comes from good pedigree of course; he is relaxed off the field but has a competitive edge on the field. Moses has real resilience; he has gone through some tough years with injuries, but he is a dynamic attacking player. They are both great men and have fit in straight away.”
Rush, made his Mitre 10 Cup debut for Northland in 2020 against Otago, while Moses Leo was involved in the North Harbour wider squad last season. They replace Jacob Ratumaituvuki-Kneepkens who has signed with the Blues and Joe Ravouvou who took a contract in France last year.
Vilimoni Koroi has joined the squad from the Highlanders, the inclusion of Super Rugby players from other clubs will be finalised and announced in coming months.
ADVERTISEMENT
Beauden may be overseas but there's still a Barrett sitting atop the rankings in the first in a series on the best players per position who are set to play #SuperRugby this year.https://t.co/q5PpkczISU
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) January 21, 2021
The All Blacks Sevens and Black Ferns Sevens are both training for their first competitions of the year, held in Tauranga next month.
The All Blacks Sevens will play a series of matches against Tonga and the Black Ferns Sevens team will play internal matches. Plans are underway for an Oceania tournament before the World Series events currently scheduled for London and Paris in May/June.
All Blacks Sevens squad
Kurt Baker (Hawke’s Bay)
Dylan Collier (Waikato)
Scott Curry (Bay of Plenty)
Sam Dickson (Bay of Plenty)
Trael Joass (Bay of Plenty)
Andrew Knewstubb (Canterbury)
Vilimoni Koroi (Otago)
Moses Leo (North Harbour)
Ngarohi McGarvey-Black (North Harbour)
Tim Mikkelson (Waikato)
Sione Molia (Counties Manukau)
Tone Ng Shiu (Auckland)
Amanaki Nicole (Southland)
Akuila Rokolisoa (Counties Manukau)
Brady Rush (Northland)
Ollie Sapsford (Hawke’s Bay)
Kitiona Vai (Auckland)
William Warbrick (Bay of Plenty)
Regan Ware (Bay of Plenty)
Joe Webber (Bay of Plenty)
Black Ferns Sevens squad
Shakira Baker (Waikato)
Michaela Blyde (Bay of Plenty)
Kelly Brazier (Bay of Plenty)
Gayle Broughton (Taranaki)
Dhys Faleafaga (Wellington)
Theresa Fitzpatrick (Auckland)
Stacey Fluhler (Waikato)
Sarah Hirini (Manawatu)
Jazmin Hotham (Waikato)
Shiray Kaka (Waikato)
Tyla Nathan-Wong (Northland)
Manaia Nuku (Waikato)
Mahina Paul (Bay of Plenty)
Risaleeana Pouri-Lane (Bay of Plenty)
Cheyelle Robins-Reti (Waikato)
Alena Saili (Bay of Plenty)
Terina Te Tamaki (Waikato)
Ruby Tui (Counties Manukau)
Niall Williams (Auckland)
Tenika Willison (Waikato)
Portia Woodman (Northland)
– New Zealand Rugby
Comments on RugbyPass
While Iose is destructive in the Canes set-up, he is not big for an international 8 and could struggle against the top teams. With his speed, he could be developed into a seven but, as Ben points out, he doesn’t show a scavenging game with the Canes or make dominating tackles. Sotutu has shown a step up this year and attitude plus motivation seems to be the big areas of growth. Deserves another AB shot imo.
3 Go to commentsNaholo is my only question mark for this side. He wasn’t the only one who had a forgettable game against the Brumbies but he was passive, defensively poor and generally lacked energy. Needs to get a whole lot busier for me. I would have liked to see Sullivan on that wing with Higgins on the bench (if staying with a 6-2 as BeegMike points out on here!)
3 Go to commentsWell, I am sure that Eben said exactly what he meant to say, exactly how he meant to say it. Does he strike you as a man that doesn't know arrogance when he sees it. He should know it because he has shaken the arrogance out of many foes before.
128 Go to commentsPls get it into your thick arrogant heads that the final was played by two Southern Hemisphere teams. The best against the best and that Argentina was just unlucky otherwise non of the Northetn Hemisphere teams would have seen the light of day.
128 Go to commentsAs long as New Zealand youth are involved in sport they are passionate for, and are well supported, it’s all good. I love league as well as rugby. NRL clubs have long since scouted the First 15 competitions, the NH and Japan scout super rugby and NPC. It’s a miracle there’s any players left for the all blacks to pick from.
4 Go to commentsI'm a Bok fan, so I don't say this lightly, but he is one of my all time favourite players. I am really going to miss watching him play. Thanks for many great memories. You are a true legend of the game.
3 Go to commentsBest way to deal with all of this is to play another game.
128 Go to commentsIt’s 12-15 games Luke. Ringrose has barely played in 2024 and Henshaw and Keenan have also been out for spells in the same time period. There are always injuries and for younger players to play with the likes of Barrett will be great for them. It’s just looking for negatives where there are none.
5 Go to commentsAndy Goode pushing his own agenda with very dubious considerations on refereeing performances. Luke Pearce speaking a bit of French doesn’t make him a good and adequate referee for the Champions Cup final; his latest refereeing performance in particular was not so great.
4 Go to commentsJordie knows that he has to earn the right to put on the jersey, whatever that jersey might be.
5 Go to commentsThe best outside centre in the world at one point. He will be greatly missed.
3 Go to commentsYip his great for the big moments when needed as a safa really enjoy watching him
4 Go to commentsOne that will start to come up from now on is penalties for back pushes during kick chase scrambles. Very difficult to detect. In Croke Park if you replay the Hendy NH try, you will see Furbank push Porter in the back, who collides with Larmour knocking the ball across into Hendy’s path to dot down. A more significant example was in the RWC QTR final where Arendse pushes Fickou into two other French players for the ball to spill into Arendse’s path for him to gather and run in to score SAs first try. Not cheating if you are not caught and very difficult to spot but with kicking becoming so critical I feel its an area that will referreeed/TMO-ed more.
4 Go to commentsWhat a pathetic little twit Andy Goode is, as if we care what he thinks…..😂
128 Go to commentsFoxy has been a wonderful player for the Scarlets and Wales.
3 Go to commentsNika the Georgian is the best referee in the world at the moment. Luckily we will be spared the shite SH refs and Barnes will hopefully remain retired given how shite and embarrassing he was at the RWC.
4 Go to commentsThis is the most exciting game of the summer imo, as we really won’t know in advance how both teams are going to play. - Will Robertson just reproduce his Crusaders tactics from last year, or will there be a conscious effort to borrow from the Hurricanes and Blues, and from the aspects of the ABs world cup strategy that worked well? - England under Borthwick have put in some good performances playing attacking rugby, and some good performances playing kick-oriented defensive rugby. Will Borthwick try to merge them together into a single all-court game, or will he continue switching between different approaches depending on the strengths and weaknesses of the opposition?
1 Go to commentsI’m predicting an aggregate points difference of no more than +/-10pts across both matches this series.
1 Go to commentsI’m predicting an aggregate points difference of no more than +/-10pts across both matches this series.
9 Go to commentsFinals are always tense affairs for the players so I do not expect this to be a spectacle of running rugby unfortunately.
4 Go to comments