Stephen Donald on one Kiwi side that 'won't be happy' after Super Round

Former All Blacks first-five Stephen Donald is of the opinion that one Super Rugby Pacific franchise will be far from pleased with their performance at Super Round in Christchurch.

The Anzac weekend round was held at the brand new One New Zealand Stadium in Christchurch, where over 70 thousand people flooded into the new venue for five games of round eleven action.

All Kiwi sides left Christchurch with victories, but the former World Cup-winning first-five isn’t so sure that all of them will be satisfied with the performance, leaving the result to one side.

The Chiefs overcame a powerful and attacking Fijian Drua side in the final clash of the weekend, despite not playing to their full potential under the roof and still sitting at the top of the table.

“Yeah. I don’t think the Chiefs would have been happy at all, lapses, moments that they lapsed, and there was a couple of times the Drua got back to a point where you thought things would go different,” Donald said on The Aftermatch podcast with Kirstie Stanway.

The current Sky Sport commentator and analyst was impressed with one player in particular, Canterbury-born fullback Isaac Hutchinson, who told RugbyPass post-match that the debut was an “awesome opportunity”.

“Really impressive debut from the young man. Hutchinson, he was outstanding under the high ball. I guess these days, any back three player that looks good into the high ball really catches your eye.

“Sinkinson, Carter, brilliant in the outside channels and obviously Quinn was just doing Quinn stuff, and Damian McKenzie and Cortez Ratima combining again, and are probably the forgotten pairing of Super Rugby.

“Damian’s always going to be Damian, but I think Cortez is starting to get back to that sharp play around the field.

“It’s just the speed of ball. Once they get that speed of ball, they’re rocking and rolling. So now I think they would be disappointed, though, with their performance.”

It’s safe to say Chiefs head coach Jono Gibbes won’t be getting carried away with the result, admitting to media post-match at Te Kaha that they were far from their best.

“It was a tough battle. We’re a bit flattered by the scoreboard. It didn’t fully reflect how tough each of those points were that we had to get,” Gibbes told reporters.

“We showed glimpses in there of real control, real accuracy, good intent, and then moments where we kind of just drifted out a little bit, a little bit untidy with the ball on the ground.”