Tana Umaga addresses the 'Ardie Savea-sized hole' at Moana Pasifika

Tana Umaga hopes to use Ardie Savea’s absence in the 2026 Moana Pasifika campaign as a galvanising force, laying down the challenge for all his players to step up and fill the massive hole the reigning Super Rugby Pacific MVP leaves in his wake.

The coach unveiled Savea’s successor as Moana Pasifika captain in Auckland on Tuesday, turning to one of Moana’s great success stories, Miracle Faiilagi, to make his mark with the captain’s armband.

The 26-year-old will lead the charge as the club navigates 2026 with their star All Black on sabbatical in Japan, and while he didn’t accept the role immediately, Faiilagi was said to be “adamant” about his readiness for the honour.

“We actually talked about it at the end of last season,” Umaga explained following training on Auckland’s North Shore. “Obviously, we knew that the talk would be about Ardie leaving and the hole that he’s left.

“But just watching the growth of Miracle over the last few years that I’ve known him, as well as watching him in Moana before I got here, I’ve just seen him grow and the respect that he’s gathered from those around him. He’s softly spoken, but he’s very knowledgeable about what he talks about.

“I broached the idea with him at the end of the season last year. It was a bit of a shock to him, but he went away and thought about it, and then when I rang him up before the season started and before we started preseason, he’d had a good talk about it, and we had a good talk about it, and he was adamant that he was ready for it. I was happy about that. It’s good for us.

“When we announced it to the team, it was a bit of a surprise to everyone, but it got the loudest cheer that I’ve heard for a long time. So, we believe we’ve got the right person with the right attributes, and we’ve got a lot of people around him that can support him.”

Faiilagi said he was thrilled to have had a year of “learning from the best” last season, and that he keeps in touch with Savea, who had advised him simply to be himself and stick to his faith. The new captain said he is ready to lead with his actions, as Savea proved so successful at doing in 2025.

Umaga, now in his fourth season as Moana Pasifika head coach, said he was quick to front-foot the discussion about Savea’s absence.

“There is an Ardie-sized hole, and we presented that at camp, a cutout of Ardie with him not in it, just to showcase how big that hole is,” the Test icon revealed with a grin.

“No one person can fill in what Ardie did for us last year and what his legacy is. So for us, it is a collective effort. We need everyone to step up to that hole that he’s left.

“We spoke about it at length; I didn’t want it to be the elephant in the room where everyone knows it, but no one wants to chat about it. So we did that right at the start of our first camp when we came together.

“We’ve had a group of young leaders step into that space with Miracle leading that, and that’s what we’ll need going forward. We’re pretty confident that these guys, with the work that they’ve done in the offseason, plus the learnings they’ve had from last season, are keen to compete here.

“All we can do is our best and make sure that we front every week, and hopefully the outcomes go our way.”