Tony Johnson's Super Rugby Pacific team to watch in 2026

Despite getting the wooden spoon in Super Rugby Pacific 2025, in patches the Highlanders played rugby worthy of a playoff spot, but often faded away late in games that meant they were left without the chocolates.

All Blacks XV head coach and current director of rugby at the Highlanders, Jamie Joseph, will be looking forward to making more inroads towards the playoffs in 2026.

Joseph has added former Kiwis head coach David Kidwell as his defence coach, after previous assistant Dave Dillon, moved on from the Highlanders.

Kidwell adds a lot of International coaching experience, including time with Argentina’s national team under Michael Cheika.

The Highlanders also have secured the signings of young up-and-coming stars in Mika Muliaina, Dylan Pledger, Josh Tengblad, and Stanley Solomon for the next couple of years.

Joseph and his coaching staff have also signed Josh Jacomb to their first-five stocks in 2027, joining Andrew Knewstubb and Cameron Millar as options in the playmaker role.

The Dunedin-based Super Rugby Pacific franchise have also lured 91-Test Argentinian lock Tomas Lavanini to the deep-south, to bolster their second-row stocks.

Current Sky Sports commentator and long-time rugby pundit Tony Johnson picks Joseph’s side as the team to watch for in 2026, even after a disappointing year in 2025.

“To me, the team I’m going to be most watching next year is the Highlanders, after the Otago NPC effort as well. They’ve got a couple of the most promising young players in the country, and we talked about them throughout the NPC,” Johnson told Martin Devlin on the DSPN Podcast in late December.

Johnson explains that with the Lavanini signing, it adds real power and punch to a forward pack that has struggled to compete in the past.

“But also we talked about the fact that there isn’t those big South African or Argentinian bodies. Well, they’ve got one in Lavanini.

“If you put Lavanini and Holland together and hope that they can stay on the field through good health and injury free, and not getting yellow carded or what have you.

“Then that gives them a massive engine room and helps them to a really terrific platform, and they have a very good coach as well.

“So I’m really looking forward to seeing how they go. I think they could be the team that could really get amongst the front runners next year, it’s always something to look forward to.”

At the New Zealand Rugby awards for 2025, Ardie Savea won All Blacks player of the year, but Johnson believes that Fabian Holland could have easily won the award too, for his impact in his debut year.

“At the start of the year, he was an All Black prospect. He was a prospect to be the rookie lock in the All Black team, and by the end of the year, he was a mainstay of the team,” the commentator said.

“You mentioned the lineouts, but also his ability to move bodies. He’s a big lad and the great thing is, he’s still young, and there’ll be things that they’ll look to add to his game.

“His tackle counts are phenomenal too, by the way, the work rate is there. And I think if they can get him to just carry the ball a little bit more, then, then you’ve really got a making of a great player on your hands.

“So just in terms of where he was at the start of the year, where he ended up at the end of the year, I think there’s a strong case for him.”