Papali'i yes, but the jury is out on Plummer. He wouldn't be the first Auckland first-five to look good in his first year and then fall away badly.

I had a re-watch yesterday. Pari Pari Parkinson was the best player on the field. Great first half at the lineout and with ball in hand, excellent second half in defense. This guy is more powerful than his lean frame might let it think. Good games from Aumua, Havili, Strange and Makalio as well. Jordan was a bit disappointing but the game did not go his way. Canterbury had less individual brilliance (with the notable exceptions of Drummond and Bridge) but their collective play in the second half was just awsome.

Awesome work Counties. Auckland have a home semi.

@act-crusader with 3 months between the end of super rugby and the game against the boks surely there won’t be stand downs

Just finished watching. That wasn't too bad in the end. I'll echo what others have said about our young guys, as long as we keep them we should do pretty well going forward (maybe the Canes could help out by signing them to keep them in the region - would rather have had Renton come on for us than against us). Damn McClutchie has a touch of the Cruden about him, follow him around enough and he'll put you in gaps. Yellow Card had another decent run and actually held the ball in two hands on lots of occasions. With Buckley on the wing I don't know why Lowe wasn't used in the midfield. @number-10 I heard he got the pip with the HBRU (and how they treated him) when he was injured and has pretty much given the game away.

Tim said: Cracking up at the commentators talking up Canterbury's 3rd choice frontrow today. No one is intimidated by Daniel Lienert-Brown, Brodie McAlister, and Chris King. agree with 2/3 of this, I think McAlistair will turn into a very good player tho. Chris King has always been useless, huge backwards step to bring him back

@canes4life said in Cantebury vs Auckland: @kirwan So pretty much Fatialofa mark 2. Yeah, and would be ironic if we lost two good locks to the Canes. Or absolutely depressing.

There was a great passage of play last night. Canterbury mullered NH in a scrum pushing them back 5m at a rate of knots, but front rows didn't pop. Liava'a miraculously managed to extract the ball from the back and ran it from the base of his backwheeling scrum. Drummond tackled him with a text book tackle and slid down to his ankles. But Liava'a remained on his feet and bunny hopped for about 5m with Drummoned wrapped around his ankles.

@shark there’s plenty of locks around. Will Tucker was NZ20s this year. Antonio Shalfoon is a great prospect at Lincoln. Was injured all year , but killing it now for Canterbury maoris. Don’t know if their FABs though.

It sounds like Canterbury is stunting his development as a player and he should be immediately returned to the Magpies to play out the rest of the season.

Good, albeit scrappy win to get our season going. Phew. They have some holes, but Wellington are a good NPC side and with the cattle missing from 2017, we just needed to get this W no matter how. Away to BOP this week which will be interesting. If Ennor is out, there will be a massive vacancy in this side which we just can't fill adequately with the erosion to our depth since last year. Man for man we should still clean them up, but that'd be what Taranaki fans thought too. At least our guys don't have to travel to that dump Rotorua.

Salmon is a lock for backup tighthead at the Blues?

@bovidae said in Game of 3 halves: All Blacks v Canterbury v Otago: @chris-b Part of the reason for the dropping of Rokocoko and Sivivatu was their vulnerability under the high ball, which was the main SA tactic in 2009-2011. That was more relevant to Rok than Sivi and led to the emergence of Jane, Dagg and then Kahui being selected as a winger at the RWC. His omission can't have been due to any off-field problems either, given the story about Zac in Aust immediately before the RWC. So I can only assume it was because Sivivatu had signalled he was going to France later that year and coin flip didn't go in his favour. But wasn’t there some off field issues nonetheless that may have been a contributing factor?

@family-man said in Canterbury v Tasman - Mitre 10 Cup Premiership Final: @billy-tell said in Canterbury v Tasman - Mitre 10 Cup Premiership Final: Sopoaga will be having nightmares about Mo'unga. Breathing right down his neck for that backup 10 spot at the moment. Not suggesting he should be an AB, and probably doesn't have enough "x-factor" but a more hardworking loose forward than Luke Whitelock is hard to find. Correct whitelock has really impressed me and I personally think with kaino nearing the end whitelock and ioane are the next best 2 I hope he doesn't go overseas just yet. But him and Brad Shields must be attractive targets for overseas clubs. I'm not sure what else Whitelock could do TBH, other than find a bit of x-factor. I thought he was a bit of a donkey when he made that ABs wider training squad a few years back, but his last couple of seasons have been very good.

@rapido said in Canterbury vs. North Harbour: Watched highlights only. My takeaway is gee Hoeata is undisciplined. You seem surprised that a Hoeata is undisciplined ...

@booboo Plummer is 19, and yes, that's 2 Eden players in 2 years that have represented Auckland.

@shark said in Canterbury vs Taranaki (Ranfurly Shield): Some saw the funny side in the responses. I think everyone did!

@reprobate During the live interview with Smithy at end of first half, he responds to a question about the Canterbury attack with something like 'well, they're fucking good'

@act-crusader No doubt he was showing some irresistible form early doors, his form dropping off a cliff was rather disappointing. If he gets that back and is consistent then he won't be able to be ignored. Reminds me of Tom Marshall, just a tad more electric.

Concerning Fidow, this is good news as his scrummaging had always been suspect. He is a formidable player in the loose, very quick for such a big man and hard to stop. A future AB ?