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Old 11-24-2015, 12:19 AM   #2
Party Elephant
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Hey Locke, glad you started this thread. Might I suggest supporting my Highlanders? They are kind of the plucky little guy team in NZ rugby, and are just coming off their first championship, a remarkable turnaround after being last place with only two wins just two seasons prior. The current squad features All Blacks Aaron Smith, Ben Smith, Malakai Fekitoa, Waisake Naholo, and Lima Sopoaga. Sopoaga wasn't on the world cup squad, having just earned his first international cap this year against South Africa, but he will be one to watch in the future. He was instrumental in their championship win as his kicking was lights out all season. He also scored 12 points in his first test match. In my opinion (and most Highlanders fans') he should have been selected over Colin Slade, but you can't really fault the selections too much when you win the world cup. The squad also features Japan's Fumiaki Tanaka, the first Japanese player in Super Rugby.

I say they are the plucky little guy team because Dunedin, where they play most of their home games, is a small city of just over 100 000 in the far south, far removed from the civilised world. Invercargill, which gets one token match per season, is even smaller and farther removed. Being from North America it's hard to fathom a city/region that small having a top flight professional sports team! You might remember their main home stadium, Forsyth Barr Stadium, from the Flames arena/stadium thread as some posters here mentioned it as a comparable to the CalgaryNext fieldhouse. It was built for the 2011 world cup and is the source of regular criticism in my region still to this day, and probably for many years to come. Dunedin is a fairly old and run down city with plenty of economic struggles so naturally a brand new stadium with lots of public money poured into it was very controversial.

Anyways, the season starts in February, so a bit of a wait. At that time of year NZ and Calgary are only four hours apart (plus a day) so if you don't mind staying up late you can catch plenty of games which are only played on the weekend. Of course with Super Rugby games are all over the place so when teams are doing their South Africa tour they're on at mid-morning.

Looking forward to talking rugby in here!

Last edited by Party Elephant; 11-24-2015 at 12:24 AM. Reason: forgot to add Naholo
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