
The festive season is over, and the holiday season will soon be too. It’s back to the grind for many, but for others it means it’s all downhill to another rugby season filled with excitement and drama, mystery and intrigue.
We’ve put together some themes and topics to ponder over before the 2025 season kicks off, in no order.
This is part one of two – looking at professional, corporate and international rugby. Part two to follow which will focus on club, college and community rugby (and be more comprehensive).
HURRICANES IN THE COMMUNITY
For readers of this website, perhaps the most anticipated match for the Hurricanes this year is the pre-season match against the Blues on 7 February. This game is being played at William Jones Park, Wainuiomata, and promises to be a big afternoon. It will be interesting how they work this logistically, if and where on the ground they put temporary stands up or whether they go for a boutique crowd of a few hundred (to keep recently exploding health and safety costs down too). Then it’s on to the first match of the competition the following week against the Crusaders away and then against the popular Drua in Napier in their first home match on 22 February.
Further Talk of the team’s composition to come, but one position in the spotlight is first five, with both Brett Cameron (knee) and Ruben Love (ankle) out of action for a while, which means that out-of-franchise recruits Lucas Cashmore and Riley Hohepa will probably be the first fives to start with. Or Harry Godfrey, who celebrates his 22nd birthday this week, but is predominantly a fullback for Hawke’s Bay. Training partner Callum Harkin is in the mix too. One positive in the inside backs is the return of Cam Roigard.
Ruben Love signs jerseys after last year’s pre-season fixture against Moana Pasifika.
HURRICANES POUA
The only way it up for the Hurricanes Poua, whose campaign last season will be remembered for criticism around their pre-game haka not their performances on the field.
The first three Super Rugby Aupiki seasons have seen three different winners, but the Pou haven’t been one of these. They open their season on 1 March against the Blues at Wellington. This is the first of six round-robin matches leading up to the final on 12 April. Their other two matches are in Wellington and at the NZCIS in Upper Hutt. Why is that? Being a regional team, there are a number of venues in the lower North Island they could have played at that are not in Wellington and are more fan friendly. The NZCIS might have state-of-the-art facilities for the players, but it is essentially soulless for the fans.
Captain Jackie Patea-Fereti leads the Poua out on to the field last year, in a 36-29 win at Wellington Stadium.
SUPER RUGBY TOO LONG?
Would Super Rugby benefit from having a shorter season? This from the Super Rugby draw media release back in September:
“With 77 round robin matches across an extended 16-round regular season, all culminating in a six-team Finals Series, fans can begin preparing for what promises to be the most exciting season of DHL Super Rugby Pacific yet.”
Remember, there are only 11 teams in the competition this year!
Will this increase the competition’s popularity? Would a much shorter, snappier competition be a better way to go to reinvigorate Super Rugby? Then a North-South series or All Blacks trials series to increase games for the top players?
American Sports have these issues, with NFL crowds for regular season matches down and NBA basketball waning with viewership down 48 percent since 2012 and similar reasons cited such as too many games and too much familiarity about the match-ups, overpaid players going through the motions and missing games and politics coming into the game.
Perhaps organisers have stepped out of their bubble and had a moment of clarity as one positive is the recent announcement of a “soon to be launched official Super Rugby Pacific Fantasy (SRPF) game.”
SRPF will launch in mid-January, allowing fans to build virtual teams composed of real-life athletes, whose on-field performance will translate into fantasy points across a variety of categories, including tries scored, tackles and line breaks, to name a few.
Trytime for the Hurricanes in last year’s 47-20 quarter-final win over the now defunct Rebels.
NEW COACH FOR LIONS
Who will replace ‘one and done’ Alando Soakai as Wellington Lions head coach? With vast experience in Japan, Soakai was an outsider who brought a new and successful perspective. Before that Leo Crowley and Tamati Ellison were promoted internally. Do incumbents Ryan Piper, Trent Renata and Greg Halford have the necessary chops for the head position, or who is not involved best suited to the role? Is Richard Watt off contract with Bay of Plenty?
Likewise, the Manawatū Turbos will be appointing a new coach, with their coach of the past two seasons Mike Rogers having left. In fact, he announced that he would be stepping down for family reasons before the 2024 NPC started.
Julian Savea scores for the Lions in the 23-20 2024 NPC final win over Bay of Plenty.
THE OTHER LIONS COMING DOWN UNDER
The British and Irish Lions are touring Australia this year, which is sure to generate much interest over here as well.
One big question will be will Wales contribute a single player to their squad? With 12 consecutive defeats and a first season without a single victory since 1937 it’s clear Wales are in disarray. When the BBC named a potential British Lions XV based on empirical data after the Autumn internationals, not one Welsh player was included. There were seven Scotsman and four English and Irish selections. Welsh captain and openside Jack Morgan might have an outside chance of being picked.
Plenty of green shoots with the Wallabies in 2024, so can they take the Lions in 2025?
WELLINGTON PRIDE TO IMPROVE?
In the past two seasons, the Wellington Pride has conceded 50-plus points in a game four times – something that only happened three times between 1990 and 2022. This year will be the third consecutive season that the Pride will spend in the Championship division. Yes, they were up against Manawatu last year, who clearly should have been in the Premiership if not for losing to Northland, but for Wellington still a poor state of affairs.
Monica Tagoai crosses for the Pride last year against Manawatu, a bright moment in a 58-24 at Porirua Park.
BLACK FERNS SEVEN TO FIFTEENS
When the Black Ferns won the Rugby World Cup in 2022 five Black Ferns Sevens players combined to score 21 of the 43 tries. Which Sevens players will make the jump across to fifteens in 2025? Does Sarah Hirini (16 wins in 17 Tests) have another World Cup campaign in her? What would Jorja Miller add to a crowded loose-forward cohort? Theresa Stefano is 18-0 as a Black Fern. Could Risi Pouri Lane cover halfback where the Black Ferns lack experience? Who will be left in the Black Ferns Sevens should there be a brief mass exodus to fifteens? Kelsey Teneti and Maina Nuku have looked very promising at the start of SVNS 2024/25.
ALL BLACKS -SPRINGBOKS AT EDEN PARK
When the All Blacks put their 50-game unbeaten streak on the line at Eden Park against world champions South Africa later this year will it be as explosive as the last clash between the countries at Eden Park? In a 2013 encounter fullback Ben Smith was Man of the Match in an All Blacks 29-15 win, a match in which Kieran Read scored two tries, Brodie Retallick a dramatic try sprinting 25 metres, and hooker Bismarck Du Plessis (79 tests, 54 wins) was wrongly sent off by French referee Romain Poite after scoring one of his 11 Test tries. In the 42nd minute, Du Plessis was given a second yellow card for leading with his elbow while being tackled by Liam Messam. However, the match officials acknowledged that they made a mistake in applying the law when he was yellow carded in the first half for a tackle on Daniel Carter that was within the laws of the game. New Zealand eventually lost Read and Ma’a Nonu to the sin-bin in the final 10 minutes.
NEW ZEALAND RUGBY AWARDS CATEGORIES
Should the NZRU look at splitting up the supreme Kelvin R Tremain Memorial Player of the Year, Tom French Tom French Memorial Māori Player of the Year and Age Grade Player of the Year awards by gender and creating new standalone supreme, Māori and Age Grade awards for women’s rugby?
Few would dispute that Jorja Miller is a worthy winner of the supreme award, the fourth female to win this after Kendra Cocksedge in 2018, Sarah Hirini in 2021 and Ruahei Demant in 2022. Indeed, Miller was a clear Top 4 tournament MVP when we first saw her in 2019 as a year 11 openside flanker, and we subsequently did a story with her on College Sport Media at https://www.collegesportmedia.co.nz/rugby-union/bright-future-in-rugby-for-jorja-miller But perhaps this award could be split into men’s and women’s categories.
Similarly, the Māori award nominees this year were Risi Pouri-Lane, Tamaiti Williams, Katelyn Vahaakolo and Tyrel Lomax (winner) and the Age Grade Player of the Year nominees were Vernon Bason, Oli Mathis, Elinor-Plum King and Xavi Taele (winner). Find another couple of nominees for each and there is scope to split these awards into two categories by gender.
Some random Predictions for 2025:
- The Wallabies to beat the British and Irish Lions in their series.
- The All Blacks to beat South Africa at Eden Park to extend their three-decade winning record there, but South Africa to retain the Rugby Championship and remain the team to beat in world rugby.
- The Blues to win Super Rugby again, but Auckland to underachieve again in the NPC. An Australian team, likely the Reds, to come good and push hard for the final.
- Richard Watt to return home and coach the Wellington Lions to a historic NPC title defence.
- Canada to make the 2025 Women’s World Cup Final and the Black Ferns to miss out.
- The All Blacks Sevens not to win a SVNS tournament this season.
- Wellington referee Jack Sargentina will get a Men’s NPC game.
- Du Plessis Kirifi will become an All Black in 2025.