@antipodean we've spent a long time wasting and poorly developing depth.

Harry Plummer, Otere Black and Fergus Burke all went overseas right on the cusp of National Selection. Probably in part because they didn't see a realistic pathway to game time.

Brett Cameron and Stephen Perfoeta should absolutely both have more caps than they do - if nothing else just to build depth. Josh Ioane if wasn't....well Josh Ioane should have too. Zarn Sullivan is intently talented and should be being developed into a long term 10/15 and yet can't even get game time at the Blues.

Bryn Gatland Mitch Hunt. Kaleb Trask. Rivez Reihana are/ were all solid Super rugby squad members. Maybe not starting first fives but not the sort of players we want to be losing. Hunt and Gatland are already gone, and I can't see a scenario where Trak and Reihana stay long term.

Highlanders invested in Freddie Burns and Rhys Patchell. While both were solid players (more so Patchell than Burns) I strongly feel any one of the above first fives would have been a better fit for the team than looking overseas.

Then the young generation - Aidan Morgan, AJ Falefaga, Cam Millar and Taine Robinson all seem to be young players thrown to the wolves too early for one reason or another.

In fact of Harry Godfry Lucas Cashmore, Taha Kemara and Josh Jacomb only two of the four have looked consistently comfortable at super rugby level and all needed to be developed more than they were before shoved into starting roles. (Cashmore probably an outlier here as he hasn't seen that much gametime).

Looking past 2027 I fear for our future. I can' see Perofeta sticking around if he gets limited game time which seems likely. I like the look of Jacomb but feel he might need another season. I fear they'll rush him into the team at the expense of Perofeta.

So come 2028 who do we have? Damian Mckenzie and possibly Josh Jacomb. Maybe Ruben love if he get's developed as a 10. An injury to Damian Mckeznie and we have a serious problem.

The Silver Fern

handa457