The Wellington Hurricanes will adhere to their clinically efficient game plan and not allow the death of Jerry Collins or impending departure of three stalwarts to form an emotional barrier as they seek to end 20 years of frustration on Saturday.
The Hurricanes host an improving Otago Highlanders outfit on Saturday in the first all-New Zealand Super Rugby final since the “Fog Final” in 2006, when the Wellington-based side lost to the Canterbury Crusaders.
Unable to match that potential in an inconsistent period since, Chris Boyd’s side have this season shaken off the tag as a team with a million dollar backline but lacking steel, particularly when put under pressure.
That ability to handle stressful situations was no more evident than in the last month, following the June 5 death of former loose forward Collins in a car crash in France.
The team found out about Collins’ demise an hour before their regular season clash with the Highlanders in Napier and proceeded to post a 56-20 thrashing of the visitors.
They then beat the Waikato Chiefs in their season finale in an away game in their former feeder province of Taranaki and also looked utterly clinical in their 29-9 victory over the ACT Brumbies in the semi-final last week.
Hurricanes stalwarts Conrad Smith, Ma’a Nonu and Jeremy Thrush are among six players leaving the team after the final and while the side were aware of the significance of hosting their first final at a sold-out Wellington Regional Stadium, sentimentality will have no role to play in the match.
“There is no emotional button in this game,” Boyd told reporters on Thursday. “We need to keep clear minds and to stick to a process,” he added of the approach that has served them so well this season.
“How could the emotion not take care of itself when there are 35,000 people at the Cake Tin and it’s game on?”
The Highlanders, who were beaten by the Crusaders in their only other appearance in the final in 1999, have also exceeded pre-season expectations just by making the final.
The Dunedin-based side have been cobbled together by cast-offs, other side’s second stringers or in the case of All Blacks Malakai Fekitoa and Waisake Naholo, players who were simply discarded before they had a chance to prove their credentials.
That mentality has helped galvanise the team, something which the coaches looked for when they recruited their squad.
“We select people on character and hard work and that’s what you’ve seen from this side this year,” assistant coach Scott McLeod told Reuters.
The Highlanders may have been beaten twice by the Hurricanes this season but easily dispatched the two-time champions Chiefs and last year’s winners NSW Waratahs in the play-offs and were not being taken lightly.
“They are worthy finalists,” Boyd said.
“From the last time we played them they have secured top-six with victory over the Blues and beaten the Chiefs and Waratahs.
“In my mind that makes them completely worthy finalists.”
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