Greeting each other at the Dunedin International Airport
yesterday are (from left) Jason Macdonald, Willow Macdonald
and daughter Juno (six months), Chris King and daughter
Chloe (11 months) with Wendy Moon (back to the camera) and
Emma King. Photo by Peter McIntosh.
It was a long return journey for the Highlanders but
vice-captain Jamie Mackintosh says they are excited to be home
and now need to focus on getting some payback against the
Sharks.
Mackintosh was part of a weary Highlanders squad which
arrived at Dunedin International Airport yesterday morning
after a long trip back from South Africa.
The team left Johannesburg at 6pm on Sunday night, and had a
14-hour flight to Sydney.
They then had a four-hour wait in Sydney before flying to
Auckland and arriving in the Queen City about 12.30am
yesterday.
The squad then got up at 5am to get from its Auckland hotel
to the airport to travel to Dunedin, where it arrived just
after 9am.
Mackintosh said it was a tough tour but felt they had come
away with something from their three matches in South Africa.
The side had beaten the Cheetahs 31-24 at Bloemfontein, then
lost 33-0 to the Stormers in Cape Town, before rounding off
the tour with a 50-35 loss to the table-topping Bulls in
Pretoria last Sunday.
"We obviously would have wanted to win all three games.
"But we had a debrief on Sunday and said not many teams are
going to come away from Africa with five points.
"Then when you look at what the Stormers did to the
Hurricanes.
"I don't know whether it gives you some sort of satisfaction
but it shows how good a side they are.
"Then when you look at who we have played - the Blues,
Crusaders, Stormers and Bulls.
"They are four of the top sides who are going to be right up
there in the competition and we've played them all in the
first five rounds.
"The guys are excited to be home and it's like we are now
starting the second lap of the competition."
Next up for the side is a match against the Sharks at
Carisbrook on Saturday night.
The Sharks are spending a few days in Queenstown before
travelling to Dunedin tomorrow.
Mackintosh said the side is treating the next few games as
absolute must-wins, starting with the Sharks.
"They have had four or five close losses so will be really
keen for a win.
"But the boys are pretty excited about it and want to pay the
Sharks back for last year.
"They gave us a bit of a tickle up in the front row last year
and we as a forward pack want to pay back for that."
Mackintosh said the incident around loose forward Adam
Thomson and inside back Michael Hobbs not being selected for
the Bulls game because of missing a curfew after the Stormers
match did not have a big impact on the game.
"It was nothing like drinking too much or that.
"The guys just broke team protocol.
"A rule had been broken which was set by the senior players."
Thomson and Hobbs returned home a day earlier than the rest
of the squad.
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