Rugby: Assurance Highlanders spread around clubs

Allocating Highlanders to club rugby was a tricky task and players were spread around clubs as much as possible, administrators said yesterday.

With the Highlanders squad growing to 37, including the wider training squad, that means up to 14 players every week are not in the match squad.

Highlanders high performance manager Greg O'Brien said the players wanted to play rugby, and with the agreement of the Otago Rugby Football Union they played for various clubs.

That had led to up to a dozen Highlanders turning out in club rugby last week, and some big scores were racked up.

With Highlanders backs Jason Emery and Kurt Baker in the backline, Alhambra-Union had a big 74-10 win over a depleted Pirates side, while Southern, which had lock Tom Franklin and halfback Frae Wilson in its ranks, thumped Green Island 68-0.

Pirates did not have any Highlanders playing for it on Saturday and neither did Green Island, with suggestions these sides should have been boosted with more Highlanders.

O'Brien said it was not easy to allocate players and there was no hard and fast rule on where the players would have to play. There were 12 new Highlanders this season and every club had at least one on its books.

''If a player has a natural association with one club and he wants to play there then we won't say for him not to go,'' he said.

''Someone like Gareth Evans has played for Dunedin before, so if he wants to go back there and play, he can.''

Green Island actually has five Highlanders on its books but none of them played on Saturday.

Ben Smith, Nasi Manu, Patrick Osborne, Buxton Popoali'i and Brayden Mitchell all linked with Green Island.

But Smith, Manu and Osborne played against the Blues in Auckland on Saturday night, Popoali'i was forced into retirement because of heart issues last month, and Mitchell had a niggly injury.

O'Brien said the issue of where Highlanders were playing had become more prominent this year as the Highlanders did not have many injured players.

''This year we have had upwards of a dozen playing every week. But last year, when we had a lot more injuries in our squad, we were only looking at maybe four or five players getting to play club rugby.''

O'Brien said it was an inexact science. It happened in other franchises around the country.

Southland players John Hardie and Josh Bekhuis returned to Southland club rugby over the weekend.

O'Brien said players enjoyed playing club rugby and usually attended club training on Thursday night.

ORFU community rugby manager Richard Perkins said the metropolitan rugby council had decided to help the Highlanders out, so players from the franchise could play for club rugby sides.

Perkins said it was not easy to get players evenly allocated.

Zingari-Richmond actually has six Highlanders - Aaron Smith, Willie Ripia, Lima Sopoaga, Fumiaki Tanaka, Phil Burleigh and Bekhuis - attached to the club, but the chances of them playing at the club on the same day are virtually non-existent.

Perkins said if the inclusion of the Highlanders became an issue for clubs, the metropolitan council would revisit the issue.