Auckland coach Pat Lam is expecting upsets to be a regular feature of the Air NZ Cup rugby competition.
Auckland were among the favourites on the receiving end as the season's opening round last weekend threw up a number of unexpected results among the seven matches.
Lam is hoping to avoid a repeat of the shock 17-6 away defeat to Counties Manukau, when Taranaki are at Eden Park on Sunday and the Ranfurly Shield goes on the line.
But he believes there will be plenty more surprises in store throughout the season.
"That's the beauty of the competition," he said today.
"Everyone can beat everyone on the day and it's certainly making it really enthralling. There are some really good match-ups and it's really fantastic for the game."
Lam agreed that the standard might have dropped with the player drain and retirements, but that would improve once the new crop of personnel got more experience.
In that respect, he said, the national championship was continuing to do its job of bringing through the next generation of players.
Auckland's loss to Counties Manukau, who couldn't manage a win last season, was one of the two major boilovers of round one.
Lam said there was plenty of embarrassment in the Auckland camp over what happened at Pukekohe.
"We never fired a shot and we couldn't carry out our game plan," he said.
"All in all, everyone is pretty gutted with what happened."
However, the attitude in training so far this week had given him confidence of a turnaround against Taranaki.
Both sides will name their line-ups on Friday and will be without their All Blacks, who leave on the same day for South Africa.
Taranaki are otherwise expected to be at full strength, with hooker Laurence Corlett (head knock) and openside flanker Scott Waldrom (hamstring) both expected to be available.
After opening their campaign with a 20-13 home win over North Harbour, Taranaki, under new coach Adrian Kennedy, are looking to repeat their feat of 12 years ago.
In 1996, they claimed the Shield with a famous 42-39 victory over an Auckland side coached by present All Black mentor Graham Henry and on their way to their fourth straight national title.
Auckland have several injury concerns, and also have outside back Isaia Toeava on standby to join the All Blacks.
However, they will have flanker Daniel Braid, who filled in for the then injured Richie McCaw in New Zealand's defeat to Australia in Sydney last month, on deck.
Round two opens tomorrow night with Wellington travelling to North Harbour.
Wellington, who avoided joining the casualties of last weekend's upsets, will have halfback Piri Weepu returning to lead them before he heads to South Africa with the All Blacks.
Weepu was on test duty when the Lions claimed maximum points with a 30-6 home win over Hawke's Bay.
Harbour have All Black back Anthony Tuitavake in their side, while skipper Jimmy Gopperth will face his former province for the first time since his loan move north.
On Friday night, Manawatu who pulled off the other big shock of round one by beating Canterbury for the first time in more than a quarter of a century, face Southland, while two first-round losers, Waikato and Tasman square off.
Among Saturday's matches, Counties Manukau back up their defeat of Auckland with an away trip to Bay of Plenty.
Otago, first-up winners over Southland, face Canterbury, while Hawke's Bay will take on a Northland side buoyed by their victory over Waikato.
