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ABs captain moves to allay injury fears

Sam Cane feels his knee issue isn’t a major one. And, writes Aaron Goile, there’ll be a few rather invested parties hoping he’s on the money.

SAM Cane is no doctor, though he probably does have a fair sort of handle on his body.

And there’ll be a few rather invested parties hoping the All Blacks skipper and Chiefs cocaptain is on the money about his latest injury.

The veteran openside flanker was an early casualty in the Chiefs’ 54-21 Super Rugby Pacific battering of the Force in

Hamilton yesterday, after copping a knock to his right knee.

The sight of the 30-year-old at least walking unaided from the field at FMG Stadium Waikato was a positive, though Aaron Cruden did the same for the Chiefs in 2015 in Christchurch and it turned out to be an ACL tear that wrecked his World Cup hopes.

And so coach Clayton McMillan applied a dose of caution to Cane’s optimism when giving an update on his talismanic leader post-match.

‘‘He seems to think it’s okay,’’ McMillan said. ‘‘But every player thinks their injury is not too bad until they wake up the next day.

‘‘But he’s walking around fine, so hopefully just minor.’’

After being attended to by medical staff, Cane initially looked set to battle on, before instead being replaced.

‘‘I think he probably would’ve carried on, because he’s just that type of guy,’’ McMillan said. ‘‘The advice of the medical team was that it just wasn’t worth risking, so we didn’t.’’

McMillan said it was likely Cane would go for scans, but only after they see how he presents at a medical clinic this morning.

The Chiefs travel to Fiji on Thursday for their final regular season match against the Drua in Lautoka on Saturday, where a win would secure them hosting rights for their quarterfinal.

All Blacks coach Ian Foster could also be rather anxious, with Ireland’s series six weeks away and Cane in line to return to lead the national side, having dipped his toes back on last year’s northern tour following pectoral surgery.

For the Chiefs, Cane’s injury was the continuation of a disrupted week, where a new wave of Covid cases made a few players unavailable, while All Blacks lock Josh Lord twisted a knee in the final acts of Thursday training to probably be sidelined for two weeks, and Kaylum Boshier was also a late out through non-Covid-related illness.

But, with McMillan

demanding he see a sharp up-turn from his side ahead of the playoffs, they stepped it up in their eight-try rout of the Force, where Quinn Tupaea bagged a hat-trick, Samisoni Taukei’aho a double off the bench, with the scrum immense and the defence stout and at times punishing, making 64 more tackles (181) than

their opponents, though missing four fewer.

A happy coach then? ‘‘Mostly,’’ McMillan noted. ‘‘It’s nice to stretch the legs and score some nice tries, but our restarts were pretty average, particularly in that first half, I think we turned over five or six.

‘‘We created a lot of

opportunities where we were one pass away from scoring and we knocked those balls on. So still some elements to tidy up, but tracking in the right direction.’’

The Drua game should finally see All Blacks lock Brodie Retallick return, nine weeks since breaking his thumb.

‘‘We’re really confident that everyone that’s not a seasonending injury that wasn’t available this week for whatever reason will be back next week.’’

SPORT

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2022-05-22T07:00:00.0000000Z

2022-05-22T07:00:00.0000000Z

https://fairfaxmedia.pressreader.com/article/281986086168182

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