By CHRIS RATTUE
Chiefs coach John Mitchell says six months of work will go on the line when his side take on the Hurricanes in a cut-throat Super 12 battle in Wellington on Friday night.
Mitchell was disappointed with many of his players' performances in the matches in South Africa, where they beat the Bulls and lost to the Stormers.
While the Chiefs have made major strides this year, their semifinal dreams could be ended by the in-form Hurricanes, who have won four in a row.
The Chiefs arrived back from South Africa on Sunday night.
They will have only today as a full training day as they try to rediscover the spark Mitchell said was missing.
"The players realise we have just got to get excited about the game again," he said.
"We're still in [semifinals] contention, which is the position every team wants to be in at this stage.
"We don't have a lot of time to prepare for this game, but there are no excuses.
"That is very much the way of professional sport and you have to be ready for what lies ahead every time. I was very disappointed in South Africa.
"Against the Stormers we turned over the ball far too much and our second-phase ball was too slow. We didn't get behind the opposition."
Mitchell praised a host of Hurricanes players, but picked out No. 8 Filo Tiatia and first five-eighths David Holwell for special mention.
He said Tiatia was always a player he had admired for his power.
Of Holwell, he said: "He must be very close to being the All Black first five-eighths.
"He holds the ball out in front of him and has options, and he takes the gaps. I've been very impressed."
Of his own players, Mitchell said he was particularly pleased with props Deacon Manu and Dennis Hazelton in South Africa, along with wing Roger Randle, and the improvement Bruce Reihana had found in his game.
WestpacTrust Stadium has been sold out for 10 days and the Hurricanes said it was too late to get resource consent to add 2500 seats to the capacity of 34,500.
Mitchell said he might wait until kickoff to confirm his lineup, since the Wellington weather always had to be taken into account.
Jonah Lomu threw a scare into the Hurricanes camp last night when he limped away from training with a recurrence of the foot injury that forced him from the field late in the win over the Waratahs in New Plymouth last Friday.
Hurricanes medical staff said it was too early to say how bad the injury was and whether it would affect the giant winger's chances of playing against the Chiefs.
If Lomu does not play, Brad Fleming and Daryl Lilley will be on the wings.
However, there was some good news for the Hurricanes last night, with injury-troubled loosehead prop Kevin Yates surviving a torrid session at the stadium.
2001 Super 12 schedule/results
New Zealand's Super 12 squads
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