Rugby: We're not defending the title - Reds

Reds coach Ewen McKenzie. Photo / Getty Images

They're confident - but just don't call it a title defence. Ewen McKenzie's Reds are heading into the Super 15 in rich form.

His big-name stars - inspired by the likes of Digby Ioane and Will Genia - were at their clinical best in a warm-up match against the Force, with their ability to string phases together on a consistent basis proving the difference.

The 40-10 thrashing of the Force in a trial match in Perth brought more bright news for the defending champions, with outside centre Anthony Fainga'a making it through 40 minutes unscathed in his first game back since shoulder surgery.

McKenzie declared himself pleased with the hit-out, but played a straight bat when asked whether his team was in good shape to defend the title. "Well, we're not actually defending the title, we're going out there to win it," he said. "We've got confidence from last year, but nothing we did last year is going to count too much. We've got to start again."

McKenzie felt his men had improved from last week's 27-20 trial victory over the Brumbies. "Both the trials have been physical and we had a lot of breakdown work to fix from last week and we did better this week. I thought we did well with a pretty young and inexperienced back row."

The Reds face the Waratahs in the first round, while the Force meet the Brumbies, who have Wallabies trio Stephen Moore, Pat McCabe and Ben Alexander returning from injury.

Force coach Richard Graham insisted he would not be hitting the panic button, despite watching his team crash to successive thumpings in trial matches. The Force were beaten 25-0 by the Brumbies earlier this month. If Thursday's five-tries-to-one thumping wasn't bad enough, the Force's woes were compounded when lock Sam Wykes suffered a suspected hamstring injury in the dying minutes.

But Graham urged fans not to become too disheartened over the losses, saying he expects a big turnaround for the season opener against the Brumbies in Canberra on February 24.

"Trial form in February doesn't count for anything," he said. "Next week, there's four or five points on offer and that's going to be important for us.

"I think there's probably more concern about the performance [against the Reds] rather than the loss. In the first 40 minutes, we just copped a lesson in terms of physicality around the breakdown.

"Clearly, when there's a scoreline like that ... guys are going to be under pressure."

The Force struggled for fluency against the Reds, with their ball handling particularly atrocious despite the good conditions.

Graham said he would not alter training plans over the next week despite the nature of the loss.

"The whole thing is you don't want to make decisions, or you don't want to react in a manner that says what you've been doing isn't working."

He said Fijian winger Napolioni Nalaga (stomach bug), Nick Cummins (leg) and Nathan Sharpe (calf) would be ready for the start of the season. But flanker Richard Brown will not be available until round 2 at the earliest after undergoing major shoulder surgery last year.

Just a week out from the competition proper, Graham saw the sunny side: "Just lucky that that one counts for no points."

- AAP