By CHRIS RATTUE
Hooker
Age: 22
Height: 1.85m
Weight: 108kg
NPC team: Canterbury
Super 12: Crusaders
Super 12 games: 18
Test debut: No tests
Test caps: None
If early this year you had posed the quiz number: "Which Super 12 side will provide two World Cup hookers", most bright sparks would have yelled "Highlanders" and demanded tougher questions.
Wrong. Anton Oliver
and Tom Willis, All Black captains both, will be parked in their armchairs while Crusaders Flynn and Mark Hammett - who was headed for retirement - join Keven Mealamu in Australia.
Even more remarkably, Hammett had a plodding Super 12 until firing up brilliantly towards the end, while Flynn suffered a broken arm in the penultimate round against the Stormers in early May and has been recovering ever since.
Flynn broke the same arm playing for Southland last year, about the same time he broke Southland hearts by revealing his transfer to Canterbury.
He's got a lot of rugby pedigree - his father Shaun played for Southland and uncle Corey was a Canterbury halfback, while the young Flynn himself was a top teenage rower.
But all the pedigree in the world won't matter if his arm doesn't hold up, and Mitchell concedes he has taken a bit of a punt.
A titanium rod was inserted in the arm but after being selected for the Maori tour of Canada in late July Flynn withdrew because the arm was causing bother.
Mitchell likens Flynn to Mealamu, though the latter has greater acceleration.
Just how keen Mitchell is on his new recruit remains to be seen.
His lineout throwing is untested at this level, but he does have the advantage of knowing a thing or two about the test tight five which has a strong Canterbury flavour. He stacks up as candidate for fairytale story of the tournament.
