Rugby: Hurricanes out for revenge against old rivals

The Hurricanes will not be short of bulletin-board material ahead of tonight's derby against the Chiefs.

Taking pride of place should be the Super 14 table, which will show that a five-point win will have them sniffing around the fringes of the top four, an improbable situation when you consider they embarked on a five-game winless streak between weeks four and 10.

Add to that the Chiefs upset victory over their southern neighbours in last year's semifinal and you have a team not lacking for inspiration.

"It's still hurting and it's been brought up," coach Colin Cooper said of 2009's 14-10 semifinal loss.

As for the Chiefs, inspiration will have to come not from the past, but the future.

"We've got some guys who are getting a lot of game time at the moment who may not have expected it, so for us as a unit we want to use this time to get stronger as a squad in the future," said coach Ian Foster. "It's really important for some of the guys coming in to show that they can play at this level and we make sure we keep growing our game."

Two players looking to show they have what it takes at Super rugby level are wing Jason Hona, who comes into the squad to replace the injured Sitiveni Sivivatu, and halfback Junior Poluleuligaga, who has kept All Black Brendon Leonard on the bench for the second week running, though that was influenced by uncertainty over Leonard's fitness rather than form.

"I thought Junior played well last week," Foster said. "And Brendon took a pretty heavy knock on his quad trying to fly-kick a ball."

Cooper has different priorities to his former Junior All Black co-coach, one of which is to engineer four tries.

"Obviously you want a bonus point particularly where we are, but you've got to win the game first," he said during the week.

"If you start trying to score four tries from the start then you get unstructured and panicky and start throwing 50-50 passes. I want structure and I want composure and then set up for those tries."

HURRICANES V CHIEFS
Wellington, 7.35 Saturday 1st May

HURRICANES
Cory Jane
Tamati Ellison
Conrad Smith
Ma'a Nonu
Hosea Gear
Aaron Cruden
Tyson Keats
Rodney So'oialo
Karl Lowe
Victor Vito
Michael Paterson
Bryn Evans
Neemia Tialata
Andrew Hore (c)
John Schwalger

CHIEFS
T. Nanai-Williams
Dwayne Sweeney
Richard Kahui
Jackson Willison
Jason Hona
Callum Bruce
J. Poluleuligaga
Colin Bourke
Tanerau Latimer
Liam Messam (c)
Culum Retallick
Craig Clarke
Nathan White
Hika Elliot
Sona Taumalolo

RESERVES
Hurricanes: Dane Coles, Jacob Ellison, Jeremy Thrush, Nick Crosswell, Piri Weepu, Willie Ripia, Jason Kawau.

Chiefs: Aled de Malmanche/Vern Kamo, Ben Afeaki, Kevin O'Neill, Luke Braid, Brendon Leonard, Trent Renata, Phil Burleigh.