Rugby: Sizing up test comeback

Jerome Kaino is the same weight as when he left to play in Japan two years ago. Photo / Getty Images

When Jerome Kaino signed with the Blues last year, there was a bit of hands on hips stuff from the conditioning staff, cheeks puffed out, heads shaking in anticipation of the re-conditioning job that awaited.

Japan's notorious love of aerobic work was expected to strip Kaino down to a thinner version of his former self. When he arrived in Auckland a few weeks ago after his second campaign with the Toshiba club, there was a touch of nervousness about how much Kaino there would be to greet.

As it turned out, against the odds, he strode through the airport looking remarkably like the Kaino of old.

"I think we are really lucky that he has come back, in terms of body composition, in a better place than when he left two years ago," says Blues assistant strength and conditioning coach Jason Price. "Stats-wise, across the board, he's in a great spot. He's come back - he got injured in March 2012 when he last played for the Blues - and his body weight is exactly the same. He's about 10mm leaner than he was two years ago. In the gym, he's stronger than he was two years ago.

"Contact-wise, he's still pretty lethal in that regard. We were doing some contact work a couple of Tuesdays ago and ... jeez ... he's still got it. He genuinely wants to be out there ... I wouldn't say hurting people ... but ..."

The Blues are optimistic that Kaino can be the player he was in 2011. Physically, he's ticked more boxes than they hoped. But optimism is tempered by history - Kaino is attempting to do something no one has quite managed yet.

There haven't been many who have tried and fewer who have succeeded in resuming an All Black test career after an overseas stint. Of those to attempt it, Troy Flavell was the closest in size, age and position to Kaino.

After three years in Japan, Flavell came home to try to crack the 2007 World Cup squad. He got close, winning test caps in 2006 and 2007, but when the selectors made the cut, Flavell didn't convince that he had the same intensity of old.

It's that word 'intensity' that holds the key to Kaino's future. His two-year stint in Japan has been akin to him being put into cold storage: it's almost as if he's been cryogenically preserved. The Blues have taken the wrapper off and found their prize in pristine condition but there is no guarantee that, just because Kaino may be much the same athlete, he'll be much the same player.

That's the problem with Japan - it's aerobic rugby, not bruising rugby. The collisions are not of the same impact; the players are smaller and the breakdown is not the scrap it is over here. Kaino hasn't had to deal with giant South Africans or the ferocity of a local Kiwi derby where the activity in the contact zones is thunderous. How well he adjusts to the physicality, if he can, will determine whether he can resume his test career in June.

"I think what happens in Japan is there is a running intensity," says Blues coach John Kirwan, who was also the national Japanese coach at the last World Cup.

"The Japanese will run all day. You go over there conditioned for 130kg Charlie Faumuina running at you - then over there, it is a very different athlete coming at you. They play a faster, running game so what happens is the condition is run off you. That happened to Jerome in his first year - he lost four or five kilos just from running.

"So the hardest thing for him is getting used to the intensity of the contact. It is just bigger bodies, on bigger bodies."

Kaino has talked about his desire to resume his test career and prove himself all over again. That desire will be critical as he tries to assimilate as he gets back into the smash and bash grind of Super Rugby.

There are new men in his path - Steven Luatua and Liam Messam are vastly different players to the ones they were when Kaino left in 2012. He'll need to offer more than one of those two to earn a test recall and the only way for Kaino to condition himself for what lies ahead is game time. His training regime doesn't necessarily need to be adapted. He doesn't need to get bigger or more defined; he just needs his body to be smashed about and re-learn how that feels.

"There wasn't much contact at the breakdown in Japan so the big difference for him is that he's going to wake up Sunday [today] pretty sore. And again on Monday," says Price.

"When he starts playing 80 minutes or 70 minutes, he's going to have to recover well if he wants to play again the next week. It's how he nails his recovery - and he's a really professional guy, so I have no doubt that he will. Other than that, it will be business as usual."