Rugby: Three wins in Super 15 leaves Hurricanes coach with headaches

Hurricanes and coach Chris Boyd seems to have hit on a winning Super 15 formula. Photo / Getty Images

Chris Boyd has the type of worries rugby coaches welcome.

His Hurricanes are happy, healthy and unbeaten and his toughest challenge in the next few weeks will be deciding which line-up to run, given nobody in his squad is out of form.

Boyd will also need to find a way to stop complacency creeping into their thinking, but that's another concern coaches yearn for.

The Hurricanes made it three road wins on the bounce to start the season as they hammered the Western Force 42-13 in Perth yesterday morning and also banked a valuable bonus point.

It's a remarkable start for a team who lost their last three games last season and eventually finished seventh.

"It's only a start," Boyd said, trying to downplay things. "We all know that it's not until June that things are going to start getting themselves sorted out. So we know that we've got a lot of work to do to play better when we come up to the back end of the competition."

The Hurricanes can ice their bruises this week and have a bye this weekend before they return to action against the Blues in Palmerston North on March 13.

One tricky obstacle for Kiwi Super Rugby coaches to overcome this season is finding a way to give their All Blacks two games off to keep the internationals fresh ahead of this year's World Cup.

Centre Conrad Smith skipped the victory over the Force, Ma'a Nonu missed the round-one win over the Lions, and Jeremy Thrush has spent the past three weeks out with a calf injury, which soaked up his rest period.

Boyd said he would look to rotate more All Blacks out during the next few weeks with wings Julian Savea and Cory Jane, hooker Dane Coles and first-five Beauden Barrett all candidates to take a spell.

"You just can't afford to get to the back end of the season and find you've got 10 rests to do, so we've just got to keep ticking away at that," Boyd said.

The likely replacement for Coles is Motu Matu'u, who is yet to be spotted this season but will return from injury for the Hurricanes development side on Thursday.

The Hurricanes' win over the Force included more of their improved defence, while their backs were given a chance to impress as they retained more possession than previous weeks.

Assistant coach John Plumtree has been a big influence on the Hurricanes this season and Coles said Plumtree's coaching experience in South Africa was evident given the emphasis he put on the forward pack playing with a higher intensity.

"The boys are responding really well, so he's been bloody good," Coles said. "He's just tried to see if that can work for us and so far we've been pretty physical."

Force 13 (Mitch Scott try; Zack Holmes pen, Luke Burton pen, con)
Hurricanes 42 (Cory Jane, Mark Abbott, Victor Vito, Julian Savea, James Marshall tries; Beauden Barrett 3 pen, 2 con, Marshall 2 con).
Halftime: 6-15.