Veteran still flavour of the month for Hurricanes

When David Holwell returned from Irish rugby club Leinster last year he was prepared for a few NPC games for Northland and long hours on his parents' Whangarei farm.

Super 14? Not for me, he vowed.

In a few short months the veteran pivot, 31, was drafted into the Hurricanes, leapfrogged their promising No 10 Jimmy Gopperth and tomorrow night will pull the strings on the team's first home semifinal here.

"I'm definitely not getting any quicker. I've matured over the years and I just try to do the basics well," Holwell said yesterday ahead of his 75th Super match.

"I'm never going to be a starry five-eighth who scores tries from 40m out."

Clearly, as the Hurricanes approach the biggest match in their 11-year history at a full house of 34,500 at Westpac Stadium, they are enviable qualities in Cooper's book.

The wily coach's admiration for Holwell was apparent yesterday, using the words "steady Eddie" and "old master" in explaining his selection ahead of the talented Gopperth who started seven matches in 2006.

In between the razzle-dazzle of the ball-playing loose forwards and speedy backs, a rock was needed for the percentages behind the pack.

"He (Holwell) was brought to help bring on Jimmy and Tamati (Ellison), and he's done that and even more," Cooper said.

"The old master's moved ahead of them. We select our team on performance and he's been performing."

The expectations weren't high for Holwell last year when he accepted the Hurricanes' offer, having made his Super 12 debut eight years ago.

"I just came down here looking to be part of the team and play a backup role to Jimmy and Tamati.

"Jimmy had a great year last year and I planned to have plenty of time in the grandstand."

Having started six matches and come off the bench in four others this year, Holwell has boosted his Hurricanes points tally to 668.

He watched last weekend's 19-14 win over the Waratahs from the grandstand in Sydney last weekend when he was sidelined with an infected knee.

"It's great to be back and I did it tough last week watching the boys.

"We're not happy with just a semi. We've finally got one at home, it's taken 11 years, and we want to go further now.

"It's about experience at this level, it goes up another notch. We've had three semis now, we've been there, done that and learned from it."

Cooper named a full strength team yesterday, with Holwell and lock Paul Tito (ankle) returning from injury and fellow lock Jason Eaton bracketed with Luke Andrews but almost certain to start after an ankle injury.

Around the same time yesterday, Waratahs coach Ewen McKenzie was naming four-game rookie Daniel Helangahu ahead of the seasoned Mat Rogers at No 10.

Rogers moves to fullback in a much-predicted reshuffle which sees regular No 15 Peter Hewat move to Wendell Sailor's vacant No 14 jersey and Sam Norton-Knight return to second five-eighth.

"If there was panic, you definitely wouldn't be moving someone like Mat Rogers out of the 10 position. He's a class player. There's no panic, that's for sure," Waratahs captain Chris Whitaker insisted.

- NZPA