The Sports Lowdown For All Your News and OpinionsOn Saturday The Hurricanes take on The Highlanders in an all New Zealand affair at the Westpac Stadium in Wellington for the Super 15 Rugby Final and what promises to be a great final between 2 excellent sides.
The match is live on Sky Sports at 8.35am, and the 2 sides both finished one and two in the competition leading up to the play offs, Hurricanes finished top after only losing 2 matches in all of the Super 15 season, whilst the Highlanders lost 5 matches.
When the two teams faced each other only a few weeks ago, The Hurricanes won convincingly 56-20. That match was also played at the Westpac Stadium, which is The Hurricanes home stadium, so they go into the final as the clear favorites.
The Highlanders who are based in Otago, have never won the Super Rugby tournament, they have been losing finalists, which is the same situation with The Hurricanes so there will be a new name on the trophy come Saturday.
The Highlanders are a very hard working team and have some outstanding New Zealand internationals at their disposal, in scrum half Aaron Smith, centre and young talent, Malakai Fekitoa and full back Ben Smith. The Hurricanes are covered in star names too, with players such as Dane Coles, Victor Vito, Ardie Savea, TJ Perenaia, Beauden Barrett, 2 of the great centres of the modern area in Conrad Smith and Ma’a Nonu and last but by know means least, Julian Savea, a wrecking ball of a winger, with fantastic football skills.
Our prediction here at The Sports Lowdown by our Rugby writer Craig Muncey is that we just cannot see past The Hurricanes thanks to both home advantage, plus their star studded line up, and we just see them having too much fire power for a tough, dogged Highlanders team.
We predict Hurricanes to win by more than 20 points, and Conrad Smith before he leaves to ply his trade in Pau in France, lifting the trophy for The Hurricanes for the first time in their franchise history.
