{"id":420282,"date":"2026-01-18T02:01:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-18T02:01:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/420282\/"},"modified":"2026-01-18T02:01:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-18T02:01:09","slug":"unruffled-rennie-shows-nerves-of-steel-with-kobe-win","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/420282\/","title":{"rendered":"Unruffled Rennie shows nerves of Steel with Kobe win"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Neither rumblings from afar, nor the emotion of the most significant day in the region&#8217;s calendar appear to have ruffled ex-Wallabies coach Dave Rennie, whose Kobe Steelers marched past BlackRams Tokyo 67-21 in Japan Rugby League One.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Saturday&#8217;s match, part of remembrance activities associated with the 31st anniversary of the 1995 Great Hanshin Earthquake that devastated Kobe, also took place in the shadow of the week&#8217;s seismic rugby events in New Zealand, where All Blacks coach Scott Robertson was abruptly dismissed.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.stan.com.au\/watch\/sport\/rugby\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\" class=\"css-tm001h\">Watch every second of Super Rugby Pacific live and on demand via Stan Sport.<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The Kobe coach is among the plethora of names thrown up as a potential successor, with former Wallabies coach Robbie Deans and current boss Joe Schmidt also having supporters.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The Kansai-based outfit&#8217;s fourth win in five, which featured four tries from ex-All Black second-rower Brodie Retallick, has Kobe third on the points table.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Wallabies veteran Bernard Foley&#8217;s Kubota Spears, as well as the Saitama Wild Knights, who have former Wallaby Berrick Barnes on their coaching staff, lead the way, tied in the standings after five straight wins.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The Spears crushed Steve Hansen&#8217;s Verblitz 39-10, and the Wild Knights remain unbeaten after comfortably taking care of the Yokohama Eagles 50-21, with Brisbane-schooled Jack Cornelsen picking up two tries.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Ex-NRL stars were to the fore in Shizuoka BlueRevs&#8217; 47-36 win over Sagmihara Dynaboars, with former Parramatta Eels try king Semi Radradra and ex-Dolphins cult figure Valynce Te Whare each crossing twice.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">After being shocked 46-0 on the opening day by the Wild Knights, defending champions Brave Lupus Tokyo have recovered their mojo, scoring a 38-27 win in Tokyo over a Urayasu D-Rocks side without former Wallabies Samu Kerevi and Israel Folau.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">The win has Brave Lupus, piloted by All Black flyhalf Richie Mo&#8217;unga, fourth ahead of next week&#8217;s showdown with the Spears.<\/p>\n<p class=\"css-2425b0\">Former Queensland Reds and new Brave Blossoms second-rower Harry Hockings was a try-scorer as Tokyo Sungoliath beat Mie Heat 30-15.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Neither rumblings from afar, nor the emotion of the most significant day in the region&#8217;s calendar appear to&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":420283,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,190835,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-420282","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-rugby-league-one","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420282","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=420282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/420282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/420283"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=420282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=420282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=420282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}