Ruben Love is gearing up for his first season back at 10 since becoming a Test fullback, but the 24-year-old isn\u2019t overcomplicating things as he enters the new chapter in his career.<\/p>\n
Love began his Super Rugby career as a first five-eighth, but shifted to the backfield with the arrival of Brett Cameron<\/a> in Wellington<\/a> in 2023.<\/p>\n In the time between drinks, Love has established himself as one of the All Blacks<\/a>\u2018 most promising young prospects and has split his few minutes on the Test stage between fullback and wing.<\/p>\n While Hurricanes<\/a> assistant coach Cory Jane<\/a> has previously revealed that Love\u2019s long-term ambition has always been the black No.10 jersey, the Palmerston North product knows he must take things one step at a time.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019ve just got to get my flow back, get my rhythm,\u201d he told the media in Wellington this week. \u201cIt\u2019s been a long time since I\u2019ve played a game; Wales, I only played 50 minutes because of my ankle.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m just excited to get out there with my mates again, to be honest. It\u2019s pre-season, I want to play the best I can, but just to get my feel, my flow, going into camp next week and then going into Moana.<\/p>\n \u201cI just want to do the best I can and make sure all the work this summer is paying off, and see what I need to work on for the Moana game.\u201d<\/p>\n The move to 10 comes in a season with plenty of expectations on the Hurricanes, who are now a full season removed from a top-seed finish in 2024 and are finally looking largely healthy coming into the new campaign. That makes Love\u2019s role all the more simple, he says.<\/p>\n \u201cI just need to be purposeful and direct the team well. I feel like we\u2019ve got a stacked team, and what the boys need from me is just control and riding the momentum of the game.<\/p>\n \u201cIf I can put us in the right areas of the field and just make sure the forwards are getting the communication that they need, I feel like that has us covered.<\/p>\n \u201cI don\u2019t need to reinvent the wheel, or try to be an individual player, I\u2019ve just got to play for the team and play for the players around me, because I feel like we definitely have the squad for me to do that.\u201d<\/p>\n Love is part of a supremely talented new generation of All Blacks plying their trade with the Hurricanes, playing alongside Peter Lakai<\/a> and Cam Roigard<\/a> in the Kiwi capital.<\/p>\n In an age bracket one tick higher, the Canes boast names like Asafo Aumua<\/a>, Tyrel Lomax<\/a>, Du\u2019Plessis Kirifi<\/a>, Billy Proctor<\/a> and Jordie Barrett. The latter has returned from a one-year stint with Leinster<\/a> in the URC, and is set to play a big role outside Love in the backline.<\/p>\n \u201cI was at 10, and he (Barrett) was at 15 when I started; my first year in 2021, he was at fullback, and he was doing the majority of the kicking and all of that stuff,\u201d Love reflected.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s special, especially watching him in the All Blacks the last two years, how he works at 12. I feel like I have a gauge of what he needs from a 10.<\/p>\n \u201cLike I said, I\u2019ve just got to make sure I put him in the right spots, give him what he needs to be able to do what he does best, and just make sure that he\u2019s got a calm head, there\u2019s no clutter in his mind.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ruben Love is gearing up for his first season back at 10 since becoming a Test fullback, but…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":464268,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-464267","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464267","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=464267"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/464267\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/464268"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=464267"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=464267"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=464267"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}