{"id":552248,"date":"2026-07-16T07:06:07","date_gmt":"2026-07-16T07:06:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/552248\/"},"modified":"2026-07-16T07:06:07","modified_gmt":"2026-07-16T07:06:07","slug":"new-zealand-v-ireland-josh-moorby-to-start-as-dave-rennie-names-all-blacks-squad-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/552248\/","title":{"rendered":"New Zealand v Ireland: Josh Moorby to start as Dave Rennie names All Blacks squad \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dave Rennie has made four changes in personnel, and one positional, in picking what effectively looks like the All Blacks\u2019<\/a> first-choice line-up from the players available for their Nations Championship<\/a> game against Ireland<\/a> at Eden Park on Saturday (kick-off 7.10pm local time\/8.10am Irish). <\/p>\n

Josh Moorby, the 28-year-old Hurricanes full-back\/winger who made an impressive debut off the bench against Italy last week, starts in place of the injured Leroy Carter, which would seem to be a nod towards his strong catching and kicking game.<\/p>\n

As expected Quinn Tupaea returns at outside centre, as do the locks Josh Lord and Patrick Patrick Tuipulotu with Tupou Vaa\u2019i, who played in the secondrow in last week\u2019s 47-14 win, shifting to blindside. Walter Sititi, last season\u2019s breakthrough star, has been omitted from the matchday squad after an error-riddled display against Italy.<\/p>\n

Once again there is a strong influence from the Hurricanes\u2019 Super Rugby-winning team, with the outstanding Cam Roigard, Ruben Love and Jordie Barrett reunited in the 9-10-12 axis in addition to Moorby and tight-head Tyrel Lomax, and a further three among the replacements.<\/p>\n

The bench again features the German born and reared backrower Anton Segner, who moved to New Zealand when taking up a six-month scholarship at Nelson University at the age of 15 and who made his All Blacks\u2019 debut last week, as did reserve loosehead Xavier Numia.<\/p>\n

Peter Lakai and Caleb Clarke also return to the 23, adding to a bench full of impact players. <\/p>\n

\u201cIreland have been one of the best sides in the world for a number of years now. They are very experienced and well-coached and will have belief on the back of their recent success here. We are well aware of the challenge they pose,\u201d Rennie said. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe have selected a strong team that allows some of the combinations we have tested to continue building, and rewards players who have impressed over the last two rounds, including some of our recent debutants. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe know how important our bench will be against a team as tenacious as Ireland, so have selected players who we know are capable of making an impact and influencing the course of the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Ireland\u2019s lineout is a problem, which might explain the team to face New ZealandOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Rennie admitted that the selection of Vaa\u2019i \u201cgives us a bigger line out, a bigger pack. I feel he\u2019s got the skill set, he suits what we want and I\u2019m keen to give him another crack there.\u201d <\/p>\n

On Moorby\u2019s selection, he added: \u201cHe\u2019s been excellent all year and for him to come on quite early and play with that sort of confidence was awesome, so it gives us a lot of confidence to throw him out there. He trained superbly and he\u2019s just a really good footballer. A massive engine, massive work rate and he\u2019s looking forward to his first start.\u201d<\/p>\n

Tuipulotu has had \u201ca challenging year\u201d with an array of \u201cniggles\u201d, and could have played last week. <\/p>\n

\u201cBut we just wanted to give him one more week, have a really good training week last week and this week to give him confidence to go out and go full throttle. But as you know, he\u2019s a big man, he has genuine impact and it\u2019d be nice for him to string some tests together.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sititi has not really recovered his best form since a bad concussion and Rennie admitted it would be \u201cfair to say he wasn\u2019t at his best at the weekend\u201d before adding: \u201cHe\u2019ll play a lot of footy for us this year\u201d after receiving a clear message about what is required of him.<\/p>\n

Selecting what Rennie feels is a big pack was also with the intention of attacking Ireland at scrum time as well.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re well aware of the importance of set piece. Ireland are very good, they\u2019re very disciplined and they\u2019ll put you in the corner and they\u2019ll hurt you down there so we\u2019ve picked a pack that we think can compete and hopefully give us an edge.\u201d<\/p>\n

Also confirming that Barrett trained fully on Thursday, Rennie again batted questions asking if the All Blacks\u2019 32-year unbeaten run at Eden Park was added pressure.<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t say pressure. We\u2019re well aware of the threats and they\u2019re an excellent side who will have genuine confidence going into the game. Clearly we\u2019ve talked about the record at Eden Park and the record is longer than most of the age of the players on our team. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo, we\u2019re well aware of that, we\u2019re really excited to play there. It\u2019s against a really high quality opposition and we\u2019re building. We know we need to be better than we were last week but we\u2019ve prepared well and looking forward to it.\u201d<\/p>\n

NEW ZEALAND: Damian McKenzie; Will Jordan, Quinn Tupaea, Jordie Barrett; Josh Moorby; Ruben Love, Cam Roigard; Ethan de Groot, Codie Taylor, Tyrel Lomax, Josh Lord, Patrick Tuipulotu, Tupou Vaa\u2019i, Luke Jacobson, Ardie Savea (Capt).<\/p>\n

Replacements: Asafo Aumua, Xavier Numia, Fletcher Newell, Anton Segner, Peter Lakai, Cortez Ratima, Anton Lienert-Brown, Caleb Clarke.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dave Rennie has made four changes in personnel, and one positional, in picking what effectively looks like the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":552249,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1451,61,60,1449,86133,43,3654],"class_list":["post-552248","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-all-blacks","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-ireland-rugby","tag-nations-championship","tag-news","tag-rugby"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552248","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=552248"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/552248\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/552249"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=552248"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=552248"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=552248"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}