The second half saw the crucial injection of the New Zealand bench, with lock Jack Laity and front-row replacements Tom Rowland and Matt Treeby making immediate differences at set piece. However, the impact of Suji Vosikata was arguably the game-changing factor, with the Fijian-born loose forward absolutely outstanding on both sides of the ball.<\/p>\n
Vosikata\u2019s line-breaking ability opened up the tight contest into one that saw the New Zealanders edge out to a six-point lead through the boot of skipper Jarred Percival. It was a crucial margin because for all their passion and intensity, the Sri Lankans were finding it increasingly difficult to gain any sort of meaningful field position.<\/p>\n
Treeby sealed the win with a cheeky try off a quick lineout try in the last 10 minutes. While the scoreline looked comfortable, the sheer physical exertion of playing in 30C heat and 90% humidity made it anything but.<\/p>\n
New Zealand coach Ben Sinnamon said that while the side were pleased with the win, they must improve before next weekend\u2019s next game.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Tuskers really showed how much they wanted it tonight, their physicality and pressure was outstanding. However, we backed our systems in some really trying conditions.\u201d<\/p>\n
Discipline was an issue for both teams, with Dilshan needlessly yellow-carded when he stomped on Percival after scoring. Asiata was unlucky when his attempted tackle slipped high on a Sri Lankan ball-carrier.<\/p>\n
Percival described the match as a \u201cclassic ding-dong battle\u201d.<\/p>\n
\u201cCredit to the Sri Lankans, they really brought it to us in the first half. I\u2019m really proud of the way we problem-solved on the go and the boys who came off the bench, they were crucial.\u201d<\/p>\n
The two sides now head to Kandy for the second match of the tour.<\/p>\n
New Zealand Under-85kg 27 (Simon Sia, Pasia Asiata, Matt Treeby tries; Taine Cordell-Hull 3 pen, con; Jarred Percival pen, con)<\/p>\n
Sri Lanka 16 (Akash Madusanka, Janidu Dilshan tries; Thenuka Nanayakkara 2 pen)<\/p>\n
HT: 16-13<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The second half saw the crucial injection of the New Zealand bench, with lock Jack Laity and front-row…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":398073,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[205586,4498,39919,171762,305,14236,78,60319,10543,20562,195036,117,111,43,139,69,6327,6102,29850,205585,18457,80],"class_list":{"0":"post-398072","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-205586","9":"tag-beat","10":"tag-colombo","11":"tag-hardfought","12":"tag-have","13":"tag-held","14":"tag-in","15":"tag-lanka","16":"tag-match","17":"tag-mens","18":"tag-muchimproved","19":"tag-new","20":"tag-new-zealand","21":"tag-news","22":"tag-newzealand","23":"tag-nz","24":"tag-rugby","25":"tag-side","26":"tag-sri","27":"tag-under85kg","28":"tag-winning","29":"tag-zealand"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398072","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=398072"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/398072\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/398073"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=398072"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=398072"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=398072"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}