{"id":475674,"date":"2026-06-13T17:45:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-13T17:45:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/475674\/"},"modified":"2026-06-13T17:45:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-13T17:45:13","slug":"blues-player-ratings-v-hurricanes-all-black-sorely-missed-beauden-barrett-wasted-at-full-back","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/475674\/","title":{"rendered":"Blues player ratings v Hurricanes: All Black ‘sorely missed’, Beauden Barrett wasted at full-back"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Following the Blues\u2019 57-21 loss to the Hurricanes, here\u2019s how we rated Vern Cotter\u2019s men in their Super Rugby Pacific semi-final defeat.<\/p>\n

Blues player ratings v Hurricanes<\/p>\n

15 Beauden Barrett: An early penalty conceded in a poor contest with Cam Roigard, which led to the opening try for the Hurricanes. It was Barrett\u2019s first start at full-back in over 30 matches and ultimately led to him being anonymous for long spells of the match. He looked far better when stepping into the first-receiver role and frankly should have started at fly-half instead. 6<\/p>\n

14 Cole Forbes: Superbly latched onto Payton Spencer\u2019s kick in behind and showed great awareness to set up the son of the All Blacks<\/a> great to score. On the whole, it was a decent outing even if he got steamrolled by Kini Naholo; so many have before to be fair. 7<\/p>\n

13 AJ Lam: Very little involvement in his 12 minutes on the pitch as he completed two passes. Suffered a head knock and failed his HIA. He was a massive loss for the Blues<\/a> in the semi-final and will continue to be when he completes his move to Clermont. 5<\/p>\n

12 Xavi Taele: On the balance of the match, Taele was outplayed by the Hurricanes<\/a>\u2018 midfield pairing, but he still did not have a poor game. He had several smart defensive reads and fared reasonably in attack. 7<\/p>\n

11 Caleb Clarke: The All Blacks winger was shaping up for a big performance for the lucky losers. He played a big role in the build-up to Patrick Tuipulotu\u2019s try, skittling defenders before being dragged down just short of the line and his skipper ran a sharp line to score. He also hammered Jordie Barrett from a restart and made another good hit on defence but hit his head on the ball carrier\u2019s hip, which led to an HIA that he ultimately failed, ending his evening after 17 minutes. His and Lam\u2019s bulk was sorely missed in the backline as the Blues struggled to make much ground. 8<\/p>\n

10 Stephen Perofeta: The Hurricanes were lethal on turnover ball and were given several opportunities by the Blues\u2019 fly-half who desperately tried to create chances. He conceded possession four times in the match, overcooked a cute kick in behind that gifted the ball back to the Hurricanes and had issues under the high ball. He really struggled to get the Blues\u2019 attack firing and was error-ridden. 4<\/p>\n

9 Finlay Christie: Kicked reasonably well out of hand in the first half, and his service was decent. Didn\u2019t return to the action after the break. 6<\/p>\n

Blues player ratings v Hurricanes: All Blacks star \u2018sorely missed\u2019 as \u2018anonymous\u2019 Beauden Barrett wasted at full-back<\/a><\/p>\n

Hurricanes v Chiefs: Super Rugby Pacific Grand Final fixture, date, kick-off time and how to watch confirmed<\/a><\/p>\n

The forwards<\/p>\n

8 Hoskins Sotutu: Proved to be his final game in New Zealand before his departure to the Newcastle Red Bulls and it perhaps showed why he hasn\u2019t got many opportunities with the All Blacks. Dropped a straightforward pass from Barrett in the 24th minute, was penalised for holding on later in the match after a soft carry and then pinged for a lazy tackle in the Hurricanes half. Made 11 carries for 32 metres but never really troubled the \u2018Canes defence. Work-rate was there, just not overly impactful or effective. 5<\/p>\n

\"\"\/<\/p>\n

7 Anton Segner: The Blues were beaten on the floor and in their air as the Hurricanes thrived off turnover and loose possession. Much of the blame for that must fall on the shoulders of the forward pack. Segner worked relentlessly and was effective in the first half, but he fell off as the game progressed and was replaced early in the second half. 6<\/p>\n

6 Torian Barnes: The young loose forward has plenty of promise, particularly given how much graft he gets through \u2013 he topped the tackle count (17). However, he needs to iron out the errors in his game, and there were plenty on Saturday, including a soft penalty in the 12th minute for obstruction which the \u2018Canes capitalised on to score. His inaccuracies at the breakdown also led to turnovers. 4<\/p>\n

Hurricanes player ratings: \u2018Rampaging\u2019 All Blacks hooker dominates as Jordie Barrett and \u2018Canes bench blow Blues away<\/a><\/p>\n

5 Sam Darry: Frankly, a poor showing from the All Blacks second rower who struggled to run the lineout effectively under the pressure of Warner Dearns while he made some very average tackle attempts. He was shrugged off by Xavier Numia in a manner that simply shouldn\u2019t be occurring so close to the ruck, and that wasn\u2019t his only lapse in defence. He did have some good moments, but the bad overshadowed those. 4<\/p>\n

4 Patrick Tuipulotu (c): Compared to last week, the Blues skipper was a more reliable lineout option on this occasion, putting in a far more energetic and effective performance. He was also rewarded with his team\u2019s opening try after he ran a great line in close. One of the busier tacklers too. 6<\/p>\n

Want more from Planet Rugby? Add us as a preferred source on Google to your favourites list<\/a> for world-class coverage you can trust.<\/p>\n

3 Marcel Renata: He was left with a lot to do on the goal line but should have at least got a shoulder onto Barrett for the opening Canes\u2019 try. He was fortunate that referee Ben O\u2019Keeffe reset scrums or allowed play to continue instead of penalising him for folding in at the set-piece. 4<\/p>\n

2 Bradley Slater: Another Blues forward that got stuck into a lot but lacked the accuracy to be impactful. He was cleared off the ball early in the second half by Fehi Fineanganofo, which resulted in a try. The lineout inaccuracies weren\u2019t all his doing, but he can hold his head high for his overall work-rate. 5<\/p>\n

1 Ofa Tu\u2019ungafasi: As with his fellow prop, he could be thankful that the officials turned a blind eye to much of the scrum illegalities but was more impactful in the loose than his fellow front-rower. 5<\/p>\n

Replacements: Spencer impressed in the first half and really tried to fire the attack into life, which he did when he grabbed a try of his own. Pita Ahki was also an early introduction and he fared reasonably well whilst Eli Oudenryn was the pick of the lot, scoring a stunning solo try and bringing real energy into the collisions. On the whole, though, the impacts off the bench was the real deciding factor in Wellington and it was where the Hurricanes really outclassed the visitors who had used all of their backline replacements by half-time. 4<\/p>\n

READ MORE: Sonny Bill Williams issues candid warning to budding athletes from hospital ahead of neck surgery<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Following the Blues\u2019 57-21 loss to the Hurricanes, here\u2019s how we rated Vern Cotter\u2019s men in their Super…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":475675,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[33339,337,42,1463,49155,111,43,82286,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-475674","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-blues","tag-features","tag-headlines","tag-home-page","tag-hurricanes","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-super-rugby","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475674","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=475674"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/475674\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/475675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=475674"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=475674"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=475674"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}