Rennie will also have to name a new captain for the game on Sunday (NZ time) after skipper Ardie Savea returned to New Zealand with a dislocated shoulder following last weekend’s 29-24 third-test defeat in Johannesburg.<\/p>\n
Luke Jacobson, who took over the leadership role for the rest of the game, is also out with an elbow injury.<\/p>\n
Codie Taylor, who deputised for Savea earlier in the tour, was dropped for the third test and is unlikely to be recalled for the game in the United States.<\/p>\n
Taylor’s place for the third test was taken by Asafo Aumua, who is likely to be named again when Rennie announces the side on Friday (NZT).<\/p>\n
Both New Zealand and South Africa arrived in the US on Monday after sharing a chartered plane from Johannesburg.<\/p>\n
“We sort of always thought we would make changes in the fourth test regardless of whether we won that third one or not,” Rennie said.<\/p>\n
“We want to make sure we are bringing in guys with plenty of energy and to share the load.”<\/p>\n
Rennie also has a decision to make around the first five-eighth position.<\/p>\n
First-choice Ruben Love has delivered two underwhelming performances in the last two tests and his spot is under threat from Richie Mo’unga, who last played a test for the All Blacks at the 2023 World Cup in France.<\/p>\n
Mo’unga, 32, was called up as an injury replacement in an effort by Rennie to integrate him into the squad one year out from the 2027 World Cup in Australia.<\/p>\n
Rieko Ioane could be the choice at centre to replace the injured Quinn Tupaea, who has also returned home.<\/p>\n
Rennie felt his bruised and battered side could still square the four-test series dubbed “Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry”.<\/p>\n
“We have definitely got one more in us,” he told reporters.<\/p>\n
“There is massive emotional disappointment, but there’s a lot to play for in our minds. We can win this weekend and tie the series two-all and will go home knowing we’re in a better spot than when we arrived.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Rennie will also have to name a new captain for the game on Sunday (NZ time) after skipper…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":594267,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[111,139,69,213],"class_list":["post-594266","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-new-zealand","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594266","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=594266"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/594266\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/594267"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=594266"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=594266"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=594266"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}