Next weekend, the feature game will see the Canes at home to the Blues, which should give a true pointer as to whether the hosts – who have won just a single Super title, in 2016, with Beauden Barrett at his brilliant best – will realise the genuine promise in this year’s squad.

Fairytale finish

The Crusaders’ 69-26 demolition of the Fijian Drua in the last game at Apollo Stadium was, as Crusaders’ coach Rob Penney said, a fairytale ending to a story that began with tragedy and destruction.

After the horrific 2011 Christchurch earthquake made Lancaster Park’s stands too dangerous to use, there was something almost symbolic about the city’s Super Rugby champions, like so many Cantabrians, being displaced from the place that was their home.

All 18 Super games in 2011 were played on the road, yet somehow coach Todd Blackadder and his players made that year’s final in Brisbane against the Reds, losing 20-13.

When the Crusaders got a home ground in 2012, the Addington Show Grounds (which became Apollo Stadium), they’d light up the field in the coldest, most non-fan friendly, venue in the country. The stands seemed to form a wind tunnel on frigid winter nights.

On the media bench I once watched enviously as former All Black turned ZB commentator Corey Flynn produced an electric blanket, plugged it into the socket for laptops, and called the game in comfort.

A host of great memories were still created for the Crusaders and their fans over the 14 seasons at the old stadium, but from April 24 games to be celebrated will be watched in luxurious covered comfort at the One NZ Stadium.

A team pillar

A Disney scriptwriter would have scoffed at a storyline in which Crusader Codie Taylor would score four tries in his 150th game for the franchise on the grounds that it sounded too corny. But in this case truth would prove to be more dramatic and joyful than fiction.

Taylor, who has just turned 35, is still as industrious as he was when he first played Super Rugby in 2013. He has a remarkable ability to break tackles, and near the line usually finds – as he did so often against the Drua – exactly the right spot to attack and score.

With his vast experience he appeals as the sort of level-headed veteran who would be a solid pillar in the World Cup All Blacks next year.

Having had the chance to once observe him off duty at a non-rugby event, a fundraiser for women’s refuge in Christchurch, it was clear he’s a man comfortable in his own skin, without a trace of a forbidding edge off the field.

A range of tactics

The Crusaders are now off to Australia for games with the Reds and the Western Force, but we won’t really know what their title chances are this season until round 12 when they play the Hurricanes in Wellington. What we do know is that the Crusaders have two main attacking options, and a good helping of commonsense to decide which to use.

On the one hand there’s the maul from the lineout, where Taylor is a world-class director. On the other, there’s tremendous speed and guile in the back three with Will Jordan at fullback and Sevu Reece and Chay Fihaki on the wings.

When David Havili returns to partner Leicester Fanga’anuku the midfield will be a big threat, too.

The good…

There was a lot to admire in the way the Chiefs disposed of the Waratahs, 42-14, in Hamilton. A smashing run by No 8 Kaylum Boshier led to a try in the eighth minute for wing Kyren Taumoefolau, and from then on there wasn’t a single sign that the Tahs would provide the massive upset they managed a week earlier with their 30-28 defeat of the Brumbies in Canberra.

There was more for local fans in Hamilton to enjoy, from a terrific, last-minute 70m sprint for Taumoefolau’s second try, to a big-hearted toiler, prop Reuben O’Neill, playing his 50th game for the Chiefs, to the cool-headed command Josh Jacomb brought to his role at first five-eighths.

… the bad and the ugly

There wasn’t much good about the Waratahs, who fumbled what chances they did have with poor handling or mindless kicking. They have some promising players, like 20-year-old fullback, Sid Harvey. But in Hamilton they played down to the level that the TAB odds for the game had suggested, as eight-to-one underdogs.

Alerting true fans

The 2026 edition of the Rugby Almanack has just been released, all 600 fact-jammed pages of it. I’m forever impressed by the massive amount of work that goes into a book that details men’s and women’s rugby in New Zealand, from test matches to the fact the team I followed as a high-school kid, Waihī Athletic, won the 2025 final of the Thames Valley club championship, beating Paeroa, 26-20.

The genius of the Almanack is that you can go to the bank on it being accurate. It also rewards browsing. I now know that the uncles of 2025 breakthrough women’s player of the year, Black Fern Braxton Sorensen-McGee, are league legends, Kurt and Dane Sorensen. For anyone who wants total immersion in our rugby, nothing compares to the Almanack.

Phil Gifford is a Contributing Sports Writer for NZME. He is one of the most-respected voices in New Zealand sports journalism.