{"id":14441,"date":"2025-07-03T06:45:04","date_gmt":"2025-07-03T10:45:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/sin-categoria\/all-blacks-robertson-starts-era-with-four-debutants-against-france\/"},"modified":"2025-07-03T06:45:04","modified_gmt":"2025-07-03T10:45:04","slug":"all-blacks-robertson-starts-era-with-four-debutants-against-france","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/rugby\/all-blacks-robertson-starts-era-with-four-debutants-against-france\/","title":{"rendered":"All Blacks: Robertson starts era with four debutants against France"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Scott Robertson Starts New Era with the All Blacks: Debutants and Strategic Changes<\/h2>\n\n\nAll Blacks coach Scott Robertson kicks off a new era, introducing four debutants in the team for the season opener against France in Dunedin.\n\nRobertson on Thursday named Christian Lio-Willie and Fabian Holland at number 8 and second five-eighth, respectively, while Ollie Norris and Du&#8217;Plessis Kirifi were included on the bench.\n\nLio-Willie is perhaps the most surprising inclusion, as the Crusaders player was originally only called up to the team as injury cover.\n\nHowever, a knee injury to Wallace Sititi, which has ruled him out for the entire series against France, created the opportunity for Lio-Willie to enter the considerations and will now play alongside Holland.\n\nThe Highlanders&#8217; second row is one of the most amazing stories of recent times, given that he left the Netherlands at 16 to pursue his rugby dream in New Zealand.\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/a.espncdn.com\/combiner\/i?img=%2Fphoto%2F2025%2F0703%2Fr1514221_1296x729_16%2D9.jpg\" alt=\"Christian Lio-Willie\" title=\"\"><figcaption>Christian Lio-Willie har\u00e1 su debut en el test en el puesto n\u00famero 8 en el partido inaugural de los All Blacks contra Francia.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\nJoins captain Scott Barrett in the second row, while Tupou Vaa&#8217;i starts at number 6, indicating the game strategy Robertson wishes to implement.\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>This is a momentous occasion for these men and their families; we are all thrilled for them.<\/p><cite>Scott Robertson<\/cite><\/blockquote>\n\n\n&#8220;For Fabian and Christian, it will be special to debut in front of the local Dunedin fans and I am sure that Fabian&#8217;s Highlanders supporters and Christian&#8217;s Otago fans will be in full voice,&#8221; added Robertson.\n\n&#8220;Ollie and Du&#8217;Plessis have shown their class in Super Rugby this year and we know they are ready.&#8221;\n\nThe inclusion of Lio-Willie, for his part, pushes Ardie Savea back to his usual position as number 7, as the veteran has spent much of the last few years at number 8 for the All Blacks.\n\nMeanwhile, Beauden Barrett surpassed Damian McKenzie to be the first fly-half, while Rieko Ioane has moved to the wing to accommodate the talented Billy Proctor.\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">New Zealand Lineup<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>Will Jordan<\/li><li>Sevu Reece<\/li><li>Billy Proctor<\/li><li>Jordie Barrett<\/li><li>Rieko Ioane<\/li><li>Beauden Barrett<\/li><li>Cam Roigard<\/li><li>Christian Lio-Willie<\/li><li>Ardie Savea<\/li><li>Tupou Vaa&#8217;i<\/li><li>Fabian Holland<\/li><li>Scott Barrett<\/li><li>Fletcher Newell<\/li><li>Codie Taylor<\/li><li>Ethan de Groot<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n<b>Substitutes:<\/b> Samisoni Taukei&#8217;aho, Ollie Norris, Pasilio Tosi, Samipeni Finau, Du&#8217;Plessis Kirifi, Cortez Ratima, Damian McKenzie, Quinn Tupaea.","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scott Robertson Starts New Era with the All Blacks: Debutants and Strategic Changes All Blacks coach Scott Robertson kicks off a new era, introducing four debutants in the team for the season opener against France in Dunedin. Robertson on Thursday named Christian Lio-Willie and Fabian Holland at number 8 and second five-eighth, respectively, while Ollie [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":14442,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[40],"tags":[4551,680,203,5247],"class_list":{"0":"post-14441","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-all-blacks","9":"tag-debut","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-scott-robertson"},"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14441","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14441"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14441\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14442"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14441"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14441"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alofokedeportes.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14441"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}