Dave Rennie has changed his entire starting XV to face the Bulls on Saturday at Loftus Versfeld. Codie Taylor takes the armband for the first time in his 110th match for the All Blacks, Josh Jacomb makes his first start and Beauden Barrett drops back to full-back.
Murray Taulagi could be leaving the NRL. According to the Australian press, the North Queensland Cowboys winger has agreed terms with a Top 14 club on a multi-year deal. At 27, he would arrive with 72 NRL tries to his name.
Francis Saili is carrying on in Pro D2. After two seasons at Vannes, the 35-year-old New Zealand centre has signed a one-year deal with Nice, a few days after the Riviera club's place in the division was confirmed. It will be his fourth club in France.
Richie Mo'unga is joining the All Blacks in South Africa for the rest of the tour. The 32-year-old fly-half replaces Billy Proctor, who fractured his shoulder blade, and returns to the national side three years after the 2023 Rugby World Cup final.
The All Blacks crushed the Sharks 54-0 on Tuesday in Durban, in their second match of the "Rugby's Greatest Rivalry" tour. Before kick-off, 44-year-old Ma'a Nonu had answered his former team's haka on his own. The gesture will be remembered, and so will the score.
Béziers beat Narbonne 29-27 with a drop goal in the dying seconds of the Feria match, having trailed 0-20. Beyond the friendly, this derby heralds another one: the real thing, in the league, missing for more than four years.
Léo Carbonneau has ruptured his cruciate ligaments in pre-season. Racing 92 lose, for a long spell, the scrum-half they used most last season. Maxime Machenaud, signed this summer after four seasons at Bayonne, inherits the role by default.
Colomiers have signed New Zealand centre Seamus Bardoul for two seasons, until 2028. The 29-year-old leaves Bay of Plenty, where he played 24 matches over four NPC campaigns.
RC Vannes are working on two relocated home games for their return to the top flight. The visit of Stade Toulousain, scheduled for 19 September, should move to Roazhon Park in Rennes, and the club is looking at La Beaujoire to host Union Bordeaux-Bègles in early November. Those are precisely the two sides that gave them the heaviest beatings during their previous spell in the Top 14.
Ma'a Nonu, 44, is on the Sharks bench to face the All Blacks on Tuesday night in Durban. Across 103 Tests, he performed the haka before kick-off. This time, he will be on the receiving end. In a 23-year career, the former centre had never played against New Zealand.
Eddie Hearn, the boxing promoter turned agent, reckons Henry Pollock is worth more than a million pounds a season. That is a sixth of the English salary cap for a single 21-year-old player. The comparison with the Top 14 says everything about two opposing models.
Billed as returning in Buenos Aires after months out, the South Africa captain left the field in the 24th minute with a damaged hamstring. Twelve days before Ellis Park, the question is no longer whether he will play the series, but for how long.
By raising its cap from 10.7 to 11.3 million euros, the LNR (the body that runs French professional rugby) pushed through a second, far weightier reform: the credits granted to clubs that supply the France team will now taper off. Applied to last season, the new scale cuts the gap in cap between clubs by a quarter. And it sheds light on Thomas Ramos's departure.
Australia beat Japan 35-32 in Osaka in Les Kiss's first match in charge, despite playing twenty minutes with fourteen men. A three-point margin, after four last October. The trend of recent meetings points to a shift.
The French Rugby Federation will overhaul its amateur pyramid in 2027-2028: six tiers instead of seven, four national levels, and the end of the word "Fédérale". The season now starting is therefore the last in this format. It involves 342 clubs and more than 3,400 fixtures.
Lucas Martins will join Castres in 2027 with seventeen tries to his name. It is the third time in twenty years that an Agen wing has finished as Pro D2's top try scorer. Before him came Yoann Huget and George Tilsley.
The FFR appeal committee confirmed Nissa Rugby's place in Pro D2 on Friday. The 4.6 million in guarantees has been lodged, and the five-point deduction becomes a two-point suspended penalty. Mont-de-Marsan stay in Nationale.
Stade Français has been targeted by the Qilin ransomware group, which has already published eighteen players' identity documents and set 15 August as the deadline to pay. Behind the news story lies an industrial method that is worth understanding.
Corentin Mézou has extended his contract with Toulon until June 2029. At 21, the Brittany-born lock is coming off a nineteen-match season and becomes the longest-committed player in his position at the RCT.
Les Kiss takes charge of a first Australia test on Saturday in Higashi-Osaka, in a two-match home-and-away series against Eddie Jones's Japan. An opponent that looks like a warm-up but that, ten months ago, left the Wallabies with only four points to spare.
