Hello and welcome to Ultimate Rugby's coverage as Manawatu host Northland. The away side are in poor form of late. They come out tonight looking to avoid their 5th straight defeat. With that in mind and playoffs out of the question, they have made a number of changes to their starting XV. Abel and Murray enter the fray in the front row while Griffin completes the changes in the pack, at 6. Ranger moves closer to the action at 13. The battle of the outside centres will be an interesting one tonight. Ranger, the former AB is set to do battle tonight with young hot shot Jason Emery!
We feel that the prospect of sneaking into the top 4 will be plenty motivation for Manawatu who will likely prove too strong for Northland this evening.