The Eagles Pacific Nations Cup campaign kicks off this week by taking on Samoa at Avaya Stadium in San Jose. The team has already gathered in the Bay Area where they will be training at Stanford. We caught up with head coach Mike Tolkin who opened up briefly on several topics, including the captaincy change, position battles, and more. (Note: We've paraphrased much of what Tolkin said so if it doesn't sound like him, or if it's not descriptive enough, that's on us.)
On the reasons for captaincy change from Todd Clever to Chris Wyles:
Todd is going through a lot of changes in his career and coming back from injury. We thought it would be better to allow him to focus on that. Wyles is coming off a great year in England.
On whether the team will pick the five best players for lock/back-row or whether they will pick on a positional basis:
Take the jump to read more.
We look at it by a positional basis rather than picking the best five. Some players are specialists. Andrew Durutalo is a specialist 7, Cam Dolan, Al McFarland, and Danny Barrett are specialist number 8s, Clever's a six.
On the team's overall health:
It's been good. A double-edge sword because they haven't played in awhile which has allowed some guys to recover from injuries.
On whether Samu Manoa will be available for the World Cup given he won't play in the PNC:
Giving him the PNC off allows him to settle in with his family down in France. He will be at the World Cup. He was bummed to miss out on the last World Cup so he definitely wants to be a part of this World Cup.
On Titi Lamositele's development:
Excited to have him back. Reports out of England say that he has been looking good.
On whether most players left out of the PNC squad are out for playing reasons:
(We paraphrased this one the most so we'll take it out of Tolkin's point of view.) Tolkin feels that the group he has heading into the PNC is the best group for the tournament. They felt that Petri and Suniula were the best options at scrumhalf and that Kruger was an exciting player. Other players, like those on the back-row and lock just have a lot of competition ahead of them.
On whether Toby L'Estrange is a fly-half or will be looked at elsewhere:
We're looking at him as a fly-half but he is a good ball player so we'll see.
On having Taku Ngwenya back in the team:
He's fit back in well and provides leadership.
On having 7s guys in camp:
We're excited to have them in. They bring a lot of energy and they bring a winning attitude coming from a winning atmosphere.
On the upcoming PNC and the team's goals:
We want to get a look and our players. It's been 13 months since this group of players were in camp aside from a four day assembly ahead of the All Blacks. We are still trying to figure out who is on the World Cup squad. The PNC and the lead in to the World Cup is about the process, not about how many wins and losses their might be. It's important to get the process right.