Hoskins Sotutu double hands Blues polished win over Brumbies in Eden Park thrashing

All Blacks number eight Hoskins Sotutu bagged a brace of tries as the Blues claimed their biggest win ever over the Brumbies, with the scoreline finishing 46-7 at full-time

The hosts were polished from the outset and scored seven tries through Sotutu’s double, Caleb Clarke, Dalton Papali’i, Taufa Funaki, Ricky Riccitelli and Kurt Eklund. From the boot, Harry Plummer kicked four conversions and a penalty in what was a lovely showing from the fly-half in Auckland.

The Brumbies finally found some sort of rhythm late on and scored a converted try through Luke Reimer, with Noah Lolesio kicking the conversion in what was a consolation score.

Click here to see teams and scorers

It was Sotutu who opened the scoring in just the ninth minute as the Blues were rewarded for early possession despite being a man down with Funaki in the sin bin. Plummer was on hand to add the extras on this occasion.

The scoring went into a lull for a while before, eventually, the Blues were once again rewarded, this time through Clarke, who barged over the line for a converted try in the 33rd minute. Plummer added to the scoreboard minutes later with a penalty before Sotutu secured his double on the stroke of half-time – a score that takes him to the top of try scoring charts.

The start to the second half followed the first, with Blues storming out of the blocks through an unconverted Papali’i try in the 45th minute. Funaki would make amends for his first-half yellow card with another try in the 52nd minute with Plummer making no mistake this time. Prolific hooker Riccitelli followed suit six minutes later.

Slowly, the Brumbies began to string some phases together and finally crossed through Reimer near the hour mark, with Lolesio kicking the extras. The game would not finish there, with replacement hooker Eklund rubbing salt in the wound as he scored with two minutes left.

Teams

Blues: 15 Cole Forbes, 14 Mark Tele’a, 13 Rieko Ioane, 12 Bryce Heem, 11 Caleb Clarke, 10 Harry Plummer, 9 Taufa Funaki, 8 Hoskins Sotutu, 7 Dalton Papali’i, 6 Akira Ioane, 5 Laghlan McWhannell, 4 Patrick Tuipulotu (c), 3 Marcel Renata, 2 Ricky Riccitelli, 1 Ofa Tu’ungafasi
Replacements: 16 Kurt Eklund, 17 Joshua Fusitu’a, 18 Angus Ta’avao, 19 Sam Darry, 20 Adrian Choat, 21 Sam Nock, 22 Lucas Cashmore, 23 AJ Lam

Brumbies: 15 Tom Wright, 14 Ollie Sapsford, 13 Hudson Creighton, 12 Tamati Tua, 11 Corey Toole, 10 Noah Lolesio, 9 Ryan Lonergan (c), 8 Charlie Cale, 7 Jahrome Brown, 6 Rob Valetini, 5 Cadeyrn Neville, 4 Darcy Swain, 3 Sefo Kautai, 2 Billy Pollard, 1 James Slipper
Replacements: 16 Connal McInerney, 17 Blake Schoupp, 18 Rhys Van Nek, 19 Nick Frost, 20 Tom Hooper, 21 Luke Reimer, 22 Harrison Goddard, 23 Jack Debreczeni

READ MORE: Super Rugby: Two All Blacks lead legendary list of all-time try scorers