McAlister back on track

Fears that Luke McAlister would be forced to withdraw from the New Zealand side to take on Australia in the Tri-Nations this weekend have abated.

McAlister was named to start at inside centre for the All Blacks’ must-win clash, which also doubles as Bledisloe Cup game, at Sydney’s ANZ Stadium despite being forced out of training with back spasms on Tuesday.

However the 25-year-old midfielder has taken a full part in a skills session in Sydney today and seems likely to take his place alongside the returning Daniel Carter in a rejigged All Blacks back line on Saturday.

“He was reasonably sore last night, although not quite as sore as I expected because I had the same thing a few times when I was playing,” assistant coach Wayne Smith told www.stuff.co.nz.

“When you go into spasm it can be very painful. But it can come right quickly. We will just have to monitor it.”

The New Zealanders broke with their usual routine to undertake the extra skills session where they worked on their passing, catching and tackling techniques, all areas that were well below standard in their two losses to South Africa.

“It’s just part of our overall programme to execute better. We don’t get a lot of coaching time to look at technique. We tend to prepare for Test matches each week,” explained Smith.

“So we have decided to fit in little periods, we have one after every training for 20 minutes.

“But here we decided with having the day off that most of the guys go to the gym anyway so we would do this and get some coaching time in.”