Record-breaking goalkicker Mike Harris has had enough of making the headlines through his radar-boot and wants more chances to shine as the Queensland Reds’ bona-fide playmaker.
And the Kiwi recruit, now seriously in the mix for a Wallabies cap in June, hopes Super Rugby officials help by taking a stricter view on rivals illegally killing the Reds’ dangerous attack.
Harris has slotted a competition-record 24 straight goals from all his attempts in the past two seasons – with 16, including 13 penalties, coming from this year’s wins over the NSW Waratahs and Western Force.
But the former New Zealand under-20 flyhalf said he’d much rather his kicking tee stay off the ground.
“I don’t want to be seen as just a goalkicker but, if teams are going to intentionally slow our ball down, then it’s nice to be able to punish them for their sins,” he told AAP on Monday.
“It would be nice to put a few more tries on the board.”
Queensland have scored just three tries with Harris calling the shots at No.10 instead of Wallabies star Quade Cooper.
Harris has been solid rather than dazzling with the ball and both he and Reds coach Ewen McKenzie have admitted their frustrations at seeing opponents taking a negative approach against the defending champions by “cheating” at the breakdown.
Harris felt rival players would be less inclined to infringe – and concede three points – if some were sin-binned.
“It would be quite nice to see a couple of yellow cards come out early for intentional infringements,” he told AAP.
“I think some teams are intentionally causing trouble, especially out wide in the 22.
“If players started having a rest for 10 minutes then it would speed the games up and allow us to play and hopefully score more tries, which everyone wants to see.
“I’m not bagging referees but it would be good to make teams pay for what they’re trying to do.”
Recruited from North Harbour at the end of 2010, Harris is eligible for Wallabies selection due to an Australian-born grandmother and his efforts to break Morne Steyn’s 21-goal record streak put him closer to earning his international dream in June.
Test coach Robbie Deans has indicated he’ll lean heavily on the Reds and Force, who have a Super Rugby bye before the Wallabies mid-week clash with Scotland, for his opening team of the year.
Queensland have fresh injury worries for Saturday night’s home match against the Melbourne Rebels with No.8 Radike Samo (shoulder) and reserve prop Greg Holmes (back) in doubt.
Flanker Scott Higginbotham (buttock) is expected to return while hooker Saia Faingaa (ankle) is improving and in better shape than brother Anthony (hamstring).
Hopperdoggy
Guest
Somehow I don't think the term super boot has anything whatsoever to do with who you are playing.
Danny
Guest
Two games and he's superboot. Aussie commentators never learn. And one of them against easybeats Melbourne. Looks like the Reds are going to have a lazyboy recliner ride again this year.
Sprigs
Guest
Mike Harris is a brilliant player and NZ will rue the day they let him slip away. . Harris may have been "solid rather than dazzling" so far this year in his running game, but this lad can run and cut through.
The truth of Europe
Guest
Gary we should cut Anae some slack as he is a prop by trade not a hooker. He was thrown the gig because of injuries.
Gary Russell-Sharam
Guest
Harris seems to be going quite well after a couple of games, and there is no reason why he will not improve if we look at last season's form. The injury worries are part of the game and Link seems to have managed them OK up to now. It will be good to have Higgy back and Schatz can go to number 8 and have either Quirk or Gill on the open side. They will loose a bit but if the Rebels are anything like last week they will not trouble the Reds too much. IMO they have a much urgent need to have the hookers fit because Anae wasn't up to scratch. the basic skills of a hooker is to be able to push in the scrum be mobile around the park and TO THROW INTO THE LINEOUT STRAIGHT. I don't single out Anae as the only hooker that struggles with this aspect but you would think with having say started playing at around 6 - 8 years old and maybe cementing your spot as a hooker when your about maybe 15 or late teens, that by the time you are in your middle twenties that you should have mastered throwing into the lineout straight. Seems it must be a lot harder than you think it is to throw an oval ball straight. Over time there has been quite a few variations of throwing into the lineout, wingers used to do this when I played. Maybe it is my memory fading but we didn't have this amount of trouble when wingers threw into the lineout. I have an opinion that they try to put too much technicality into a simple task, when coaching young players I just tell them to stop with the technicality and just chuck it in straight I don't care if it spirals properly as long as you get it in there to the right height and the right distance. Sound simple doesn't it?????