Highlanders flyhalf Lima Sopoaga scored 16 from the boot and broke Tony Brown’s Highlanders season point-scoring record.

by Brendan Bradford –

The two-time defending Super Rugby champion Chiefs have made a habit of pulling results out of the bag over the past three years, but the Hamilton-based side couldn’t find the winning touch in a 29-25 loss to an impressive Highlanders outfit in Dunedin on Friday night.

The home-side Highlanders trailed 13-10 at halftime but stormed out of the sheds in the second half with 16 unanswered points before the Chiefs mounted a late comeback which ultimately fell short.

After clawing a couple of draws from impossible situations in South Africa earlier in the season and relying on late heroics in semi-final matches against the Crusaders each of the last two years, the Chiefs are left with 36-competition points and have only a slim mathematical chance of making the finals with two matches two play.

On the other hand the Highlanders, who travel to Sydney for a do-or-die match with the Waratahs next weekend, rise momentarily to first-place in the New Zealand conference and third overall in search of their first finals berth in 12 years.

“Whatever happens this weekend happens, but we’ve got two games left and play a quality team in the Waratahs next weekend but we’ve given ourselves a chance,” said Highlanders forward Nasi Manu

“It means a lot to us, we’ve worked hard over the break to get the result and we knew the Chiefs were going to come down as defending champions and they’re a quality side with some quality players. It was an ugly win, but a win’s a win.”

Chiefs flyhalf and co-captain Aaron Cruden was left to rue what might have been.

“We thought we put ourselves in a pretty good position at halftime and started the second half well, putting them under pressure and putting phases together, but one lapse and the Highlanders will punish you on turnover ball and that’s what they did,” he said.

“The confidence was pretty high leading into the game and the guys have worked hard over the June break but unfortunately the result didn’t go our way. We fought right to the end there but in sport and footy sometimes it just doesn’t go your way.”

As always when these two sides meet, there were plenty of fireworks as Highlanders flyhalf Lima Sopoaga scored 16 points from the boot while Malakai Fekitoa was a menace in midfield.

The Chiefs were first on the scoreboard through a Cruden penalty before hard-running Highlanders centre Fekitoa created space for winger Patrick Osbourne to cross on the left.

Chiefs winger Dwayne Sweeney picked up a Cruden grubber to score in the corner and a long range Gareth Anscombe penalty followed by a Sopoaga three-pointer left the visitors with a three-point halftime lead.

The uptempo Chiefs hammered the Highlanders in the five minutes after the restart, but a Fekitoa break deep in his own 22 saw All Blacks fullback Ben Smith score at the other end of the pitch. Sopoaga landed three penalties while replacement Hayden Parker added one of his own to extend the lead as the Chiefs fought back with tries to replacements Tim Nanai-Williams and Josh Hohneck for a four-point gap with four minutes left.

The Chiefs threw everything at it in the dying minutes but the committed Highlanders defence held steady for a famous win to keep their finals hopes alive.

Highlanders 29 (Osbourne, Smith tries; Sopoaga 4 pen, 2 con, Parker pen) bt Chiefs 25 (Sweeney, Nanai-Williams, Hohneck tries; Cruden 2 cons, pen, Anscombe pen)