Mitre 10 Cup & NRC: Saturday Top Performers

Following a jam-packed day in the Mitre 10 Cup and NRC we take a look at who performed for their respective sides.

Josh McKay - Canterbury

An outstanding performance by the Canterbury speedster who headed into the match having signed a new contract extension with the Highlanders.

It's easy to see why the Landers were eager to tie down the youngster as he ripped through the Bay of Plenty defence with relative ease to score two tries.

A former flyhalf McKay's kicking game is also superb as to is his distribution. 

Trael Joass - Bay of Plenty

The New Zealand 7s star was a standout performer for Bay of Plenty despite his side going down 19-31 to Canterbury.

He did well to go the likes of Chase Tiatia, Fa'asiu Futai and Kaleb Trask into space and was superb on defence.

Fijian Drua

Hard to narrow it down to one or two players with the Drua putting in a fantastic team effort to beat a strong Melbourne Rising side 40-17.

The Drua's team effort is perfectly summed up by this superb try: 

Rob Thompson

Thompson's incredible 2018 form continued today with another superb performance in a losing effort against Otago. 

The Highlanders' centre was involved in all three of the Turbos tries, dotting down for one himself and assisting the other two.

Villimoni Koroi - Otago

Another New Zealand 7s star to feature on this list!

Koroi was crucial to Otago's win over Manawatu despite not crossing the line for his side.

He was exceptional on the counter-attack and linked up well with his fellow teammates to secure a 17-50 come from behind victory.

James Slipper - Queensland Country

The Wallabies front-rower was extremely impressive on his return from suspension. 

He carried the ball 9 times in the first half and made metres with relative ease. 

He also dominated at scrum time and was unlucky not to be rewarded with a meat pie. 

Folau Faingaa - Canberra Vikings

Faingaa returned to Canberra in fine form after making his test debut against the All Blacks last week.

He was under pressure at scrum time but his lineouts were pinpoint and was lethal on attack and defence.

He made good decisions at the back of the Canberra maul leading to two tries.

Finlay Christie - Tasman Mako

The clever Chiefs halfback had an outstanding game against North Harbour upstaging one of the form halfbacks in New Zealand at the moment - Bryn Hall.

He controlled the Tasman attack brilliantly darted over for a crucial try in the 69th minute.

Shannon Frizell - Tasman Mako

Frizell is another All Black who performed well after being released from the national side to get some game time.

Playing at no.8 Frizell was deadly on attack and showed off his wide range of skills with a number of offloads, bone-crunching tackles and superb running lines.