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Wellington - World Cup-winning All Blacks Julian Savea, Cory Jane and Victor Vito were among five players dropped by the Wellington Hurricanes on Thursday for breaking a team curfew.
The trio, along with Ardie Savea and Chris Eves, will miss Saturday's match against the Reds as punishment for staying out late before last week's upset loss to the Sharks in South Africa.
Hurricanes coach Chris Boyd said the players had made a poor decision.
"Though some people may not see staying out late as being particularly serious, the team set their standards very high this year and everyone bought into that at the start of the season," Boyd said on Thursday when naming his line-up to play the Reds.
"We have a great bunch of guys in the squad and this was an isolated incident, but there are certain lines in the sand and when those lines are crossed there are consequences.
"The players involved know they made a mistake and I'm pretty confident they will be motivated to make up for that when they become available for selection again next week."
Julian Savea was the overall leading try-scorer in last year's World Cup, Jane played in the final of the 2011 World Cup and Vito was a member of both the 2011 and 2015 winning All Blacks squads.
The Hurricanes, who two weeks ago beat top South African side Lions 50-17, were beaten by the Sharks 32-15 and slipped from third to fourth in the New Zealand conference.
Teams:
Hurricanes
15 James Marshall, 14 Jason Woodward, 13 Matt Proctor, 12 Vince Aso, 11 Wes Goosen, 10 Beauden Barrett, 9 TJ Perenara, 8 Blade Thomson, 7 Callum Gibbins, 6 Brad Shields, 5 Michael Fatialofa, 4 Vaea Fifita, 3 Jeffery Toomaga-Allen, 2 Dane Coles (captain), 1 Reg Goodes
Substitutes: 16 Motu Matu'u, 17 Loni Uhila, 18 Ben May, 19 Mark Abbott, 20 Tony Lamborn, 21 Te Toiroa Tahuriorangi, 22 Ngani Laumape, 23 Willis Halaholo
Reds
15 Ayumu Goromaru, 14 Chris Feauai-Sautia, 13 Campbell Magnay, 12 Anthony Fainga’a, 11 Eto Nabuli, 10 Jake McIntyre, 9 Nick Frisby, 8 Curtis Browning, 7 Liam Gill, 6 Hendrik Tui, 5 Rob Simmons, 4 Ben Matwijow, 3 Greg Holmes, 2 Andrew Ready, 1 James Slipper (captain)
Substitutes: 16 Matt Mafi, 17 Sef Fa’agase, 18 Sam Talakai, 19 Cadeyrn Neville, 20 Michael Gunn, 21 James Tuttle, 22 Duncan Paia’aua, 23 Junior Laloifi
