Moana Pasifika are in a race against time to prove they've recovered sufficiently from their COVID-19 outbreak to field a team for their match against the Chiefs on Sunday.
The team was forced to self-isolate in their Queenstown hotel after several players and staff tested positive, a number coach Aaaron Mauger says was "a lot higher" than the seven originally reported.
Subsequently, their opening game against the Blues was postponed.
While the first contingent of the squad were cleared to return to training on Sunday, there are still 15 players self-isolating in the hotel.
NZ Rugby has tweaked the Super Rugby Pacific schedule for round two to allow the team more time to prepare, pushing Moana Pasifika's game from Friday back to Sunday afternoon.
But the team only has until Wednesday to prove it can field a matchday-23 for their potential Super Rugby debut.
"That's been one of our challenges as we look forward to how can we safely prepare a team as best we can to play this weekend," says Mauger.
Obviously, we’ve got a deadline [on Wednesday] to meet and that will be challenging just based on the amount of guys who have been affected and tested positive with COVID.
"It will be a bit of a balancing act and a bit of a squeeze, but we're doing everything we can to get our players back out on the track."
To meet Wednesday's deadline, Mauger will look to his strength and conditioning team to assess where his players stand after missing out on so much valuable conditioning time.
They will also be adhering to NZR's 'return to play' protocols for players who have contracted COVID-19.
"The big one is trying to avoid injury to Achilles, calves, knees, a lot of proprioception stuff, and the ability to absorb force.
"We did a lot of stuff with force plates on the first day out. We got some measures from that.
"That sort of told us the impact of not being at high intensities. It also gives us a bit of indication of how hard we can push our players in these initial couple of days.
"The danger of pushing too hard too early is that it can have a longer-term or residual effect, which can catch up on you later down the track."
Mauger mentioned the possibility of bringing in some replacement players from other Super Rugby squads or reverting to uncontested scrums, which are an option under NZR's guidelines.
"We'll do anything to get back out onto the field. There has been talk about replacement players from other teams.
"We could probably do that with maybe three or four max, anything past that and it's not really a Moana Pasifika team.
"So when it starts to get to those levels, we'd probably take that off the table and do what's right for Moana Pasifika and for our players."
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