Reds

Kerevi has long been earmarked as a future captain of the club and while he may only be contracted until the end of 2019, Queensland fans will be hoping he is their leader for many years to come.

The star centre will replace Scott Higginbotham as skipper.

It’s understood the veteran back rower will still form part of an extended leadership group.

The captaincy armband is not completely foreign to Kerevi, who has already led the team on seven separate occasions while one of James Slipper or Higginbotham have been absent.

Two contentious first half yellow cards two minutes apart cruelled any chance the Reds had of breaking their six-year drought at Auckland's Eden Park.

While they were reduced to 13 men, the Blues ran in two tries to open up a 21-6 halftime lead and were never headed despite seeing two yellow cards of their own in the second half.

Duncan Paia'aua and Alex Mafi crossed to add some respectability for Queensland but it was too little, too late.

The code-hopper has played five Tests for the Wallabies since making his debut against Fiji in June.

Hunt, 31, represented Australia and Queensland in rugby league and played Australian rules football before settling into union with the Reds in 2015, having also featured in the 15-man code six years earlier.

"It's been a big year for me personally, obviously making my Wallabies debut was a huge honour but I really enjoyed getting some really solid minutes up in Queensland with Reds," he said.

All they can do now is sit back and wait to see if they have to travel to Johannesburg to play the Lions or to Christchurch to play the Crusaders in the quarterfinals, something they might not know until about 5am on Sunday morning. 

Highlanders coach Tony Brown has maintained all week he'd rather play the unbeaten Crusaders, meaning he will be keeping a close eye on Saturday night's match between the Hurricanes and Crusaders in Wellington.

However, eight-Test flanker Liam Squire returns from injury to boost the Highlanders, who are fourth in the New Zealand conference and set to meet either South Africa's high-flying Lions or competition-leading countrymen the Crusaders in the quarter-finals.

Halfback Aaron Smith is rested after playing every match in the All Blacks' drawn Test series with the British and Irish Lions, while influential fullback Smith has been given another week off after vertigo kept him out of the final two tests.

The Blues region is home to about 150,000 Samoans while the team itself has a number of players with Samoan heritage, as well as head coach Tana Umaga.

"We've seen the amount of Samoan players that are playing overseas and it's good to take something back to the islands," he said.

"We saw it with obviously other teams going to Fiji and now it's Samoa's time. It will showcase what they can do and how they can cater for these big games, which is a positive," said Tana Umaga.

The family of Blues and All Black lock Patrick Tuipolotu emigrated to New Zealand from Samoa.

They scored five tries to one in a 28-4 romp in front of 50,390 fans on Wednesday night.

Not since Game Three of the 2005 series, the nadir of Queensland's Origin history, has a Maroons team been so humiliated on home soil, NSW scoring inside the final minute of the first half to lead 12-4 at the break and then posting three further tries in the second term to take a 1-0 series lead to Sydney for Game Two on June 21.

Moore is being rested by Queensland after a heavy load this season, coach Nick Stiles said, as the side prepares for the first Super Rugby clash to be played in Samoa.

It's not the first time the captain has been rested this season, left out of the side to face the Kings at Suncorp Stadium in round eight.

Wallabies coach Michael Cheika confirmed Moore would be his Wallabies captain in June, meaning the 33-year-old's workload is far from easing off as the year goes on.

Stiles said Moore's absence was a planned one, a stance he has maintained this season.

The loose forward was helped from the field late in the team's 34-15 win over the Reds in Brisbane, having taken the ball into contact and not got up.

Savea had produced a typically robust and explosive performance, from No.8, in what was a rather atypical match.

Referee Angus Gardner awarded three tries to the Hurricanes - Beauden Barrett in the 24th minute, then Mark Abbott (53rd) and finally TJ Perenara (56th) - only to think better of it after the host broadcaster went through its repertoire of replays.

Trailing 20-7 at halftime after losing three players to injury early at Lang Park, the Crusaders rallied brilliantly to keep the Reds scoreless after the break and maintain their perfect record after three rounds of the season.

The Crusaders were down to 14 men in the 68th minute after loose forward Jordan Taufua was sin-binned for a light punch on Reds lock Rob Simmons but replacement scrumhalf Bryn Hall's second try gave the visitors hope with four minutes to play.

Hunt converted Hall's try to bring the Crusaders within a point and the Reds duly crumbled under pressure.