Australia's ACT Brumbies are looking to their clinical structured play to blot out the Waikato Chiefs for a second straight week today and secure a place in this year's Super 12 final.
If the Brumbies repeat their controlled performance from last week's 15-12 win over the Chiefs in Hamilton they are confident of playing in their fifth final against likely competition nemesis, the Canterbury Crusaders.
The four-time winning Crusaders have home ground advantage and settled preparation for their semifinal today against Western Stormers, who are disadvantaged by having to travel from South Africa to play in Christchurch.
The Brumbies and Crusaders are the form teams of the southern hemisphere provincial competition this season, but must overcome their underdog rivals to lock up another trans-Tasman showdown.
ACT scored two tries in beating the Chiefs last weekend and such was their iron-fisted control that the Kiwis had to rely on penalty goals to prise a bonus point and clinch their first-ever playoff spot.
Brumbies enforcer Owen Finegan says his Canberra-based team owed it to themselves to play their best rugby or risk blowing their third straight finals campaign.
The Brumbies fell to eventual champions Auckland Blues in last year's semis and lost the 2002 final to the Crusaders in Christchurch after carrying off their first Super 12 crown in 2001 against the Coastal Sharks.
The Chiefs, who have been this year's surprise packets with their resolute play, have All Blacks scrumhalf Byron Kelleher back from a thigh injury which kept him out of last week's encounter.
Kelleher is hellbent to prove that Brumbies and Wallaby rival scrumhalf George Gregan does not get under his skin and unsettle him in big matches.
The burly All Black, whose arrival from the Otago Highlanders has played a key role in the Chiefs' reversal of fortunes, believes he has more often been able to upset the chatty Gregan with his aggressive play than the other way around.
Of the 24 Super 12 semis played since 1996, 17 have been won by the home side. The Chiefs' sole triumph from four matches in Canberra came in 1999, 16-13.
Crusaders coach Robbie Deans will use rookies Jamie Nutbrown at half and Ross Filipo at lock, giving the Stormers two untried targets.
Stormers are the underdogs but coach Gert Smal warns they will have more bite this time round.
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