{"id":11004,"date":"2011-03-16T17:12:20","date_gmt":"2011-03-16T17:12:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/?p=11004"},"modified":"2011-03-16T17:16:32","modified_gmt":"2011-03-16T17:16:32","slug":"ulster-announce-major-new-signing-afoa-auckland-blues-and-all-black-prop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/ulster-announce-major-new-signing-afoa-auckland-blues-and-all-black-prop\/","title":{"rendered":"Ulster Rugby Announce Major New Signing: Afoa: Auckland Blues and All-Black prop!"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ulster Rugby have today revealed details of a major signing, announcing that they have signed Auckland Blues and All-Black prop John Afoa on a two and a half year deal commencing after RWC 2011 in New Zealand.<\/p>\n

A powerful and explosive prop, John (27) has risen through the age-grade ranks to become one of New Zealand\u2019s leading forwards and his signing represents a major coup for Ulster Rugby.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have deliberately looked for high quality, international players in key positions and in John, we believe we\u2019ve got it absolutely right\u201dsaid Ulster\u2019s Director of Rugby David Humphreys<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a hugely talented player, both at set piece and in the loose and he will bring a huge amount of Super Rugby and international experience to Ulster.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since joining the Auckland Blues in 2004, Afoa has made an impressive 86 Super Rugby appearances and in 2005 he became the 1062nd player to represent the All-Blacks when he made his first senior appearance in November against Ireland.
\n\"\"<\/a>
\nAfoa has represented New Zealand at School, U19 and U21 levels. In 2003 he was part of the New Zealand side which won the U21 Rugby World Championship staged in England and was one of four New Zealander\u2019s named in the IRB Team of the Tournament.<\/p>\n

He has made 28 appearances to date for the All-Blacks, most recently against Scotland during the 2010 Autumn International Series and looks certain to be part of the squad for this year\u2019s Rugby World Cup which will be held in his home country.<\/p>\n

Commenting on his move, Afoa said;<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve been part of the Blues\u2019 family for my entire career so far and so, when the opportunity to look at a move came up, I felt that period post World Cup would be the perfect time\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve done my research and can\u2019t help but be impressed at how the Ulster Squad is developing. There\u2019s seems to be a good mix of local and overseas players and I\u2019m very much looking forward to playing my part in that\u201dsaid Afoa<\/p>\n

\u201cI want to challenge myself and the northern hemisphere style of play will certainly offer me that. Most of the players moving north state that the chance to participate in the Heineken Cup as one of the key factors in their decision and the same is true for me, but since the possibility of a move came up I\u2019ve also caught some of the Magners League and that looks like a competition that is going from strength to strength.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom what I hear, the Ulster people seem to have a similar outlook as Kiwis and I\u2019ve been told that I can expect a warm welcome when I arrive in Belfast. I have a young family who will be making the move with me and while the opportunity to experience a new culture and way of life will be a wonderful experience for all of us, it\u2019s nice to know that we won\u2019t feel too far away from home.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ends:\/\/<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ulster Rugby have today revealed details of a major signing, announcing that they have signed Auckland Blues and All-Black prop John Afoa on a two and a half year deal commencing after RWC 2011 in New Zealand. A powerful and explosive prop, John (27) has risen through the age-grade ranks to become one of New […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[4791,4790,4788,4789,4792,17188],"class_list":["post-11004","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ulster-rugby","tag-all-black","tag-auckland-blues","tag-major","tag-new-signing-afoa","tag-prop","tag-ulster-rugby"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11004","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11004"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11004\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11004"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11004"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11004"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}