Rua Tipoki
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Te Rua Reihana Tipoki (born 11 August 1975 in Te Puia Springs, New Zealand) brought up in Te Araroa in Gisborne, is a rugby union player who has played for North Harbour in the Air New Zealand Cup and for the Auckland Blues in the Super 14. Tipoki currently (As of 2007) plays for the Irish club side Munster. His position is inside centre. Tipoki holds the unique honour of captaining two different Air New Zealand Cup provinces to Ranfurly Shield victories, Bay of Plenty in 2004, and North Harbour in 2006.
He has also played for the Otago Highlanders, New Zealand 7s in 1997, and the New Zealand Maori team which defeated the British & Irish Lions team for the first time ever in the history of Maori rugby in 2005. Has played for his home Union East Coast.
Tipoki is fast becoming a cult hero with Munster and has fashioned one of the best centre partnerships in the Heineken Cup with Lifeimi Mafi. He played in the Munster team whch won the European (Heineken) cup on May 24th, 2008 beating Toulouse 16-13 in the final. He plays with passion and flair, with a strong tackle and a nice step. He has currently scored two Heineken Cup tries and won man of the match in Munster's Thomond Park win over Llanelli Scarlets in this competition. He has also stated that his only complaint since moving to Munster is that he had not done so sooner Rua Tipoki is an fans' favourite in Munster which has led to a site being set-up for him on the social networking site Bebo.
[edit] Foul play
Tipoki has been involved in several well documented – caught on television cameras – incidents of foul play. Both incidents showed him hitting opponents (Jean de Villiers and James Hilgen-dorf) in the head with his elbow. He has the dubious distinction of being handed the longest suspension ever in the Super 14 for the elbow on Hilgendorf during the 2006 Super 14 season.[1]
Rua was the first Super 14 player to get a hat trick of tries, in the first ever new Super 14 competition.
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