There was some puzzlement last month when Bristol Bears registered an international player in their European squad who doesn’t play for the club.
Eagle eyed fans spotted Bristol had added Hurricanes lock Kane Leaupepe to their European squad on the ERCR website - sparking understandable rumours the three time Samoan international was set to sign for the Gallagher Premiership club.
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Under EPCR tournament rules, clubs which had qualified for the knockout stages of the Heineken Champions Cup and the Challenge Cup can change up to three players in their European squads.
The registrations of players had to be completed by midday on March 14. At the time Bristol were deep in a mire of second row injury crisis having just beaten Northampton Saints 24-26 and a couple of days away from another bruising encounter with Worcester Warriors.
Bristol had eight players capable of playing second row injured at one point in February with: Sam Jeffries, Ed Holmes, Joe Latta, Joe Joyce, Aly Muldowney John Hawkins, James Dun and Nick Haining, all sidelined.
At the time head coach Pat Lam repeatedly stated if the right player became available he would bring him in.
But Leaupepe’s arrival to BS3 never happened.
In fact the 26-year-old made his Super Rugby debut for New Zealand franchise the Hurricanes’ just last Friday in their 8-32 defeat to the Crusaders.
Bristol Live understand the Bears were ready to pull the trigger on a short term loan deal for the 6ft 6in, 18st 8lb forward, much as they did with hooker Sam Parry from Ospreys, but with their front line players returning to action opted against it.
However at that point the club had already registered him for Europe as a precautionary measure with a quarter-final against La Rochelle on the horizon.
A quarter-final they lost 39-15 on Sunday.
Going into The Clash, the derby game against Bath at Twickenham on Saturday, Lam has Chris Vui, Muldowney, Holmes and Joe Batley available in the second row.
Meanwhile Leaupepe, who plays for Bay of Plenty in the Mitre 10 Cup, has certainly won himself plenty of admirers in the last 12 months partnering Bristol lock Vui in the Samoa second row this autumn on the Pacific Island nation’s tour of the Northern hemisphere.
Speaking about Leaupepe’s impact on the tour back in December national coach Steve Jackson said: "I probably can't understand why he's not playing Super Rugby at the moment and if you were to say put him in the top three of the standout players of the tour then he'd be right up there.
“He played every single minute of every single of the three games and he was absolutely outstanding.”
