Canty looks to lift game after first win | Canterbury Sport | Surfing, Rugby, Soccer, Football, Cricket in Canterbury

Keen hunter George Whitelock has refs in his sights this week as Canterbury prepare for their first home Air New Zealand Cup match against Waikato on Friday night.

The Canterbury captain wants them to be as sharp-eyed as he is with his rifle in the bush, if his team are to get traction from their opening Air New Zealand Cup win in Auckland.

Canterbury couldn’t get over the Eden Park try line in a first half they dominated, and have scored only two tries in the first two matches.

Against a Waikato team full of All Blacks, they have to be more penetrating.

New All Black Whitelock, whose rugby maturity has earned him the Canterbury captain’s armband at only 23, said the big problem was once a team got a bit of a flow, the opposition was willing to concede penalties as Auckland did.

"Therefore you’ve got to stop, and everyone gets a chance to regroup. That’s reflecting all around the whole competition, the rule change.

"We like to have a wide game and keep it moving, which is not really happening for us at the moment because teams are willing to infringe. So we really want the refs to control that."

However, the players also had to be harder and be more disciplined to keep going and play their game, he said.

Southland ref Keith Brown will be in charge on Friday. Whitelock has been thrilled by the defensive effort in the opening matches.

"The boys have huge hearts, and everyone’s willing to work for each other, which is really great," he said.

However, Canterbury had to have more accuracy in their set piece this week so they could give the backs good ball, he said.

The lineout had some hairy moments in Auckland.

"I think we put pressure on ourselves, to be honest," said Whitelock.

"We’ve got a great lineout, we’ve got locks that can win a lot of ball, so we’ve just got to be patient and back our skill set."

Waikato like Canterbury are one from two, and played an expansive game in their 30-22 win over Whitelock’s home province Manawatu at the weekend.

They bust a lot of Manawatu’s tackles and had big strong carriers, he said.

"So we’ve got to really make sure we drop them straight away.

"Obviously at set pieces they’ll have a crack at us, and they’re big physical loose forwards," he said. "They’ll carry hard and strong. They’ll keep coming for 80 minutes.

"So we’ve just got to bring more of what we’ve got and keep raising the bar, really."

Whitelock said after four weeks away (including two pre-season fixtures), Canterbury couldn’t wait to get back on AMI and put a good performance out.