Manoa Back for Toulon

USA enforcer, Samu Manoa is back for Toulon. The Californian will make his return from injury this evening, facing the Argentina XV in Tucumán. Manoa has been named as a replacement for the fixture to be played at Tucumán Lawn Tennis Club in Northern Argentina.

Injury to the 32-year-old saw him missing out on playing in the June Internationals. This included the Rugby World Cup qualifiers against Canada. The Eagles made history by qualifying as Americas 1, over Canada.

With Manoa back to fitness both Toulon and the USA are set to benefit tremendously. Toulon is looking to bounce back from a disappointing 2016-2017 season by pushing for titles in the Top 14 and Champions Cup. The USA is looking to win test matches away to Germany and Georgia.

Manoa’s most recent cap came against Tonga in November 2016. He also faced Romania that month but missed out on the June Internationals. His prior cap was against Japan in Rugby World Cup 2015. He played in all four of the Eagles’ matches starting all games at No 8. This including captaining his country against South Africa.

TOULON
1 Laurent Delboulbes, 2 Anthony Etrillard, 3 Emerick Setiano, 4 Swan Rebbadj, 5 Mamuka Gorgodze, 6 Facundo Isa, 7 Raphaël Lakafia, 8 Jean Monribot, 9 Eric Escande, 10 Anthony Belleau, 11 Chris Ashton, 12 JP Pietersen, 13 Mathieu Bastareaud, 14 Eneriko Buliruarua, 15 Hugo Bonneval

Replacements: 16 Bastien Soury, 17 Thomas Vernet, 18 Corentin Vernet, 19 Jocelino Suta, 20 Sébastien Tillous-Borde, 21 Anthony Meric, 22 Levan Chilachava, 23 Samu Manoa, 24 Florian Fresia, 25 Marcel van der Merwe