The New Zealand shearing team of world champions and Hawke's Bay guns John Kirkpatrick and Rowland Smith face seven test matches on a four-week CP Wool tour of the Britain.
The tour by new world champion John Kirkpatrick, of Napier, and 2014 champion Rowland Smith, of Maraekakaho, near Hastings, is part of an annual home-and-away arrangement with a history dating back almost 30 years.
![Rowland Smith, the 2014 World Champion, has been beaten only four times in 30 finals during the latest New Zealand season.](https://www.nzherald.co.nz/resizer/v2/WNXFK5K4BPHRVSD74KNXUW7CLQ.jpg?auth=683b7ca1abf305f17a042be0bfc64e0608e2edbc9ade08966d7c89531a241957&width=16&height=22&quality=70&smart=true)
The manager and touring shearing judge is sheep and beef farmer Johnny Fraser, who operates a small shearing run in North Otago and who managed the New Zealand team in transtasman tests in Australia last October and the Golden Shears in Masterton March.
The tour will open with a single test against Scotland at the Lochearnhead Shears on Saturday (local time), but Scotland could be missing both its world championships team members, 2012 world champion Gavin Mutch and 2014 world teams champions partner Hamish Mitchell, both injured.