Sivivatu given time out by Waikato

The Waikato NPC rugby team have given wing Sitiveni Sivivatu time off to get himself right, while welcoming back another All Black in Marty Holah.

Waikato will not name their team to play first division leaders Auckland on Saturday night until tomorrow.

Sivivatu, a sensation for the All Blacks this year before he was sidelined by a knee injury, has been told to take as much time as he needs to get himself right and get his confidence back.

"He's tried for the last two weeks to get back ...." Waikato coach Warren Gatland said..

"To be fair to him we haven't put any pressure on him to do that but he's tried to do it himself and he's not right so we're just going to give him time to get back in the gym a bit, get a bit of confidence back in his body and hopefully he will then be right for us."

Holah's return from international duty will be welcomed by the team and player himself. Holah has not started a match since featuring for New Zealand Maori in their win over the touring Lions in June.

Gatland said his Waikato side were still working out why they missed so many tackles in the 17-41 loss to Wellington last Friday but the team had found plenty of positives to take out of the rest of their performance.

"We looked at the video and while the scoreline says we were really poor and well beaten, apart from some disappointing first-up tackles which we have addressed this week, statistically in territory and possession it was pretty even and there were lots of good things," Gatland said.

"So we've really concentrated on the positives to work on -- keeping our shape and just making sure that defensively we're right."

With a tough series of games ahead against Auckland, Canterbury and North Harbour, all away from home, Gatland said they had to be more accurate this week and have more confidence in keeping hold of the ball and taking all the scoring opportunities that arose.

- nzpa