All Blacks captain-in-waiting Kieran Read should be leading the Crusaders into battle and stamping his mark on the post-Richie McCaw era instead of missing the opening rounds.
Unless Read has issues relating to his history of concussion, there is no excuse for him missing the opening to the 2016 Super Rugby season.
It's time for New Zealand administrators and players to give something below the All Black obsession a chance to breathe again. The Read no-show sends out a depressingly bad message. And if he does have to miss any matches, they should not be ones against New Zealand opponents, games that draw the main attention.
Yet the rugby public is so conditioned to the pre-programmed resting nonsense and Super Rugby so discredited as a genuine professional competition that Read's voluntary absence from the first two rounds has hardly raised a ripple.