Tamati Tua: Exeter centre’s return to fitness excites Rob Baxter

Exeter Chiefs boss Rob Baxter says he is excited at the prospect of being able to pick centre Tamati Tua.

The 27-year-old joined Exeter in the summer from Super Rugby’s ACT Brumbies, but a neck injury meant he missed all of pre-season and the first block of Premiership games.

The New Zealander finally made his debut in the Premiership Rugby Cup win over Championship side Hartpury earlier this month. Exeter travel to Gloucester on Friday night for their third match in the competition.

Tua’s return will be a boost to Exeter who have been hit by injuries in their midfield this season with Henry Slade and Ben Hammersley also absent for periods of the campaign.

“Watching him at the Brumbies he’s got a good level of physicality carrying through the gain line, reads defensively very well and has a good skill set around carrying and offloading, which you saw a couple of instances of that at the weekend,” Baxter told BBC Sport.

“He’s just a good all-round player. He’s a big athletic guy, so he challenges the opposition in attack and defence and that’s what we want to see.

“We want to see him with ball in hand as much as possible and attacking opposition to give us some start points, but also to create some opportunities as play breaks down a little bit and keep the ball alive.

“I think you’re going to see a lot from him over the rest of this season.”