Rugby New York added Waisake Naholo for the remainder of the 2022 Major League Rugby season. The 30-year-old wing (31 at the end of May) is 6’2″ and 231 lbs.
Waisake is from Sigatoka, Fiji, but moved to New Zealand where he played senior rugby with Wanganui in the 2009 Heartland Championship. He played with Taranaki in the Ranfurly Shield and the ITM Cup (latter Mitre 10 Cup), and with New Zealand Under-20s in the IRB Junior World Championship in 2011. In 2012-2013 he played in 9 World Sevens Series tournaments for the New Zealand 7s, making his debut at the Wellington Sevens, and also played in the 2013 Rugby World Cup 7s, with the All Blacks 7s winning the championship.
In 2013 he played two matches with the Super Rugby Blues and then switched to the Highlanders, where he played 62 matches for the team from 2015 through 2019 and was the leading try-scorer with 45 tries.
Waisake made his All Blacks XVs debut against Argentina on 17 July 2015 and played 2 matches in the 2015 Rugby World Cup. The last of his 26 caps (24 starts) was against Italy on 24 November 2018. He was a prolific try-scorer with 16 tries.
Waisake also played with the Barbarians, the London Irish in the English Premiership in 2020, Canterbury in 2021, and was on the Crusaders 2022 pre-season training squad, but was not contracted and signed by Rugby New York.
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