Southland co-coach Simon Culhane says the depth of his squad is being tested and the season had not even kicked off yet.
Culhane, who is in his fourth year coaching the Stags with David Henderson, said two months ago there looked to be depth in the side, but broken bones to three players and a nagging toe injury to prop and captain Jamie Mackintosh have led to back-up players being named in the starting side.
Backs James Wilson and Tony Koonwaiyou both have broken legs and are unlikely to play again this season, while No 8 Iona Sipa broke his arm last month but may be available for games near the end of the season.
A date for Mackintosh's return is not yet known, though his toe is improving.
Some Southland pundits are talking up the Stags' chances this year, with an increase in Super 14 players and promising young talent coming through.
But Culhane said such talk was premature and the side had to show some consistency.
Southland has enjoyed a reasonable pre-season, beating Otago 43-36 and North Harbour 22-3, and losing 12-24 to Canterbury.
Culhane, though, is not taking too much from the pre-season, saying the games often produced lopsided results, and it was really the "silly season" before the arrival of the real matches.
The hardest task for the teams would be adjusting to the new experimental law variations (Elvs).
Southland finished sixth last year before losing heavily to Wellington in the quarterfinal.
"Obviously we want to finish better than we did last year. We do just approach it game by game but we want to look at the semifinals," Culhane said.
Southland beat Otago at Carisbrook last year, 26-20, for its first win there in 30 years.
Otago triumphed 15-8 in 2006, the last time the two sides met in Invercargill.
Culhane said co-coaching with former Southland flanker Henderson worked well.
The pair talked through issues and had never had a serious disagreement.
He rejected talk of today's match being a Highlanders trial between two of the three unions in the franchise.
"Glenn [Moore, Highlander coach] will be looking for consistency over the season rather than one game.
"In some ways it's good that this game is first up, as there is quite a lot of tradition around it and a lot of talk so maybe it's good to get it out of the way."
Culhane said a decision on who sits on the bench between John Hardie and Hua Tamariki would be made today, with both loose forwards carrying niggling injuries.
