Hellier, who has been in the island barely a week, is suitably talented and versatile that he steps in to the 15 shirt for the difficult away trip. But he will handle it, head coach Jordan Reynolds has no doubt. ‘He will bring a little bit of experience and a good skill set,’ said the coach. ‘His versatility will be good for us. (Fitness-wise) it won’t be perfect, but he was playing right up till the end of the New Zealand season, so he’s only had a few weeks off.’

For those Raiders fans who won’t have seen Kenny yet, he will stand out, or so the coach says. ‘He’s got a head of hair on him....he’s got the long locks going on.’

Also set to feature for the first time this season, is new skipper Lewis Hillier.
The big man makes a welcome return from injury in the second row and is one of six changes to the Raiders starting XV from that which beat Chichester last week, including a whole new back three.

Sam Whitehead is out injured, while Dave Davison and Luke Sayer are unavailable.
Those gaps see Gareth Davies and Ben Challinor come in on the wings. ‘We brought Kenny in as a centre really, but he can play centre or fullback and with Ned Brown and Luke Jones being so solid in midfield in our first two games, it would be stupid to change that partnership now. There is no point because Ned and Luke have been creating a good partnership. We don’t have our back three from last week, but we’ve still got a pretty strong backline,' said the coach.

Davies has impressed Reynolds since returning from university, as has ‘Detective’ Challinor when he has not been injured or unavailable through his police work.

Meanwhile, a familiar face is helping out in the pack as Blair Campbell is named at open-side flanker with Dale Martin and Romain Mercadal both out injured. The Frenchman had an operation on his broken hand, but should not be out for too long, great news because he was shaping up so promisingly in pre-season.

The coach expects his returning captain to have a positive impact in the set-piece as well as the loose, ‘Having Lewis back will hopefully help the work-rate around the pitch, but he will also go back to calling our line-outs. This is going to be a massive challenge,’ he said.

‘Westcombe Park have done a lot of damage to both Chichester and Tonbridge Juddians through their forward pack already this season so individuals have the opportunity to step up for us and see if we can get some parity with them there.’

Guernsey Raiders team (1-15)
Steventon, Ceillam, L. Batiste, Hillier, Merrien, Hill, Campbell, M. Thomas, Nixon, O. Thomas, Davies, Brown, Jones, Challinor, Hellier.
Replacements
Collenette, Skovronek and Ahne.